I would say this is one of the shots I paid most dearly for. I had driven several times to the Harrison-Crawford State Forest in Indiana, which stretches along the Blue River. The lot sits beside the road that travels on to the O’Bannon Woods State Park on the Ohio River—aside from park visitors and the local traffic of a few homes, it’s an isolated place. No wonder my car was broken into while I was down at the dry creek getting this shot. When I returned, I found my driver side window smashed in—same as the van parked beside my Prius—and my lunch pack stolen. What wasn’t touched, miraculously, was the camera case in the hatchback, with all of my lenses and gear. It was worth it, I suppose (I was only inconvenienced by a lot of glass on the driver’s seat, which a park custodian helped me to vacuum, and a drive home on the interstate on a sunny day without a window). I’d tried this shot a number of times, and it was a difficult one—essentially, it is a macro shot, which made focusing all the more difficult, especially with the 4x5 pointed straight down with a very heavy Nikon 210mm macro lens! But this shot, accentuated by the ice, is the one I chose to work with. It required some contrast masking to get those pebbles to really stand out in the shadow. The film is Kodak TMAX 100. It always makes me think of a bird.