Sometimes, a small moment can change the direction of your entire life.
This photograph was taken in the summer of 1985, when I was a music major taking a few photography classes on the side. The year before, U2 had released The Unforgettable Fire. The photograph on the album cover stopped me in my tracks. I was obsessed.
When I showed the album cover to my photography professor, I asked the question only a curious but clueless college student could ask: “How'd they do that?”
The answer was infrared black-and-white film. Of course, I had to try it.
That summer, I went home to Nampa, Idaho. The days were long and nights short, filled with family dinners, old high school friends, and our Old English Sheepdog, Gretchen, who looked just plain wrong sporting her summer buzz cut.
One morning, Gretchen and I jumped in my truck and headed into the Owyhee Mountains, bound for the ghost town of Silver City.
The drive back down the mountains was wonderful. A wide-open sky stretched over the high desert, and the landscape opened out below me. The Snake River wound through the plains in the distance, carving its way through the dust. I remember thinking how beautiful it was.
I stopped the truck, jumped out, and began photographing the landscape with infrared film loaded in my camera. Gretchen hopped out and wandered around while I worked.
Then, just as I was halfway through the roll, she wandered into the frame and stood there, looking out over the vista.
I took the shot.
About a month later, back at school, I developed the film. When I saw that shot on the proof sheet, that was it. My days as a music major were over.