Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, March 28, 1994 TAG: 9403290004
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: 6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BY BILL COCHRAN OUTDOOR EDITOR
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
That was a bit of bad news on a spring day that appeared to offer nothing but brightness. Cramer likes to use his gray van as a mobile blind, poking the cannon-size telephoto lens of his camera out the window on a special bracket.
He is a wildlife photographer whose pictures have appeared in a number of books and magazines, not to mention on the walls of offices and homes. When Falcon Press recently needed illustrations for its Virginia Wildlife Viewing Guide, it went through hundreds of Cramer's offerings. The soon-to-be-published book is part of a national series designed to showcase some of the best areas to watch wildlife.
Wildlife watching is one of the fastest growing outdoor sports - but at the Roanoke Sewage Treatment Plant?
While this piece of bottom land, with its series of lagoons along the Roanoke River, isn't exactly the kind of place most people go to spread a picnic, it is an excellent area for viewing a wide variety of birds and butterflies. It is so popular with members of the Roanoke Valley Bird Club that they succinctly call it the STP and treasure it as a close-in place where you can throw your cares to the wind for a couple of hours, preferably upwind.
``It is attractive to us because it is attractive to the birds,'' said Cramer, who lives in Vinton. ``Migrating shorebirds and some waterfowl find this place and they must tell their friends because sometimes they show up in great numbers. They can wade out there and find something, I'm not certain what.''
Well, for one thing, they find diversity, a sanctuary to rest, to wade, to feed, where the whiteness of a gull tends to be rather brilliant against the gray soup called sludge. You never know when something really special might stop off, something to share at the monthly meeting of the bird club, or sooner. Cramer checks a Roanoke Valley Bird Club message box next to one of the lagoons and learns that a fellow birder recently spotted an Iceland gull. It is believed to be the first of its kind observed and cataloged in the region.
Cramer expresses mild concern over the new travel restriction, something he views as just another erosion of freedom, gradual but certain.
This parallels some thoughts he had earlier in the morning, at his studio on Third Street, about how wildlife habitat also is being nibbled away by the mice of time, a loss of a piece of wetlands here, a grove of trees there, a nesting area yonder.
When Cramer mentions this he isn't just discussing faraway Audubon issues, such as the burning of the rain forest or the cutting of old-growth timber or the draining of the Everglades.
Wildlife, for him, can be a backyard thing.
``I don't know many other places that have the diversity that we do,'' he said. ``We don't have Yosemite or the Grand Canyon. Our beauty is on a somewhat smaller scale.
``But I think we are fortunate to live in a city this size where your basic needs are pretty well covered, and still you can get in your car or on your bicycle or walk and in a few minutes you can be in near wilderness. You can be seeing wildlife, you can be seeing unspoiled views, you can be catching fish, you can be away from the maddening crowd.''
Cramer uses his camera, his paint brush, his carving knife as conservation education tools to capture and display what is special, even rare, about familiar, nearby places. When people connect with nature, by viewing a bluebird or raccoon or falcon, he said, they are better equipped to recognize that a bit of green space on a map has value beyond being the potential pathway of an interstate, that a stream in an urban area isn't just a flood waiting to happen, but a refuge for warblers, a migration route of black ducks.
When you benefit wildlife, you are benefiting humankind, he said.
``I am no great spokesperson for the cause, but it has become apparent to me that so many people live in isolation and are never exposed to the outdoors. I try through this medium, besides making a living, to get people's attention a little bit and get them to appreciate what we have and how fragile it is, how easy it is to let it get away.''
Cramer's real job is a one-man business called Cramer Graphics, which specializes in commercial art used in the advertising business.
``I am not making a living selling wildlife pictures; very few people are. I still do my commercial design art illustrations to support my habit of going out with the big lens and trying to take wildlife pictures.''
Since 1975, he has enjoyed being an instructor and will teach an outdoor and nature photography workshop at Ocracoke, N.C., in early May, but it is becoming increasingly difficult to lure people to such classes, he said.
``I think it is the automatic point-and-shoot cameras now that make people say, `Why should I pay a couple hundred bucks to go learn to take pictures?'
``You have a light meter that averages exposure, you have a focus meter that averages focus, and you get an average picture. What I try to do is teach people why things work, what happens to light coming through a tube. Once they know that they can take the same camera and do a better job with it. They can override some of the automatic features. They can make a picture that is better than average, and occasionally - what we all try to get - take a great picture.''
His best picture?
``Whatever I am trying to take at the time.''
Which happens to be a wild turkey gobbler that has been coming to his blind too early these March mornings, before there is suitable light for his telephoto lens to capture the sheen of chestnut feathers, the crimson of an engorged neck.
``The greatest frustration of all is time.''
There's never enough of it.
|BY BILL COCHRAN| |OUTDOOR EDITOR|
Fred Cramer pulled into the Roanoke Sewage Treatment Plant one day last week, stopping by the office, like the sign on the gate tells visitors to do, and learning that he no longer could drive around in the facility as freely as he had in the past.
That was a bit of bad news on a spring day that appeared to offer nothing but brightness. Cramer likes to use his gray van as a mobile blind, poking the cannon-size telephoto lens of his camera out the window on a special bracket.
He is a wildlife photographer whose pictures have appeared in a number of books and magazines, not to mention on the walls of offices and homes. When Falcon Press recently needed illustrations for its Virginia Wildlife Viewing Guide, it went through hundreds of Cramer's offerings. The soon-to-be-published book is part of a national series designed to showcase some of the best areas to watch wildlife.
Wildlife watching is one of the fastest growing outdoor sports, but at the Roanoke Sewage Treatment Plant?
While this piece of bottom land, with its series of lagoons along the Roanoke River, isn't exactly the kind of place most people go to spread a picnic, it is an excellent area for viewing a wide variety of birds and butterflies. It is so popular with members of the Roanoke Valley Bird Club that they succinctly call it the STP and treasure it as a close-in place where you can throw your cares to their wind for a couple of hours, preferably upwind.
``It is attractive to us because it is attractive to the birds,'' said Cramer, who lives in Vinton. ``Migrating shorebirds and some waterfowl find this place and they must tell their friends because sometimes they show up in great numbers. They can wade out there and find something, I'm not certain what.''
Well, for one thing, they find diversity, a sanctuary to rest, to wade, to feed, where the whiteness of a gull tends to be rather brilliant against the gray soup called sludge. You never know when something really special might stop off, something to share at the monthly meeting of the bird club, or sooner. Cramer checks a Roanoke Valley Bird Club message box next to one of the lagoons and learns that a fellow birder recently has spotted an Iceland gull. It is believed to be the first of its kind observed and cataloged in the region.
Cramer expresses mild concern over the new travel restriction, something he views as just another erosion of freedom, gradual but certain.
This parallels some thoughts he had earlier in morning, at his studio on Third Street, about how wildlife habitat also is being nibbled away by the mice of time, a loss of a piece of wetlands here, a grove of trees there, a nesting area yonder.
When Cramer mentions this he isn't just discussing far away Audubon issues, like the burning of the rain forest or the cutting of old growth timber or the draining of the Everglades.
Wildlife, for him, can be a backyard thing.
``I don't know many other places that have the diversity that we do,'' he said. ``We don't have Yosemite or the Grand Canyon. Our beauty is on a somewhat smaller scale.
``But I think we are fortunate to live in a city this size where your basic needs are pretty well covered, and still you can get in your car or on your bicycle or walk and in a few minutes you can be in near wilderness. You can be seeing wildlife, you can be seeing unspoiled views, you can be catching fish, you can be away from the maddening crowd.''
Cramer uses his camera, his pain brush, his carving knife as conservation education tools to capture and display what is special, even rare, about familiar, nearby places. When people connect with nature, by viewing a bluebird or raccoon or falcon, he said, they are better equipped to recognize that a bit of green space on a map has value beyond being the potential pathway of an interstate, that a stream in a urban area isn't just a flood waiting to happen, but a refuge for warblers, a migration route of black ducks.
When you benefit wildlife, you are benefiting humankind, he said.
``I am no great spokes person for the cause, but it has become apparent to me that so many people live in isolation and are never exposed to the outdoors. I try through this medium, besides making a living, to get people's attention a little bit and get them to appreciate what we have and how fragile it is, how easy it is to let it get away.''
Cramer's real job is a one-man business called Cramer Graphics, which specialized in commercial art used in the advertising business.
``I am not making a living selling wildlife pictures; very few people are. I still do my commercial design art illustrations to support my habit of going out with the big lens and trying to take wildlife pictures.''
Since 1975, he has enjoyed being an instructor and will teach an outdoor and nature photography workshop at Ocracoke, N.C. in early May, but it is becoming increasingly difficult to lure people to such classes, he said.
``I think it is the automatic point-and-shoot cameras now that make people say, `Why should I pay a couple hundred bucks to go learn to take pictures?'
``You have a light meter that averages exposure, you have a focus meter that averages focus, and you get an average picture. What I try to do is teach people why things work, what happens to light coming through a tube. Once they know that they can take the same camera and do a better job with it. They can override some of the automatic features. They can make a picture that is better than average, and occasionally - what we all try to get - take a great picture.''
His best picture?
``What ever I am trying to take at the time.''
Which happens to be a wild turkey gobbler that has been coming to his blind too early these March mornings, before there is suitable light for his telephoto lens to capture the sheen of chestnut feathers, the crimson of an engorged neck.
``The greatest frustration of all is time.''
There's never enough of it.
by CNB