Pearl Hunter

Dedicated for =Behana who had her birthday few days ago..

I would say, this image is proof for me - I still can do it. I had already given up hope that I won't be able to make no manips anymore and the reasons what made me run here and start manips two years ago have gone - no it is not. It is still with me and I won't give up. And maybe this is the message of the image - not to give up.

Pearl hunting has been a dangeorus profession for centuries. In past, the only way to get to those wonderful pearls was to dive into the depth - with one breath over 100 m. I could not even imagine it. It was a dangerous profession and they could lose it all, including their life, while trying to get those treasures from the underwater world.

And somewhere while making this piece I was realizing I am back for the Nemo theme. It was on "20 000 Leagues Under Water" where Nemo while taking walk on his forest saw the pearl hunter. The man had come early before the season in order to get his share of the treasure as most of those hunters worked for people who take the pearls and leave them very little.

I just feel that I have to quote you little of thie book:

It was a man, a living man, a black Indian fisherman, a poor devil who no doubt had come to gather what he could before harvest time. I saw the bottom of his dinghy, moored a few feet above his head. He would dive and go back up in quick succession. A stone cut in the shape of a sugar loaf, which he gripped between his feet while a rope connected it to his boat, served to lower him more quickly to the ocean floor. This was the extent of his equipment. Arriving on the seafloor at a depth of about five meters, he fell to his knees and stuffed his sack with shellfish gathered at random. Then he went back up, emptied his sack, pulled up his stone, and started all over again, the whole process lasting only thirty seconds.

This diver didn’t see us. A shadow cast by our crag hid us from his view. And besides, how could this poor Indian ever have guessed that human beings, creatures like himself, were near him under the waters, eavesdropping on his movements, not missing a single detail of his fishing!

So he went up and down several times. He gathered only about ten shellfish per dive, because he had to tear them from the banks where each clung with its tough mass of filaments. And how many of these oysters for which he risked his life would have no pearl in them!

And this is also the way with life.. We try to do things we think are right and what we need to do but we never know what comes out and if we get anything at all. In some way we all are pearl hunters from day to day, trying to get that shining and worthy item, diving our selves into black water we wish we did not and we can never be sure of the outcome. But what matters is that we have faith and hope and we try our best to catch the light we see at the end of the tunnel and do not give. This is the power of hope and power of dreams.. and dream of this pearl hunter...

So, this is something totally different for me and I was sure that I will never be able to make a mermaid but quess what - here it is.

When I had just joined DA I read from someone's journal that every photomanipulator has to have at least one mermaid on their gallery.. Now I have fulfilled that.

I most say the idea for this image came on May or in June before going to country and if blame anyone, then one episode of "Seconds From Disaster". I never saw that episode but the beginning sequence where they tell what is going to happen - and there was a plain crashing trough the ice and shot from below ice and it was visually very impressive and so I thought.. I could make a piece where someone is coming trough the ice, braking it, there is light rays from above and the someone is reaching for the golden key.


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