The first time I experimented with this idea (see The Archer), I only saw a figure in the photos when reviewing them. This time, I set out to find characters and scenes in the abstract shapes of microscopic broken glass, and within an hour of painstakingly moving my slide a hair's width at a time by hand, I stumbled across a greater image than I could have hoped for.

I see a figure standing in a graveyard with their head bowed. The colors in the background, refracted in various ways through the surrounding unfocused glass, give each photo a distinct feeling, though the meaning is up to interpretation. To me, the series depicts a figure experiencing a storm of different emotions represented by the wide range of colors. While most of the photos have intense, abstract swirls of color, some appear to have more literal depictions of storms, especially images 1, 3, and 5 that look to me like lightning, dark rain clouds, and a desert sandstorm scene.

Because of the 40x magnification in this 1/8 inch by 1/8 inch area of broken glass, and how drastically the focus can change with so little adjustment, I may never find this spot on the broken slide again. Even if I can, the light also changes at such a small scale that none of these images will ever be recreated. Instead of mourning that, I'm going to spend more time on this tiny patch of glass to see what else I can find. I have my microscope out of storage now, so there's more coming very soon!

Every photo in this series was shot on an iPhone, and is completely unedited aside from a little cropping to center the viewing area.