I spend a lot of time in Big Bend National Park and enjoy walking around in the desert. I think there's a lot of beauty there, and not just in the majestic vistas and remarkable time-sculpted rock formations. There is also a lot of beauty to be found on a smaller scale. Individual exotic plants and small eccentric creatures are easy to overlook because the desert presents them subtley, almost always in muted earthtones (and covered by a layer of dust). So I thought I'd try to accentuate that beauty by setting color images against monochromatic backgrounds. I eventually settled on sepia backgrounds because it evokes historic associations with the Wild West while echoing the principle color of the desert – brown.

I liked the effect and started using it on other images, including a series on religious icons. Sometimes the juxtiposition of color and sepia can reveal a story or idea not immediately evident in a full-color image. And sometimes it just looks cool. A few images here are repeated elsewhere in this site.