In terms of the kind of photos Jodi Arlt typically captures, they are not of owls. “I’m not experienced at all,” she says. “I mostly do sports photography of my kids.”
And yet, she captured “I’m Watching You…,” a photo that Arlt describes as a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
“I work from home as a production support manager for a bank, and there’s a big window looking out onto my backyard and some protected wetlands. I was on a conference call when, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a blur, and there was this big owl perched right there,” she says. “I grabbed my camera, which sits in my office with me, and set it to burst mode for 30 seconds. Just as quickly as it appeared, the owl was gone. I’ve never seen anything like it since.”
Arlt rarely takes photos of nature, so she didn’t recognize the striking characteristic of her photo at first. When her sister saw the photo, she urged Arlt to submit it to Plymouth Magazine. “I don’t think of [photography] as art. I just like to capture cool things when I see them.”
Arlt is slowly taking more photos of nature, and hopes to take seasonal photos that she can frame and swap on her walls as the months go on. “I just have to remember to bring my camera with me when I go out,” she says.
