Spider Rock
Spider Rock is in the middle of Canyon de Chelly National Monument near Chinle, Arizona in the Navajo Nation. The spire stands 750 feet above the floor of the canyon. According to native lore, it is the home of Spider Woman one of the most honoured deities of the Dine (Navajo People).
The day that we were there, a sand storm was blowing through. We were told that it was the remnants of a hurricane that had moved up from Mexico but lost all of it’s moisture on the way. The winds gusted up to 50 miles per hour, making camera stabilization a priority. I braced my tripod against the guard rail for maximum rigidity.
In the best light…
Rundle Reflection
Instead of going for the usual grand landscape with the mountain and the sky, I concentrated on the reflection in Vermillion Lakes in Banff National Park. I liked the way that the cloud hung in the sky and was mirrored in the still water. The bit of color from the sunrise accents the triangles formed by the upside down peaks.
In the best light…
Bad Weather, No Problem
A little fog and rain and snow never hurt anyone, and it can improve your photography.
Near Bow Falls
This is one of my favorite images from my morning in Banff National Park with Dave Brosha and Stephen DesRoches.
The Big Giant Head
Wonderland is the actual name of the sculpture, but a 12 metre tall wire mesh head sculpture, what else could you call it other than the Big Giant Head. If you were ever a fan of the TV series Third Rock From The Sun, you can’t get the Big Giant Head out of your mind.
Zooming Around Town
As Pablo Picasso supposedly once said “Good artist copy, great artists steal”. I met my friends Peter Carroll and Royce Howland out on a hill above downtown Calgary for some night shooting this past weekend. Peter was trying some zooming shots, and so I thought that I might give it a go as well.
Hill Shadows
I love that there are days that I can leave the house, drive a few miles and see the mountains. The slanting afternoon light is just skimming the edge of the hills. I don’t know if I’m 100% sure that I like this image. There seems to be a lot going on in the frame. The fence line moves your eye across the picture, but the cross fence also grabs your attention. I like the mountain silhouette, it might be anchored by the small grove of trees mid-frame. Do you think that this image holds together?
In the best light…
Lakeside Wander
The only thing that I like about winter road closures, if they occur during daylight hours, I can get out and take pictures.
Bow Valley In Black And White
Bad weather makes for more interesting images. The first image is looking west, up the Bow Valley with the Lafarge cement plant’s plume of smoke rising in the fairly calm air. (calm air, how unusual)
Snow On The Mountains
These aren’t so much mountains but hills along the South Thompson River. The actual mountains are not that far away.
Cloud Peaks
In this image, I was going for some simplicity. I wanted to create a bit of a sombre mood. It’s a bit of an anonymous location, so mood is important. With the warm light accenting the deep shadows on the mountains and the mottled dark grey of the clouds hanging overhead. Adobe Lightroom and Nik Color Efex Pro 4’s Tonal Contrast were called to duty for this image to bring out more detail in the clouds.
In the best light…
Sunset Barn
Well, we have no shortage of prairie winter scenes in this area, it’s just a matter of bundling up and getting out to shoot! This image is a bit of a twofer, I managed to get a little strip of the front range of the Rocky Mountains in at the horizon. This started as a 4 frame HDR image. I dropped the +2 of the 5 frame bracket because there was no detail left in the image. After HDR Efex Pro 2, it went into Color Efex Pro 4 and Viveza 2 for further massaging. The point of all of the post processing was to create an image that resembled what I saw in my mind’s eye when I shot the original images. This is what Ansel Adams used to call “previsualization”. I wanted to keep some light on the side of the building to show some detail, leaving the front to go darker.
In the best light…
Shoot What’s There
Well you know that I’m probably not going to be shooting white sand beaches with palm trees in Canada in January. So, I shoot the white snow fields of the Alberta prairies where I live. We left the warmth of our house on New Year’s Day to do my first outing of the brand new year. We returned to a location that I’ve recorded images from before, where we had permission from the farmer to photograph on his property.
I used 4 frames of a 5 frame bracket. I thought the +2.0 exposure had so little detail that it would be not much use. After processing the frames in HDR Efex Pro 2, I left Adobe Lightroom again to adjust the foreground in Nik Viveza 2.
Nikon D300s, Nikkor 24-70mm, @24mm, f/11.0, ISO 200.
In the best light…
Where To Go For Great Pictures
For the cheapest photo trip try your back yard. If you live in an apartment, check out the grounds and nearby parks.
Prairie Winter Sunset
For my last blog post of the year I thought I’d present to you the view from about 2 miles from my door. My wife Sherri and I headed out before sunset to see what would develop. It turned out to be not as dramatic as I had hoped but never the less, fairly spectacular.
I shot this with 2 frames from my Nikkor 12-24mm using a Singh-Ray 3 stop hard graduated neutral density filter. I actually shot two 3 frame brackets but liked the density of the meter 0 exposure. Then I converted the RAW files into TIFFs and stitched the two with Panorama Maker. Final finishing touches were done in Adobe Lightroom, keeping the overall blue tone of the image while trying to keep the snow whitish.
Wishing you another year of great shooting!
In the best light…
Castle And Bow Winter
Sometime the light is just sweet and all you have to do is frame the image and press the shutter. I rarely post right out of the camera and I used Tonal Contrast from Nik Color Efex Pro 4 but little else was done to the file. Enjoy !
In the best light…
Best Twelve Of 2012
As usual, I’m ending this year with a roundup of what I consider to be my best images of the year.
February starts our little trip down memory lane with a day trip to Canmore. We stopped on our way out and back at the McDougall Church near Morley, Alberta.
Winter Trees
Another of my images that look black and white, but were not converted to monochrome. The snow was lightly falling and covered the branches of all of the trees in a dusting of flakes. I lightened the exposure in Color Efex Pro 4 using High Key. I wanted to make the snow look whiter, rather than the mid grey the exposure meter suggested.
In the best light…
Winter In The City
Winter seems to have made it’s way in to town and is making the streets cold and icy. I composed this image while waiting to load a while back. I think that is shows the effects of winter on an industrial area in a city.
In the best light…
Sawback Fog
A shaft of light burned through the fog on the Sawback Range in Banff National Park. It lit up the folds and crevasses on the rocky peak.
Does It Have To Be Sharp?
Normally, I’m a sharpness freak. I like to see crisp edges to objects in my images, everything tack sharp. Once in a while there comes an image like this one. I wasn’t as steady as I thought I was, or the focus was off, but still liked the composition. So I added Glamour Glow for an even softer look with Nik Software’s Color Efex Pro 4. The rustic frame also comes from CFxP4, and contributes to the mellow mood. When the subject is unclear, sometimes it simplifies the message. The image is no longer about the specific location or tree or sunset. To me it infers that it could be any location or tree or sunset. It also suggests possibilities, like “What’s over the horizon?”.
In the best light…
Prairie Skies
The cottony wisps of puffy white clouds has always held an allure for me. Growing up in a rural area, I played under an expansive sky as a young boy.
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