Notes To My Mother

  Dallas Creek Road I have not spent enough time in Colorado.  It has such amazing beauty.  The one place I did spend some time was in the San Juan Mountains.  I was there about 10 days, first with a group of photographers and then with my wife, Jan.  The scene above is on Dallas Creek Road.  I had been there a few days earlier with the group of photographers but the sky was boring and the snow was missing.  One morning, after the photographers had left Jan and I were staying in Ouray.  It snowed! I was up before dawn and headed for this location.  In the dark I missed the turn off and did a bit of frantic wandering until I finally found the road.  I knew this location with fall color, snow on the mountains and a dramatic cloudy sky could be an exceptional scene to photograph.  That is Mt Sneffles in the background and Dallas Creek in the foreground right.     This is a closer look at the scene on the left of the prev...

Lagoon at Sandy Beach, Acadia. Five images wide When you have a scene you would like to photograph that is wider than you can capture in one image it may be an opportunity to do a panorama. Once you start shooting pano’s you may begin seeing opportunities to shoot them that would have passed right by you. The image above is of Sandy Beach in Acadia National Park. On this particular day it was raining and I have my camera covered with a rain sleeve. I am standing with the ocean to my back. Lagoon & Glacier, Iceland. 7 images wide Tip Number One: Overshoot the Scene The first thing to determine is what part of the scene do you want to include. You need to decide where the image will start and stop on the left and the right. Along with this you want to decide where the upper and lower limits will be. Once decided, overshoot. In other words, start farther to the left and end farther to the right than the area that will be in your final image. Likewise, ca...

In the northwest corner of the State of California there is a little town called Trinidad. It is a sweet little place perched on a hillside overlooking the Pacific Ocean. A short squat red and white lighthouse next to the road on the southern edge of the town looks over the boats moored far below by the pier that juts out into a protected cove. The view from here is toward the south and it is expansive. Venturing around the town to the northwest side you will find a sweet little beach with some very nice views. The easiest way to access this beach is through Trinidad Beach State Park where you can easily access a trail that winds back and forth down to the beach. As with so many sites I visit I first discovered this one on the internet where I found an exquisite image taken by Patrick Smith. It was a time delayed shot taken with the aide of a ten-stop neutral density filter and the colors and textures were wonderful. I wanted the experience of shooting a similar shot, so on my w...

Why “Notes to My Mother”? My mother was the one person in my life who was always interested in what I was doing, what I had to say, who I was. She was never too busy to listen and take an interest. Never critical, always accepting. Even when I was wrong or misguided, there would still be a gentle interested listener present. Though she has been gone over 6 years, I still get the urge to write or call her, to share an image I am proud of or share my latest adventure to some beautiful place. I know she would love to hear about it. My mother was an artist. She painted most of her life, right up to her passing at the age of 96. When I was 4 years old we lived on the east side of the Sierra Nevada Range. She would take me out to paint with her - she with her easel, me with mine - and we would sit together creating our art. While I gave up on the medium she kept at it. Then, in the year she passed I picked up a digital camera and began my adventure into the world of landscape ph...