Preparing

Yesterday my friend Deigh sent me a link to a website featuring long exposure, black and white photography.  He’s good at pointing me (and others) to places I would miss if left to my own devices.  I’m fairly sure that the opening image on the site, a shot from Iceland, was a lot of the incentive to share the site with me. He also knows that I love this type of image… glassy water surfaces, clouds in motion, high contrast.  Since we are on our way to Iceland soon I am trying to figure out what camera gear to take if my hopes, perhaps too high, are to come back with shots that show the stark beauty of Iceland that I’ve seen so many times in others’ photos.  It isn’t necessarily easy for me to reach these decisions.

Some thoughts so far:

• We will be day hiking anywhere from 2-8 hours.  My gear, including a small laptop, will be on my back.  Weight matters.
• We will be in Iceland in July when the sun stays out most of the day.  No northern lights this trip.
• We can expect wind.  Traditional advice is to take a heavy tripod if you want to get long exposure images.  I admit to being totally on the fence about what tripod to take but bought a little Siuri carbon fiber tripod and ball head with hopes that it will make do.  Initial tests say that I’m dreaming but I have not given up on it yet.
• Waterfalls everywhere.  My hope is to come back with image files that can be made into something other than postcards.  I’m operating on the assumption that we will be able to have time to actually linger at some locations rather than just hike through. I’m studying famous waterfalls in Iceland so I can be somewhat prepared for compositions that I can avoid due to their popularity (ease?). Time will tell.

The gear so far:

• D700 without the add-on battery pack.
• Nikon 28-300 f/3.5-5.6 lens (same one that went to India)
• Nikon 20 mm f/2.8 lens
• 2 and 3 stop graduated neutral density filters with 77mm adapter and holder
• 8 stop variable neutral density filter
• cable release
• diGPS camera unit
• CF cards (1-16 gb, 4 -8gb)
• Toshiba Ultrabook laptop with Lightroom 4
• Card reader
• 2 Western Digital Passport 500 gb external hard disks
• Siuri T1250SX carbon fiber tripod
• Siuri ballhead
• Lowepro Photo Sport 200AW back pack (love it)

My biggest concern is tripod stability and shake due to the anticipated winds and my generally crappy technique.  So I’m training myself to the degree that I can.  Today I ventured down to the Portland waterfront to see if I could get a sharp photo from the gear if I expose for 20-30 seconds or more.  Joints on the tripod tight?  Check.  Cable release? Check.  Mirror lock up?  Check.

It’s a start.  I’m thinking that another neutral density filter may be needed to get the real sense of cloud movement (and water) that I want.  My friend Eric uses a 10 stop filter to great effect.  The image from Iceland that Deigh pointed me to was made with a 13 stop neutral density filter in place.  Filters are light but not cheap.  I’ll keep experimenting and hope to land in Iceland with a lot more confidence than I have now.

A quick Gorge hike

When we visit Iceland in a few weeks I anticipate taking many photos of waterfalls… the country is famous for its outrageous abundance of falls.  I also expect to visit falls when the light is harsh and not really the best for photography.  To prepare ourselves and my photo skills we hiked up Eagle Creek in the Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area today.  It was a short hike and we got to Metlako Falls (~100 feet high) as the light was starting to bath the western canyon walls. No cloud cover to diffuse the light but at least the sun was not directly on the water. We stopped long enough to take a few shots of this iconic Gorge falls before heading on to Punchbowl Falls.  As always, you can click on the image to see a larger version.

A short distance upstream from Meglako Falls is a true Gorge icon… Punchbowl Falls.  I’d been to the falls before but have always turned away since to view the falls in a grand fashion requires wading and I’d not been prepared for that in the past.  Today I found that someone(s) had constructed a small, 1 rock wide, path out into the stream to allow dry foot access to a view.  While this is not necessarily the best view it did allow me to dance around a bit and set up a shot.  Again, we got there just before the light would have made the shot way to contrasty to succeed.

I visited with another photographer who I assume was a visitor to our area.  He had expected there to be a trail down to this waterfall.  He had attached his polarizer and was moving out onto the rock path as I turned around to join Dianne for the hike back out to our car.

This was a classic, beautiful day in the Portland metro area and the trail into the Falls was pretty heavily populated by a variety of hikers heading in.  Everyone had a smile on their face and seemed to be enjoying the day.  Why not?

Wahclella Falls

I try to listen to comments made by people who don’t live near the Columbia River Gorge.  It’s common to hear exclamations about how lucky we are to live near such a beautiful spot.  They are right of course.  I was sipping coffee this morning and discussing the day with Dianne.  She had a full day of events lined up so I looked outside at blue sky and decided that I’d go to the Gorge to take a short hike into Wahclella Falls.  It had been a year since I was there and I wanted to see if I could get a picture of the falls that I’ve been wanting for some time.  Off I went.

The hike into Wahclella is an easy mile.  The trail winds along the creek near the falls and makes a nice little loop back to the main trail to return to the parking area. My friend Deigh and I both wanted a view of the creek, both levels of the main Wahclella Falls and a small falls that comes off the cliff to the west of the trail.  This smaller falls is intermittent so one needs to be onsite after a period of rain.  Not a real problem this year.  The trick to this shot though is that it requires leaving the safety of the trail and climbing up a scree slope to get the elevation needed.  Both Deigh and I have done this before and come away thinking that we were lucky to be in one piece.  Tricky walking.  Today I took a different approach and made it to my vantage point with little effort or concern about safety.  Not to say that I wasn’t pretty deliberate about foot placement and balance… I was.  But I was relieved to get to the target spot and off load the pack and tripod.

My initial test shot told me that the composition was within my reach.  I set up the tripod, mounted the camera and lens along with the cable release.  I framed, focused, metered and shot.  Nice… if you like lens flare.  My dallying around in Portland allowed the sun to climb to a point where it was lighting the hill just above me and the sun line was descending the hill as I shot.  I moved into a deeper shade and tried again.  I finally got a frame without flare and set out to shoot a bracketed series thinking that HDR may be needed to bring the range of light into range.  I continued to shoot as the sun drove me back down the hill.  Soon I lost the composition that I was after and went back to the trail and poked around there a bit.  Got to meet some nice people who were out enjoying the area.

I was pretty content with the image set and started to head back to the car.  I paused to look back and was caught by the brightly backlit tree and spray at the top of Wahclella Falls.  I set the tripod back up and switched to a longer lens and began to shoot bracketed shots based on the character of the spray that was drifting up and down.  Very dynamic scene and some really interesting light – in my opinion.  The shot below captures what I saw.  My eyes kept bouncing from the backlit maple tree and it’s glowing rim to the mist to falls behind the mist and back to the tree.  Very nice way to spend another 20 minutes in this beautiful part of Oregon.

 

 

Time on the river

Yesterday morning was spent on the Columbia River. Yesterday afternoon was spent with my good friend Connie. Both periods were well spent if you ask me.

I made a commitment to myself to slow down when taking photos and to try to be more deliberate in producing higher quality images more frequently. This is a stretch for me as many of you know. But, with the commitment in mind I’ve been studying the workflow of Vincent Versace who is a well known and respected fine art photographer. This guy is VERY deliberate in what he does with his photos while in the field and once he enters Photoshop. He’s not for everyone and I have a bit of a hard time not yelling at him “HURRY UP”. But the lessons, for me, were well placed and timed. You can get a taste of Versace by looking at his book “Welcome to Oz” if you are so inclined.

I balance Versace’s approach with Moose Peterson’s approach. Moose declares that he doesn’t want to spend more than 4 minutes on an image and purports to exercise more care while shooting to “get it right in the camera”. Well, there’s something to be said for that and I want to get better at the moment of capture. Back to the “slow down” approach.

I have a keen interest in the variety of rows of pilings that jut out into the Columbia River between Corbett and Cascade Locks. I still don’t know the history of these features but I do know that they intrigue me. One set near Corbett offers a background on the Washington side that is (a) not cluttered with houses or factories and (b) has a nice unifrom row of alders growing along the bank. Someday I hope to capture a scene where the tree line is lit brightly and the sky is filled with dark storm clouds to the north. I keep waiting.

Part of my plan to get pictures of the pilings and alders involves having the river be in a calm state. That means little or no wind. It also means no boats creating wakes. In the Gorge both of these conditions are fleeting. I had been watching the weather and knew that yesterday had a good chance of being calm in the early hours. It was worth a chance to get up early and get out there.

My main goal was to get a shot of the row of pilings extending toward the far shore from the south (Oregon) bank. I parked at the Corbett off ramp and walked toward the river. A low cloud at the east end of the Gorge caught my eye. I saw a few posts and pilings that I thought could make a nice composition. I walked down the closed road trying to get as close to the river as I could before entering the field of loose rocks and black berry bushes. Let me tell you that those rocks were SLICK. It took me a good while to walk back downstream to get the pilings/posts in the frame. No falls but amazingly tricky walking. The rocks were like ice.

Tech details: Nikon D700, 16-35mm lens at 16mm, 3 stop ND grad filter, 8 stop ND filter, 30 seconds at f/22, ISO 100. 14 bit capture, uncompressed NEF. Processed in Lightroom 3 and Photoshop using Color Efex Pro and Topaz BW plugins.

If you click on the images you’ll get an expanded view.

After making my way back to the interstate highway I walked the short distance to the row of pilings that was my original target of the day. I’d been in here before and was not looking forward to the beating the blackberries were going to give me. I kept looking for a spot to drop down to the river that was not a 10 foot vertical wall and that offered the least berry vines to contend with. A miracle happened. When I got to the point where the row of pilings was just below me I saw fresh churned dirt and what looked like a small debris flow heading right down the shortest path to where I wanted to be. Turns out that ODOT had been in there with a machine to open a drain. The result was as easy an approach that anyone could ask for. No berries. No slick rocks. Made me want to whistle as I walked.

Once I got to the flat at the river I started trying to find compositions that worked. I tried several from the upstream/up-light side of the row of pilings. As I shot I kept noticing that the sky and clouds were developing nicely. The shot quickly became one of the clouds more than the pilings. I moved to the downstream side of the pilings and found a foreground feature to put in the frame. Again, this was shot with the same gear listed above but this is a 5 shot HDR set processed in Photomatix before going into Photoshop.

I really enjoy the clouds and reflections in both of these images. I’ll say thank you to Vincent Versace for reminding me that treatment within an image can be very tightly controlled and does not need to apply globally to the image. Effects created by a variety of plugins can be tuned and masked to emphasize those elements of an image that are the most important to the photographer. I spent about 2 hours on each of these images… sorry Moose.

A tugboat came upriver and spoiled any more shooting of the calm river. Wake waves set up and persisted long enough to frustrate me. When I realized that I was both frustrated and cold I gave myself a little talking to and headed back to the car and the thermos of coffee. It’s always good to return to your car and see that all the windows are in place. I celebrated with a quick camera review of the images as the car warmed up. Then I headed for Multnomah Falls… an icon for sure and a scene I never really tire of photographing even though it is so overly photographed by the millions of tourists who pull in to view it. It is an amazing waterfall.

Same camera gear but without the split ND grad filter. This is a 5 image HDR shot processed in Photomatix. Perhaps the blurry leaves in the foreground give away that the exposures were long and the wind had started to come up. A bit of rain fell as I started to leave to meet Connie.

I drove over to Estacada via my old stomping grounds near Bull Run. It had been a long time since I’d been on the Sandy River in the Aims area and I enjoyed the drive filled with memories of bike rides with Dianne and our boys. The hills are a lot easier in a car than they were on the tandem. I got to Estacada in time to wander around a bit before meeting Connie at the Spiral Gallery in which she displays her art and works part time. We had arranged to meet for lunch and catch up conversation…. always a treat when I can get her time. I now own another Athman original painting. The first one, Bull Run Lake and Mt. Hood, was given to me by Connie as a retirement gift. The one I procured yesterday started as one of my photographs of Sandhill Cranes lifting off during a Bosque del Apache sunrise. The scene is now a wonderful watercolor that is hanging directly over my keyboard as I type.

What a treat. A day out where I had time and inclination to better my approach to photography and to visit with a close friend who creates wonderful art. Life is rich.

More color

It’s that time of year and I’m seeing all sorts of wonderful images of fall colors experienced by friends who are roaming the Northwest.  Good on all of you!

I was heading out of Leavenworth, WA with a destination of Cle Elum Monday afternoon and I knew that there was a good chance that the hillsides would be colored up as I drove down the Wenatchee River canyon.  The Wenatchee National Forest never disappoints and has always left me wanting more time there to experience the seasons.  Monday was no different.  As I came around a corner I saw a bunch of cars parked in a turnout.  As I looked up I saw a hillside that had burned in the recent past and seemed alive with fire again.  The bright yellows seduced me and I pulled over with the crowd… something I tend to not do.  Since I was traveling without my color checker (aka, Dianne) I rely on the obvious… if others think it is worth stopping to look at or photograph then there is probably something there.  I pulled in and set up the camera and tripod.  The crowd was concentrated at the edge of the parking lot… as expected.  I jumped the guard rail and walked a path along the edge of the road until I was alone and had a view that showed reflections in the still water of a side channel.  Ten minutes later I was being jostled by others who wanted my view.  Darn that tripod… a crowd magnet I guess.  I shot my shots and visited with a few nice folks on their way to Spokane.  After the crowd thinned I worked my way out of the remaining few and headed back to my car and on to Cle Elum. A nice little stop in what had been a very busy day.

Fall frolic

I got to spend yesterday in the Santiam River watershed shooting some project work for the US Forest Service. Since I had the camera along and since the fall colors were popping and since I was in charge of my own time and since there was a waterfall I’d never seen… well, you get the idea. I was not the only one out with a camera and I bet this weekend will be an overload of “leafers” in the canyoon. It was the best I’ve ever seen.

Wahclella Falls

Recently my friend Deigh suggested that we hike into Wahclella Falls.  As I did a quick recon of the falls I was astonished that I had not been there before. Say what?  I browsed my image catalogs and came to the same conclusion… no files.  Well, it turns out that Deigh was not able to make the trip we had planned so I decided to go out today and make a day of it.

As I was sipping the last of a cup of coffee in the parking lot I looked around and found some wonderful digitalis sitting right in front of the car.  It was overcast and had just finished raining.  The flowers were covered by soft, uniform light.  I took several shots of this bloom with varying compositions.  This closeup is my favorite and is made from 8 stacked images to get sharpness throughout the bloom.

There’s just something about water drops and wonderful light that rings my bell.

I headed into the falls after chatting briefly with some other folks who were leaving and some who were heading in as well.  No rain.  Overcast.  Perfect for the falls if the clouds stay in place during the short hike.

Getting to falls is an easy hike of about a mile. The waterfall book I have said to take the trail to the right when I encountered a fork… “easier” the author said.  I went left… go figure. The view from the left (east, high) trail was compromised by a huge boulder that blocked the pool below the falls.  I found a decent vantage to get the whole falls and pool into the frame but was unwilling to get soaked by spray.  I backed off and found an opening in the boulders so that at least some of the pool is visible.

This view means that you lose the upper falls but gain some visibility of falls coming in from the side… a reasonable compromise I think.

I headed down a small trail to join in with the other (the one to the right) at the base of the falls.  Again, I hunted for places where I could see the pool among the huge boulders in the area.  I opted to shoot from the footbridge crossing the creek.  Those massive boulders will be in the view until I bring some waders in to shoot this site.

I started to head out on the other trail and thought that maybe I could climb up along the large boulder at the end of the bridge.  If I could get high I might have a decent view into the pool after all.  Most of the way up I decided that it was not a good idea since I had to somehow find my way down too.  Too many reports of silly accidents in the Gorge and I sure did not want to add to that collection.  I worked my way down and headed out.  A few feet down the trail I saw a talus slope that looked very climbable.  I headed up again… this time successfully.  The shot still did not allow a good view of the pool but it did provide a nice context for the falls among the bridge, trees and rock walls.  I’m thinking that Fall may be a good time to see that big maple tree color up to add to the scene.

I waited patiently for the people on the bridge to move into place.  I used to resist this type of shot all together and tried for no sign of man-made stuff or people in nature shots.  India taught me that having people in the frame can be a good thing.  Of course I took a few shots without the people and bridge too.

After working my way down to the trail I headed out to the car.  I stopped at the smaller trailside falls near the parking lot and played a bit with contrast and movement.

The rest of the trip was just casual walking and enjoying the area full of flowers and birds and water and clean air.  Lots of bird songs filled the air as I drove out.  Not a bad way to spend a morning.

Road Trip

I was scheduled to help the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation and the US Forest Service install a camera to do some time lapse photos of a restoration project on Meacham Creek last Thursday and I decided to make it into a photography road trip. I was lucky to coordinate time to see my friends Caty, JD and Stacia in Athena, OR Wednesday night. I laid out a series of photo opps enroute to Pendelton and headed out early Wednesday morning. I hoped to find an eagle nest near Multnomah Falls but that didn’t work out as planned.  I moved on to take a look at the river flowing into Hood River but nothing moved me too much although the view of Mt. Adams was wonderful. Some nice cumulus clouds were forming and I headed to Rowena Crest.  The light was bright when I got there (well past ideal) but the flowers were looking really good and the clouds were so nice they reminded me of Montana a few weeks ago.

That’s an osprey looking like a small speck on the cloud near the top of the photo.  I waited for about an hour for the group of 3 osprey to fly over the balsam root flowers and with the clouds in the background.  I wanted the bird to be MUCH larger in the frame but I ran out of time.

Dianne and I had seen the group of bighorn sheep east of The Dalles when we went to Bozeman recently but there was no stopping our progress at that point… baby waiting. I was lucky enough to see them again this trip and feel very fortunate that they were in an area where I could safely get way off the Interstate.  My best shot opportunity happened when I was trying to get out of the car, get the camera lens mounted and the tripod set up.  A large group of rams ran right next to the fence beside the road… close enough to make a really nice photo.  I did manage a couple of shots before they headed up the hill but the fence and my spastic preparation did not combine to produce a good image.  I switched to the long lens and spent the next 45 minutes watching the rams move around the slope before bedding down.  I got to see and hear 3 different times when two rams exercised their right to be males and clashed heads… ahhhh, Spring.  The shots were pretty distant but I am happy with them and glad that they are sharp enough for a moderate size print.

The small clumps of lupine sure don’t hurt the images.

I headed on to Pendleton and got checked into the motel.  Then I was off to Caty’s place in Athena. We had a nice dinner and they indulged me with a showing of the images from India before I headed back to Pendelton for the night.  Thursday morning Caty and I joined up with Mike and Keith from CTUIR and headed out to put the camera on a ridge above the project site.  It was not really a long hike to the site we chose for the camera but the phrase “steep as a cow’s face” does come to mind.  I was pleased that I got up and down the hill with no real problems and no injuries. The camera install went pretty well thanks to some creative rock piling and the crew that Mike had brought along.

After Caty and I returned to Pendelton I headed directly for Terrebone to meet up with my friend Deigh and an evening shoot of some nesting bald eagles we had seen a few weeks before.  After a dinner in Terrebone we drove to Smith Rocks and hiked through the bivouac camping area to the rimrock near the nest.  We visited and played with the fading light until we concluded that the eagles were not going to show up.  We drove back to Redmond and discussed morning plans.  Deigh wanted to see the sunrise on the Three Sisters but I opted to pass on the 03:30 departure in favor of some sleep.  We agreed to meet in Sisters at 07:00 for breakfast. After a quick breakfast at the Gallery we headed into the Wizard Falls area of the Metolius River.  I had not been here in years and was pleased to see that it really has not changed substantially.  It is still one of the prettiest rivers I know and any time on the river is a gift.  We grabbed our cameras and set out to play.  I see that Deigh has posted some images from his collection and I now know that we were both looking at the abstracts formed by the colors and flow.  Hey… we’re a couple of retired hydrologists… what do you expect?

We parted ways after the shoot and headed for our individual homes. I tinkered around with some reflections on the way home but didn’t come up with anything that is worth sharing. I marveled as I drove through Detroit, Salem and up I-5 about how blooming fortunate I am to have the opportunity to make a trip like this and that I have friends who are willing to give me time with them. It was a jam-packed 3 days… all good. I look forward to future trips like this when Dianne can be along.

McCord Creek

It feels like we stole one today.  We left the house about 12:30 and drove to the McCord Creek, Elowah Falls trailhead and headed in.  The sky had some nice cumulus clouds to the north and was pretty open to the south.  Mid-day sun… hmmm.  Waterfall photos?  I admit that my expectations were low for waterfall images but moderate to high for wildflowers.

We hiked the lower trail to the view of Elowah Falls but I opted to stay quite a distance from the falls due to the spray generated by the high flows.  We dropped down to the creek and took a few shots of a small falls while the spray still coated the lens with a light mist.  After about 20 minutes we headed out and stopped to take some flower shots along the trail.

Next we took the upper trail to Upper McCord Creek falls.  The falls were raging.  The two plumes of water forming falls were totally different.  One was in the shade but uninteresting.  The other was in bright sun and I was really liking the varied textures created by the rocks near the base.  What the heck I thought.  Bright sun, wind… what ever.  I put the vari-ND filter on the 28-300 lens and zoomed in.  I like the result of these 15-25 second exposures.

But I’m sure that this photo of the little bleeding hearts along the trail is my favorite shot of the day.  Regardless, t’was good to get out with Dianne and witness Spring in the Gorge.

A clean sensor is a beautiful thing

After spending too much time chasing dust around the camera’s sensor I finally succeeded in fully cleaning the sensor and mirror chamber of my camera yesterday.  Usually this operation doesn’t take me too long but it seems that I’d gotten one of the filaments from the Artic Butterfly sensor brush caught in a slot near the sensor.  It would not dislodge with blown air.  It stuck tight when brushed with the same brush that caused the problem in the first place.  It clung on even when I tried to use a swab to dislodge it.  Hanging just above the sensor this fiendish filament presented me with a challenge and a great opportunity to totally screw up the camera.  Tweezers?  Olive picker?  Live with it?  I could not stand the thought of putting a metal point any where near the sensor so I ended up taking a small “corner swab” and bending it into a sort of “J” to hook under the filament.  After a few minutes of maneuvering around I succeeded in getting the rascal out of the chamber.  After that it was a simple task to get rid of any residual dust.

I also cleaned the camera body, frequently used lenses and all filters.  There I sat with a table of clean gear and a sense that all was once again in alignment.  I took the tripod apart one leg at a time and removed all the sand that had succeeded in migrating into the working parts.  The leg tension got adjusted and the ball head was cleaned.

Wow… a whole set of clean gear.  What to do now?  Go to the Japanese Garden to see what colors might still be in place.  I wanted to continue to play with the “motion” theme I started at the beach.  It was a bright sunny sky but the air was calm.  I put the vari-ND filter on and headed for the waterfall pond.  After waiting about 20 minutes to get to a vantage that allowed me to shoot into a fairly uniformly lit scene I began experimenting with different densities and exposure durations.  The following images are both taken from the same file.  Only the crop is different.  While the effect won’t work for everyone, I enjoy the movement as contrasted to the stationary rocks and calm leaves.  I like the linkage of the movement in the waterfall to that in the pond.  If you have a reaction to either the effect or the crop I’d appreciate you leaving a comment to let me know your thoughts.