Landscape

Fun with Ice!

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Well hello, world! It certainly has been a while since I posted anything, don’t worry I’m not dead or retired. As the saying goes life gets in the way of life but with time and effort, you always get back to what you’re good at. Except for writing blog posts, that still challenges me. Well truthfully I have been quite busy working with several aviation nonprofits here in Bozeman and at some point, I share some of that with all of you. For now, here are some photos of frozen and nonfrozen water.

I do enjoy photographing bodies of water in the wintertime. On sunny days you can have a lot of fun with ice because the light from the sun glistening off of the water combined with the light on the ice makes some great contrast. Ice itself is very bright and the contrast against dark water is a no-brainer. Fast pockets of water are naturally a good spot for black-and-white opportunities but combined with ice it can be even better. I was using the Nikon Z6II with the 24-120z lens and boy it was easy and fun at the river this day.

Spring Time Clouds Are Back!

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Spring in the Rockies is such a fun time of the year. The days are longer and warmer but the storms are still moving through so the afternoons can be filled with some great cloud-filled skies. I know I’ve talked a lot about clouds before but they do add more unique elements to landscape photos than just a blue sky. Not only that, but when you have a nice lake reflecting that sky, all the clouds add more patterns to the water’s surface making that lake look more interesting. On top of all that, there is something peaceful about a nice calm spring afternoon outside.

Falls Come and Gone

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Fall has yet again come and gone. It was an amazing year with some truly gorgeous colors in the Cottonwoods and Aspens but with one good storm, it’s back to the bare bones of the soon-to-be frozen ground. As always I didn’t get out nearly as much as I would have liked but I did manage to get a few good photo trips in this Fall and am greatly looking forward to what Winter has to bring.

Fall Contrast

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Fall is all about the changing of the seasons and seeing that dramatic pop in color in the trees. Some of us are lucky enough to live in areas where that is more prevalent than others. What I’ve always loved about this time of the year is when an afternoon storm rolls through and the sky becomes very dark. All of a sudden there is this great contrast between the dark sky and the bright leaves on the trees which makes for some great drama.

A Year Later

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Okay so it’s actually been a little longer than a year when this fire first started but it was burning all throughout September 2020. This has been one of the worst fire seasons throughout the West and thankfully we’ve been very fortunate to have not had a bad season here in the Bridger Mountains. It’s sad to see the scar left on the forest after a fire comes through but forests are designed to handle fires over time. The emotional and sometimes financial toll forest fires take on people is always harder to handle but like forests, we have to learn to adapt and to make things better so that we can bounce back while continuing to push forward. Problems like the ones we’ve faced this year won’t just solve themselves, we have to help.

 

The Leaves are Turning

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Fall color is starting to pop up around Gallatin Valley but nothing major yet. I’m really curious with the hot summer and lack of water what kind of fall color year it’s going to be. In theory, it should be really good but anything could happen and one big rainfall, snowstorm or a month of cold weather could change everything. I took this last year while out fishing a local creek on the same weekend last year and now I sit here waiting and watching what this year will be like.

Getting up Early Pays Off

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I’ve never been much for getting up early but sometimes it really does pay off to get up early. Fall is here and we’re finally getting the lower temps combined with warmer afternoons making for some great photography. A couple of weekends ago I went to Hyalite Reservoir which is a place I tend to underestimate, one because of how beautiful it is and two just how much you can do up there. Despite how little time I spend up there, this was by far the most beautiful morning I have ever encountered upon the reservoir. The clouds were puffy and scattered and the sun heated up the air above the reservoir created an amazing layer of steam.

Shooting into the Sun

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This is always an option at sunrise or sunset but you have to remember that if you do then the range of light is going to be so great that the foreground is going to be darkened out and most of the detail will be lost. You can bring back those areas with the shadow slider in ACR but that will create more noise which will have to be dealt with. If you use plus exposure comp when taking the photo then you will have bright highlights which can also lead to loss of info. If you’re worried about either of these elements then you can try to hide the sun behind an object, like a tree, which will change the light ratio and create more beams of light. There are so many options it just depends on what you want to do.

Looking Ahead

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Summer storms can materialize really fast and can be dangerous to get caught in them without warning. This past weekend I was out on the local rivers and sure enough, an afternoon thunderhead popped up out of nowhere. To be honest I was thankful that it appeared because the skies were really boring before they did. The one cloud added a nice bit of a pop to an otherwise simplistic landscape.

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