Posts in Category: forest
4/19/2011: Lichen and ???
The flaky growth on a fallen branch at Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge is lichen, and I think the little miniature pine-tree-thingy is too. I think, from a bit of googling, it may be a fruticose lichen related to Spanish Moss. I was struck by the contrast in form and color, and framed this with the long end of the zoom and macro on the Canon SX20IS, which provided the attractive bokeh. The early morning light of early spring picked out the detail and gave the image some warmth it would not otherwise have had.
Canon SX20IS at 356mm equivalent field of view, f5 @ 1/80th @ ISO 80. Program Mode.
Processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom.
4/16/2011: Miniature Mountains, Forests, in a Stump
On my photo walk last Saturday, spring just was not happening all that much, but I found a brave display of moss and lichen along a new trail through a little patch of public use land donated to the town recently. This is a rather small stump, in the scale of things, but well decorated. In the light of an early spring morning it builds possibilities in the mind. Kind of an alternative scenery for Saturday.
Canon SX20IS at 28mm equivalent and super-macro. F7.1 @ 1/30th @ ISO 80. I used Program Shift to select the smaller aperture for added depth of field.
Processed in Lightroom for intensity and clarity (see Lightroom Processing page above).
4/12/2011: Waiting for Footfall
This needs to be seen larger, and clicking the image will open it on its SmugMug page as large as your monitor will support. You may need to scoot back in your chair, away from the computer, to really catch the effect. An exaggerated perspective on the path in the forest shot, from ground level…and with the trees still bare in spring. This shot is about line and light…the lines of the bare trees outlined in light, and the light receding at the far reach of the tunnel. The few evergreens and the leafy floor anchor the eye and help the eye and mind to make sense of it. In addition to the low angle, I used some telephoto compression to emphasize the effects. Cropped from the bottom and top for composition and to eliminate distracting out of focus foreground.
Canon SX20IS at 330mm equivalent field of view, f5 @ 1/400th @ ISO 100. Landscape Mode.
Processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom. I took it into PhotoShop Elements to clone out a twig that was protruding upward into the frame from the bottom.
4/4/2011: Spring Light on the Bascom
This is the Bascom River above the main pool at Emmons Preserve in Kennbunkport Maine. Emmons, as I have detailed here before, is a little preserve set aside for public use, with a short loop trail beside the stream, several pools, some minor waterfalls and rapids, etc. Altogether a wonderful little patch that I always enjoy visiting. Here, the real feature is the clear, crisp light of early spring, the reflections in the water, and the symmetry of the narrows. There is really nothing there…but it is a pleasing…an inviting nothing.
Canon SX20IS zoomed out to 85mm equivalent field of view for framing, f4 @ 1/125 @ ISO 100. Landscape Mode.
Processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom (see the processing link at the left).
4/2/2011: Pool Panorama, Emmons Preserve
For Scenery on Saturday, another panorama from Emmons Preserve in Kennebunkport Maine…this time a somewhat more conventional one. A sweep of the middle pool along the main run of the Baston River through the preserve. With no leaves on the trees the light actually reaches the water in early spring. This is a very different place during summer. Because of the level of detail here, this will benefit from a larger view. Click the image and it should open on a page resized for your monitor.
Three 28mm equivalent captures with the Canon SX20IS handheld. Stitched in PhotoShop Elements Panorama tool, processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom. f8 @ 1/100th @ ISO 80. Landscape Mode.
2/13/2011: Who Goes There
Happy Sunday!
Snow had fallen heavily the day before, but people had already cross-country skied and snow-showed the trails at Rachel Carson NWR, so, with care, a booted photographer could get back pretty far in the woods. These tracks must have been made just before the snow ended. Though I thought I was capturing the tracks, it turns out this is mostly about what the light is doing with the texture of the snow. A Black and White conversion brings that to the forefront.
Canon SX20IS at about 285mm equivalent field of view, f5 @ 1/1250th @ ISO 80. Snow Mode.
Processed in Lightroom for clarity and sharpness. Converted to B&W using the Green filter effect.
And, being Sunday: Like the image itself, our spiritual journey is often more about what the light does with the snow than it is about the tracks we, or others, leave. And yet, without the tracks, what is there to draw another’s eye? We are much more likely to stop to see the light on the snow if someone has laid a track across it. That seems to be a part of what it means to be human. “Who goes there” is our first question. But it eventually leads to the realization that there is a there to go and a going…and that every step, to the eye of the spirit, is through textured light!
1/14/2011: You can’t keep a good moss down!
The boggy fir forest that surrounds Saco Heath is always an interesting place. The water there must be on the warm side, perhaps from the peat decomposition, because despite several inches of snow covering the forest floor, there were these little bare patches of moist moss showing in odd spots. The contrast of bright green with the snow and old oak leaves is what caught my eye here. Then it was just a matter of framing it.
Canon SX20IS at 360mm equivalent, f5 @ 1/400th @ ISO 160. Snow Mode.
Processed in Lightroom for intensity and clarity.
1/11/2011: Light in the Forest
After church on Sunday, my daughter and I stopped at Saco Heath again, just to see what it looked like in winter. She was impressed with the beauty of the light under the tall fur trees where the trail works its way toward the bog, and we were discussing how difficult it is to catch that particular (and undeniable) beauty in a photograph…how the eye and the brain…the mind…absorbs the impression of beauty without needing any center of focus, as we move through the landscape, but how in an image, once you place a frame around it, without that center of focus, the result is, most of the time, just a clutter from which we fail to recapture the original impression.
So I took a few shots to demonstrate the limits of what can be done. I explained as I worked and showed her the results that I was also visualizing the image in B&W, using a green filter effect, which lead us to discussions of how B&W photographers used to tailor the light and the response of the film with a whole bag full of different colored filters…how it was, in a very real sense, the one control they had over the image once basic exposure decisions were made. I told her that often, in situations where it is really the light you are photographing, B&W can be more effective, or at least, just as effective as color.
So here is the same image processed in Lightroom using the green filter B&W effect. This treatment brings the little fur into some prominence and is perhaps better focused as an image than the color version.
I am not sure which I like better, or, even if I like one better. Of their kind, and given the limitations of forest photography, they are both satisfying. Just. Unfortunately the experience is fresh enough so I still remember the impression I was attempting to catch!
Canon SX20IS at about 110mm, f4.5 @ 1/160th @ ISO 80. Snow Mode.
Processed for light, intensity, and clarity in Lightroom. Cropped for composition. Green filter B&W effect.
1/8/2011: the corner of simple and green
Sometimes you see an image very clearly, but when you attempt to frame it, it turns out harder than you thought. That was the way here. Simple image. I saw it right away. It then took me an inordinate amount of time to find the angle, zoom setting, and particular section of branch. Still, I like it.
Emmon’s Preserve, Kennebunkport, ME.
Canon SX20IS at 180mm equivalent, f5 @ 1/250@ ISO 125. Snow Mode.
Processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom.
12/28/2010: After the Blizzard
It stopped snowing late in the afternoon yesterday, at the tail end of Maine’s first blizzard of the winter of 2010, and I got out for an hour or so…until the light failed. This is Rachel Carson NWR, where someone had already been around the trail a few times in snowshoes…which made it considerably easier for me in my boots. I like the light here and the subtle leading line of the snowshoe prints…and of course the trees painted white by snow on the wind.
Canon SX20IS at 28mm equivalent, f2.8 @ 1/60th @ ISO 80. Landscape mode.
Processed for intensity and clarity using my normal methods in Lightroom (see page link), but more fill light than normal to pick up the green in the trees, less blackpoint, and some added brightness.