Posts in Category: river
4/17/2011: Where the Merriland meets the Little
Happy Sunday! I spent an hour yesterday morning at Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge headquarters area, walking the little nature trail through the woods down to the Little River and the Merriland, as the sun was trying to warm a cold early spring day. There is little sign of spring at Rachel Carson beyond the light, the first hard leaf buds, and the earliest signs the intention to blossom on the Hobblebush.
This is where the Merriland River, in the foreground, meets the Little River, on the left. It is a 4 shot panorama and really needs to be seen as large as your monitor will allow. It is, in fact, considerably wider than you would be likely to take in at one view. By relaxing your attention and, so to speak, stepping back behind your eyes, you would be able to see this sweep, but generally our attention is more focused and we would only see this as a series of impressions. I like the way the early light is playing across the marsh and bringing up the blues in the water, when there are none in the sky.
Canon SX20IS, four 28mm equivalent fields of view, stitched using the Panorama tool in Photomerge within PhotoShop Elements 9, and processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom. Average exposure was in the f4 @ 1/160th @ ISO 80 range. Landscape mode.
And,for Sunday…I think about that focused attention we bring to bear on the world around us, limiting our natural 180º plus, to between 15º of truly focused attention, and 60º-90º of operational attention. We call the rest peripheral. And yet, we could all benefit, I suspect, from the habit, say, once or twice a day, of stepping back behind our eyes, relaxing, and taking in the full width of our vision. It is certainly so in spiritual things. One of the most profound insights of any spiritual journey is just how focused on our limited view of things we all are, and what a change it makes to step back and look out of larger eyes than our own. Doing so does not diminish in any way the particular that is the focus of our attention…it just puts it in perspective. What is my own salvation, precious as it is, in comparison to the salvation of mankind and the redemption of creation? There is a kind of prayer that seeks that experience…not petition (necessary focused on the particular)…but a reverent approach to unity through love that is sometimes called meditation. Unfocused attention, while I would not argue that it is the highest form of vision, or of prayer, is undoubtedly good for us.
Which is maybe why every photographer needs to experiment with panoramas once in a while. 🙂
4/9/2011: Upriver Mousam Panorama
This is just two 28mm equivalent images stitched, but I guess it still qualifies as a panorama. We are looking up the Mousam from the Route 9 bridge in Kennebunk on a day with amazing clouds and a spring snow on the ground. It is interesting to me that, being familiar with the seasons in Southern Maine, I could never mistake this for a winter shot, despite the snow. The quality of the light, and its angle, marks this as somewhere very near the equinox…as indeed it was. April 4, the first weekend April. The only strange part is that I had to pull off through a line of huge snowballs pushed up by the plough to take the shot. Likely, but only possibly, the last snow of this season.
I really like the quality of the light and its variations across the surface of the water.
Canon SX20IS. Two 28mm equivalent field of view exposures, f4 @ 1/640th @ ISO 80, Landscape Mode, stitched in PhotoShop Elements 9’s panorama tool, and processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom. There was a telephone pole at the left, which I cropped out, so it is not quite the width of the two exposures.
This is a rare panorama with waves in that the blend where the exposures meet actually works, managing to pass for a eddy in the current.
4/7/2011: Saco Bay
I was feeling the old theme was a bit too busy, and it seemed to have some display problems at certain page widths on certain browsers, so…something new for today. 🙂
And this is Saco Bay, taken from East Point in Biddeford Pool, Maine, looking back along the course of the Saco River northeast of the pool itself, between the point and Wood Island. A classic early spring Maine scape featuring some interesting clouds.
Canon SX20IS at 28mm equivalent field of view, f4.0 @ 1/1000th @ ISO 80. Landscape Mode. Tipped up for metering to bias for the sky.
Processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom. (see page link above for processing details.)
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.
3/23/2011: Mousam HDR
This is a section of yesterday’s panorama taken at the mouth of the Mousam River behind Parson’s Beach in Kennebunk Maine…not literally a section as in one of the three stitched images…but a section as in a piece of the same view. This time it has received the HDR treatment. For a scene with this kind of sky drama already happening, about the only thing HDR adds (the way I use it) is a bit of detail enhancement in the foreground, some extra detail in the cloud cover, and greens you can see. In a normally exposed image of this scene, the greens would be going toward black (or the sky would be pale and lifeless), especially the evergreens in the distance. They might hold a bit of green, but HDR brings them back up to normal visual levels while preserving the cloud detail.
Canon SX20IS. Three bracketed exposures centered around –2/3EV, assembled and tone-mapped in Photomatix Pro and processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom.
3/22/2011: Mousam Panorama
This has to be seen as large as your screen will allow. Click on the image and it should open full width on your system. It is three 28mm equivalent fields of view stitched in Photoshop Elements 9. The Panorama tool in PE has been pretty good since they introduced it a number of versions ago, but it seems to have been improved again in PE9. I used the Cylindrical tool, which places the images just about perfectly, given that my handheld technique rotates the camera through an arc between shots. With the auto setting I have used before, I generally lost considerable height due to alignment issues. Here the full height of the individual frames is preserved. This is far and away the most natural looking pano I have ever shot or assembled. This is very close to the naked eye view if you were standing on that spot.
And, of course it is really about the expanse and the clouds, the reflections in the river, the texture of the marsh grasses, the grand view and all its little details.
Canon SX20IS at 28mm equivalent field of view, f4 @ 1/1000th @ ISO 80. Landscape Mode.
Stitched in Photoshop Elements 9, processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom.
3/20/2011: All in a day. Happy Sunday
Happy Sunday!
We woke to freezing rain yesterday, which, by full daylight turned to huge feathery wet flakes of snow. Not totally welcome as the last of the 3 plus feet of compacted snow from winter is just about gone from the backyard, and we are all (I think I speak for the general population here) getting a bit eager for spring in Southern Maine. It showed pretty heavily through noon, lightly covered any bare ground, and clung to bushes and trees and standing grasses.
This shot is out the window of the car at Parson’s Beach and gives a good sense of the density of the falling snow. In the dim light, I used Sports Mode, to force the ISO higher and the shutter speed faster, to catch the flakes, as much as possible, in mid-air.
And this shot was taken at about 3:15 that same afternoon, from just about exactly the same spot, looking the other way. The sky had cleared, the snow on the ground had melted away, and the sun had a touch of spring, even summery, warmth that made me, for one, hopeful.
And that is early spring in Maine…the most inconstant of seasons: Winter and seeming summer in a single day.
Both with the Canon SX20IS. 1) 160mm equivalent field of view, f4.5 @ 1/800th @ ISO 400. Sports Mode. 2) 28mm equivalent field of view, f4 @ 1/1250th @ ISO 80. Landscape Mode (biased for the sky by tipping the camera up and locking exposure…then processed for the foreground in Lightroom).
And being Sunday: certainly there must be a spiritual lesson in the rapid alteration of the season and the mood from morning to afternoon of a single day. Of course, the day itself is rare enough for record…in it we see the change that is spring happening in such an unmistakable way, in such an exaggerated way, that we can not miss it…so that the day becomes a parable for seasonality and, in a way, in this season, for the hope associated with the coming of spring. I know it makes me feel like throwing off care, like embracing a hopeful turn of mind, like renewing my trust. On a day like this I am reminded: Though dark may cloud the morning, I know who wins the day. And that is true in any season. It is just hard to miss on such a day.
2/28/2011: Kennebunkport HDR
Looking across the Kenneunk River at flood tide toward Kennebunkport. This is intentionally processed to be more painterly, using heavier than my usual tone-mapping in Photomatix, and, of course, it is scene that might feature in a painting. The variety of light…sky and cloud, reflections in the water, patches of sun and shadow on the trees and the far shore…keeps my interested as much as the scene itself.
Canon SX20IS at 28mm equivalent field of view, three bracketed exposures centered on –2/3ds EV, assembled and tone-mapped in Photomatix pro, processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom. It required some noise suppression, distortion control, and just a bit of color temperature adjustment (warming).
2/27/2011: Postcard from Maine Winter
Happy Sunday!
Wet sticky snow fell most of the day Friday, with some light rain following…just enough rain, and light enough, to really set the snow on the branches of trees, bushes, and power lines, and to increase its weight about 4 fold. For a wonder (and a blessing) there were no power outages locally. Saturday morning came up sunny and cold, with little to no wind, so I managed to get out early enough to catch the accentuated winter scenery.
This is Roger’s Park, a tiny little parcel on the Mousam River, with a skating pond and fishing access, just a few blocks from Main Street in Kennebunk. It is one the few spots on the lower Mousam where the public has access to the river, and I check in there frequently for photo ops. The tangles of vine covered shrubs and trees back from the river, between the river and a marshy area behind the park, are also a wonderful spot for warblers and other song-birds in spring.
In this shot the attraction is clearly the dark water, almost metallic, in sharp contrast to the filigree of snow coated trees…and the clarity of the winter light. It adds up to a postcard view of Maine winter…a scene not often seen, in fact, but easily imagined as what Maine should look like in winter. And occasionally it does.
🙂
Canon SX20IS at 28mm equivalent field of view, f4 @ 1/500th @ ISO 80. Snow mode. Because of the dark water filling a good deal of the frame, I tipped the camera up so the meter read more of the snow covered bank, locked exposure and focus by half-pressing the shutter release, and then reframed for composition.
Processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom.
There are several Sunday thoughts possible here: Beginning with the gratitude I always feel for the foresight of public officials (the town fathers in this case) who preserved a little pocket park like this, or something as grand as the Grand Canyon, for the public…for me…so that I can enjoy it, and find inspiration and revelation in it. Then, on a completely different track, there is the dangerous beauty aspect of the scene. A snow fall like this is indeed beautiful, but the potential for damage to the trees, and power lines, is very real. Branches fell, trees cracked, and if was only God’s grace that the power lines were not under any of them when they fell…this time. And maybe it is, in part, at least a little, that dangerous beauty that speaks to our sense of wonder. I know that a scene like this fills me with a kind of wild joy…I have to take deep breaths of the cold air and I feel a surge of energy. I know my face is fixed in a silly grin of enjoyment. And I enjoy being able to enjoy it as much as the experience itself. That I can see the beauty in this postcard from the Maine winter…that is a thing of wonder, and deep gratitude, in itself. Happy Sunday.