Category: Landscape

09-22-16 Sparkling Harvest Moon

What do you see that I don’t? (read more)

By Scott Shephard

I think a photo is a combination of what the photographer sees and composes and how the camera records it. And while the digital camera is designed to to capture the world the way most humans see it, that isn’t always the case. This photo is a good example.

Van Gogh might have seen funky things radiating from celestial objects (see “Starry Night”)* but I certainly didn’t see rays coming from the moon on the morning I took this photo of the Harvest Moon setting over the Black Hills. I also didn’t see the colors quite as vividly as you see them here. Finally, the clouds had a different look to me.

But my camera “saw” all of this. That’s part of what motivates me when I go out hunting for photos, especially in predawn light such as this. I often can’t wait to open the photo up in my “digital darkroom” when I get back home. I like to see what develops.

On this morning, I took several series of photos for well over an hour. The light and clouds were changing quickly and when I got done, I had the feeling that while I felt blessed just be witness to such a beautiful morning, I felt that my photography was a big FAIL. And while it may seem odd, it has occurred to me lately that my photography is less about results than it is about process. It’s also largely about being in amazing places like this in the dawn’s early light and completely losing track of time and self.

Is this a good photo? You’ll have to decide that. I’m just happy I was there when it happened.

*One theory suggests that Van Gogh’s exposure to lead based paint caused him to see halos around bright objects. My camera has had no such exposure.

Canon 5DIII 6s f/11.0 ISO320 16mm (five frame HDR)

09-01-16 Out in the Middle of Somewhere

Two numbers: 1100 or 11? (read more)

By Scott Shephard

When I finally get my drone-mounted camera (Deb, are you reading this?), I might finally be able to give you an idea of the immense scale of Lake Oahe. I might also be able to give you a better impression of the Mission Creek/Little Bend area of the Missouri River. It’s a place I have often referred to as “one of my favorite places on earth.”

I just returned from spending the better part of three days here and during those days, I saw two other boats – one fishing boat and one pontoon boat. That’s it. At the end of August, vacations end, school starts and the fish stop biting. That’s when this stretch of the Missouri River becomes an especially perfect place to get away from it all.

I am in flyover country in many places when I travel across South Dakota. Does that mean that I am in the “middle of nowhere?” I don’t think so. And even if it is, it’s where I want to be. Consider this: New Jersey has 1,110 people per square mile; South Dakota has 11. And on the day I took this photo, I’m guessing I had about 30 square miles all to myself.

And in South Dakota, I’m always in the middle of Somewhere.

Olympus TG-4 1/250s f/8.0 ISO100 4.5mm (35mm eq:25mm)

 

08-19-16 The Earth Is Flat

Have you travelled the Polo Road? (read more)

By Scott Shephard

I am not a member of “The Flat Earth Society” whose credo suggests that the idea that the earth is spherical “is the biggest lie ever told.” I guess I believe that “lie,” though when you drive in parts of my state, it is easy to think that the world is very flat indeed.

This is the Polo road somewhere west of the little town of Polo and there is very little undulation in the landscape. I have driven this road many times but on this day, I was impressed by the clouds and the sun rays that I could see off to the east. 

And so I stopped my truck, kneeled down on the middle of the road to lower my point of view and took several photos. It was dead calm and very quiet. I spent several minutes in the middle of the Polo road and felt like if a car had been approaching, I would have heard it long before I saw it.

But no cars came. The empty Polo road is one of the things I like about South Dakota.

Canon 5DIII 1/1000s f/5.6 ISO400 24mm (3 sequence HDR)

04-27-16 A View from Our Porch

By Scott Shephard

Deb and I have re-located for a few days and our first stop is a small house above Cane Garden Bay on the island of Tortola in the British Virgin Islands. It gets up to 85 degrees pretty regularly here and at night it dips down to 83. Pretty boring, I guess.

I hear that snow is forecast for parts of our home state. Unless climate change takes a bizarre turn, we won’t see any snow here. 🙂

Canon 5DIII 1/10s f/8.0 ISO200 27mm (3 frame HDR)

03-22-16 A Walk Through Indian Canyons

Can you find Deb in this photo?

By Scott Shephard

On the last full day Deb and I were in the Palm Springs area in California, we went to Indian Canyons. There are several hiking trails of varying difficulty but we took the easy one. Deb understands my methods well enough to know that when I am taking photos, a 30 minute hike can stretch into something much longer.

The web site for Indian Canyons says “it is a place of contrasts.” That’s apt because you have nearly barren mountains, flowering cactus and shaggy palm trees all in one frame. Oh, and a brilliant blue sky. (I thought South Dakota’s skies were blue!)

Thanks, Jim and Char, for recommending this place. We would certainly go back if we get back to this part of the world again.

Canon 5DIII 1/500s f/16.0 ISO400 40mm

03-14-16 The Caves at La Jolla

The birds certainly don’t mind the wind and rain. . .  (read and see more)

By Scott Shephard

It was rainy, windy a deeply overcast when we parked our car at the overlook to the La Jolla caves. I thought twice about getting my camera out. Frankly, I’ve thought twice about getting my camera out at any time in 2016. Believe it or not, I’ve even thought about just quitting photography. But then what? The fact is that I’ve just gotten lazy. . .

But I did get the camera out and took a few photos. I’m glad I did. As I’ve taught my students, photography isn’t an accident; its a concious process. And it takes discipline, practice and dedication. Oh, and a good “digital darkroom” to help gray days look just a little brighter.

Canon 5DIII 1/125s f/8.0 ISO400 24mm

A few more from this beautiful area:

03-12-16 A Pretty Good View

By Scott Shephard

On our recent visit to southern California Deb and I drove over to Point Loma, a peninsula across the bay from San Diego. We went to see the famous tide pools on the western side but I ended up spending more time photographing the Rosecrans National Cemetery, which is located there, than I did anything else.

I have always been drawn to cemeteries as photographic subjects though I don’t often share the pictures I take there. Military cemeteries are especially compelling, in part because they are symbols of sacrifice and in part because of the symmetry, color and geometry that draw my eye.

Beyond all of this, though, the most striking thing to me about the Rosecrans National Cemetery is that it is full. After putting 110,000 soldiers to rest, this cemetery has no more vacancies. Maybe once the military cemeteries all fill up we could find less violent ways to resolve our differences. . . . ?

Canon 5DIII 1/750s f/11.0 ISO250 98mm

01-11-16 Big Island Morning

Do you visit the Photo A Day blog once and a while? Thanks is you do. (read more)

By Scott Shephard

First, if you subscribe to this blog via email, thanks. It turns out that I have been sending the daily posts to the wrong group so I think I am welcoming some of you back. I hope you stay. Of course, if un-cluttering your life is a 2016 resolution, you can easily unsubscribe to this blog. But how about attacking that bloated junk drawer in your kitchen first? Or your sock and underwear drawer? Or you car’s glove compartment.

Second, those who are my friends on Facebook will have seen this photo already. Sorry to repeat myself. 

But what about the photo? Well, it’s really 5 photos layered and processed as an HDR. And you’d never know it, but the sun was about 20 minutes from coming up. I shot this in twilight and needed a flashlight to see the camera settings! The longest exposure was 30 seconds and it looks almost like mid-day. There I go bending reality again. 🙂

I will also mention that the waves were crashing onto the rocks but the long exposure makes the water look relatively flat. The only evidence of the waves is the spray, which looks like low fog in this picture. More bent reality!

Finally, look closely and you will see two people in this photo sitting on the far shore by the palm trees. They are waiting for the sunrise, not for me to finish the 1 minute photo sequence. Because they are pretty sharply focused, they obviously sat very still for those 60 seconds.

Hawaiian sunrises will do that to you.

Canon 5DIII f/16.0 ISO200 40mm (5 shot HDR sequence)

01-07-16 Into the Woods

Dark and mysterious? That’s how I saw it. You may have seen something else. (read more)

By Scott Shephard

Not too far from the place I captured in yesterday’s photo, I found this location. And, like many things I see in Hawaii, it is amazingly photogenic. This road is called Pohoiki Road and runs for a few miles though trees that arch over and shade the road.

I am fascinated by this place and suspect that the locals who drive this road every day don’t even notice its mystery and beauty. That leaves me wondering what we in the Northern Plains see every day that a person born and raised on the Big Island would be impressed with? Miles of flatland, covered in wheat, corn and sunflowers? Frozen lakes that you can walk on? Thunder and lightning? Lingering twilight that seems to last for hours in midsummer? All of these and many more are bound to impress.

Canon 5DIII 2s f/16.0 ISO400 24mm

01-06-6 So Many Textures

Can you call yourself a photographer when you don’t take your camera out of the bag? (read more)

By Scott Shephard

The most important part of getting a decent photo is getting the camera out of the bag. For me, believe it or not, that hasn’t been a regular thing for the two weeks we’ve been on the Big Island in Hawaii.

And so this morning just before sunrise I told Deb I was going out to look for photos. She asked, “Where?” and I said, “I don’t know. Maybe the lava fields nearby.” But the lava fields didn’t call me. Instead, I ended up at a place called Isaac Hale Park. I got out of the car (without my camera) walked out onto the rocky shore and watched the surf roll in.

I was actually back in the car with the motor running when my inner photographer voice, which I had put on mute weeks ago, asked, “Really?! You’re too lazy to take a photo of this?” I ended up taking many more here but this is the first one I processed.

There’s a lot going on in this photo – maybe too much. But at least I took my camera out of the bag . . . 

Canon 5DIII f/16.0 ISO100 28mm (3 bracketed exposures combined in HDR Efex 2)