Week 49 - 2015 in Photographs

Day 343

It was all about trees this last week of photographs. I love trees. Especially old trees. They are majestic overseers of life around them. And in them. At the top of the tree above is a red tail hawk. The oldest trees seem to get the hawks. Maybe because their top branches are taller or sparser. Or maybe they are just old friends. To date a tree you count the rings after it has died. But my sister and I found an approximation method based on the girth of the tree near the base. The Ponderosa Pine above is probably over 200. There is a tree across the street from my house, the Sentinel, which may be 300. Those familiar with my blogs have seen a lot of photographs of it.

Day 342

The same tree in the first photograph is in the background of the picture above clouded in freezing fog. The tree in the foreground has some issues, but it made it through another summer. It is also featured in the last photograph from another angle. And more heavily decorated in frost. The freezing fog is a major player in this week's photos. And no, they were not taken on the same day. It is a not an infrequent occurrence approaching winter in the mountains. I love the fairy tale appearance of frost on the trees and will rush out of the house with camera to catch it before the rising sun breaks through and melts it away.

Day 341

Aspens, sans their leaves, look marvelous in frost, so they get their pictures taken often by me when so dressed up. Aspen trees are seldom solitary as a grove is all one plant rather like a fairy ring of mushrooms. A family lives for just about 110 years I read. 

Day 340

When the freezing fog burns off there is brief time when the frost remains highlighting the tree branches against a blue sky. It is definitely one of those things you have to be in the right place at the right time.

Day 339

I would assume it is the moisture content of the air which determines the density of the frost, but it also seems that Ponderosas just make a better show of it. Maybe the long needles collect frost better. They come out of the fog looking like flocked Christmas trees.

Day 338

And put that against a clear blue sky it it is magic for a brief moment.

Day 337

Week 40 - 2015 in Photographs

Day 274

 We seem to be hanging between seasons. Other years we have already had snow. And snow could come and go any day. Meanwhile we are enjoying more Indian Summer weather. Great weather to be out and about with a camera. The hawks and eagles and ravens believe it is a great time to soar. Some mornings the air just seems full of them. Hard to take a picture without one or two captured.

Day 275

Seasons have colors and I do not mean just the spring green or fall gold. Water changes color too. The temperatures cause or cease the blooms of algae in them. Fall can have some of the bluest waters and most clear reflections. The birds are getting new plumage, the grasses are going to seed, and the trees are preparing for winter.

I pick up feathers and rocks and seed pods which I stuff in hat bands and pockets and this particular feather I put on the truck door to bring inside later. That was a week ago and it seems to have stayed there.

Day 276

Day 277

That desire to collect the last of summer before it is buried in snow drives my photography too.
And goes with me inside because there is also a certain color to the sun streaming through the windows at a lower arc in the sky.

Day 278

I am also working on a theory about the quality of black and whites in the fall. I love black and whites in the winter when nature has added the white in the form of a blanket of snow. Fall does not provide the dynamic contrast of that pure white. There are more shades of gray to work with, however. It is a good time for textures.

Day 279

The aspen above lost its leaves very early. I find myself wondering if it will green up next spring. And the grandmother ponderosa below seems to every fall have less live branches. Its silhouette more lacy. Maybe it is a strategy to withstand better the winter gales on its high hill. The hawks would miss it if it was not there to hunt from.

Day 280

Week Three - 2015 in Images

Day 15
In the midst of January thaw

January thaw is on. Or still was this last week. Note the absence of a snow cap on the mountain. It made the weather great for getting out with the camera. I was really on a trek to find ice to capture when I took this photo. Coyote Creek is nearby this area which stood in for Montana during the filming of Lonesome Dove.

Day 16
Suspended in time

This melting ranch house from the early settlement days in Black Lake has been slowly melting into the field. The outhouse, however, seems to be doing quite well. If you look closely hidden in the tree line are the newer homes.

Day 17
The old root cellar

No snow this last week but a freezing fog. It creates a fairly land frost on objects and the picture above was really about the Ponderosa pine and the frost on the long needles. I didn't even get out of the car for this photo. Just rolled down the window. Not lazy but wanted the extra height the pick up gave me to zero in on the pine needles. Sometimes you can get so focused in on one object you miss what is in the background until you are home and the photos are on the computer. The post processing era says we can crop or clone out anything not wanted, but in this photo nothing was not wanted.

Day 18

This picture was about the condensation on the inside of the green house. I loved the pattern it created. The geranium is just foreground interest. Not everyone is totally into abstract textures and patterns. I reduced saturation on this photograph so the bright pink flowers did not distract from my precious patterns of condensation.

Day 19

Day 19 is another frost photograph. But I was also very much attracted to the pattern of melting snow. This little valley collects snow and so the January thaw does not hit it as hard. But the edges are melting around the pond and the streams which pass into it. It was a nice background to the frosted aspens.

Day 20

Frozen fog seems to just kiss certain branches. I was drawn to squat down and photograph this isolated low fir tree branch. No other part of the tree was so blessed. And I loved the contrast with it and the old trunk. Only processing was to use a vignette focus to highlight the center of the composition.

Day 21
Search for the creative SLR Selfie

When I encounter a reflective surface I must photograph it. I am still in search of the ultimate creative selfie using an SLR camera but I also greatly love reflections found in ponds and mirrors and glass usually without me in it. With this one I was actually looking to get the forest reflection in these windows. There is a triangulation formula I am told. But when I am out with my camera I am totally in my right brain. One of the reasons I do not make a great technical photographer. You will not find me out on a cold night doing star tracks across the sky with an app on my smart phone.

This photograph which captured me and not the forest could be called a failure. I think I needed to be on the frozen pond to get the angle I wanted. But do you see the ghost to my right?