June Photo of the Month: Mountain Pride (Penstemon newberryi), Lee Vining Canyon, Eastern Sierra Nevada, CA

This month’s photo was taken four years ago on June 9, 2005. It was taken up Lee Vining Canyon on the Tioga Pass Road in the Eastern Sierra Nevada.  2005 was a big snow year in the Sierra Nevada and the day this was shot Tioga Pass still wasn’t opened up, (The pass opened on June 24th in 2005). Tammy and I had driven up there to check out the conditions. Ellery Lake was still half covered in nice, Tioga Lake was still completely froze and the snow was a good 5-6 feet deep.

But lower down, in Lee Vining Canyon, the Mountain Pride was blooming like crazy. We pulled over in an area where the flowers were very heavy and began shooting. Tammy saw this bunch of flowers first. She had climbed up some rocks and saw these guys blooming on a ledge. She called for me to come up there, but before I could get up there she had to get down since there was only room for one.

This was an area that I like to call a Creative Tripod Area. You have to get very creative with your tripod legs in areas like this. I was crouched on the ledge with rocks poking my butt and back, a little afraid to move to much. Tammy got a good picture of me taking this picture.  I was so focused on taking the shot that I never knew she took it.

I would say that this is one of my favorite wildflower I’ve taken. It was a challenge to shoot not only due to where the flowers were, but there was a good bit of harsh side lighting too. That’s the reason the flowers glow the way they do. I was using the cliff to my right to shield the lens from the side light coming in. This image is a good example of going a little out of the way to get a good shot.

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Mountain Pride, Lee Vining Canyon

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May Photo of the Month: Burro at Custer State Park, Black Hills of South Dakota

I thought that since I’m two weeks late on posting the Photo of the Month for May that I’d have some fun with this months photo. This months photo wasn’t shot by me, it was shot by Lynne, and it features one of the very friendly burros that guard the entrances to Custer State Park in the Black Hills of South Dakota.

As I rolled down the window to get a picture of the burro it decided to stick it’s head in and say hey.  That’s my hand to the left. My picture is pretty good, but this one that Lynne shot is much better. This shot just makes me laugh all over again as I remember the craziness with the burros and how hard we were laughing at the time.

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April Photo of the Month: Yellow Daffodils, Petrifying Springs Park, Kenosha WI

This months photo was taken on April 27, 2008 out at Petrifying Springs Park (Pets) here in Kenosha.  I didn’t know what to expect for wildflowers my first spring in Wisconsin, so imagine my surprise when I drove through Pets one afternoon and found daffodils blooming everywhere. I was pretty much floored. My only experience with daffodils was seeing them planted in flowerbeds. I’d never seen them growing wild like this.

The day I shot this was a cloudy, lightly raining kind of day. Lynne and I went out to Pets just to shoot the flowers. As I said, there were flowers all over the place, but I was looking for single groups like this one. This group was on a little hill, so by laying on my belly I was able to get an angle where I’m looking up at the flowers. When I first shot this I wasn’t sure about the leaves in the foreground. But after I got home and saw it I loved those leaves.  The detail in them is so cool. There was a little breeze blowing that day, so I had to be patient and wait for a break so the flowers wouldn’t blur with my 1/8 sec. shutter speed. I shot this picture 5 times just to make sure I got a sharp one.

Something else that happened that day, Lynne and I saw for the first time what each of us would go through to get a good shot. Both of us ended up laying on our bellies at some point breaking our necks in order to get the shot we wanted

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Daffodils at Petrifying Springs

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March Photo of the Month: Kenosha Pierhead Lighthouse, Kenosha WI USA

This months photo was taken on March 8, 2008, my very first day in Kenosha. It had snowed 2-3 inches that morning, but the roads were clear so Lynne and I drove down to the harbor. Little did I know then that Kenosha Harbor would become one of my favorite places and that this lighthouse would be the subject of many great images.

The light was awesome that afternoon. There was just enough light in the foreground and the dark sky really set it off and made the lighthouse glow.  This light is pretty common in the winter along the lake. I didn’t know that then and was pretty excited to shoot in it.

I was standing at the western end of the harbor and used my telephoto lens to zoom in on this shot. The birds in the water and in the air were problematic on a few of the shots. But they behaved themselves on this shot and everything came out sharp.

I drive by this scene all of the time now. But the day this image was made was my first glimpse of Kenosha Harbor. My first impression of a place I now love and call home.

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