Tag: Lone

Posted on by

Lone Tree Moon Silhouette

Lone Tree Moon Silhouette
Lone Tree Moon Silhouette

Lone Tree Moon Silhouette

(May 2020, third/last supermoon of the year) I was fortunate to have worked them all. This month I only had one opportunity to work it against the landscape. I have 4 quality images from this month’s full moon which is about par for the course. Without a doubt this image is the best one I have obtained from this combination.

This one is somewhat similar to others I’ve taken and I’ve shot this tree many times as it’s only a mile from my driveway. However the burgundy (muted pink light) alpenglow, details in the dark and the dynamic range of this one makes my heart pitty pat… 📸📸

I’ve taken a few photos of this tree in front of various astronomic occurrences. It is indeed a lone tree on that position about 1000 yards away from where I took this image.

Photographing images like this a combination of finding the right position in x/y space, timing and distance is z, and that position moves with the speed of the moon. This makes using Tripods very difficult as you have a moving target. Maybe a monopod. This however was handheld. Distance is your friend here from that Lone tree.

Practicing this kind of photography has found me on my butt more times than any other tripping over sage. The moon is constantly moving, I’m usually on some parallel ridge walking forwards (as the moon is rising and to the left a bit while looking through a 2 foot long lens (tube) and not at my feet with sage brush around on uneven ground.Bear with me as capturing this kind of image is a “sub-hobby” of mine within the general photography that I do. I find it a serious challenge to get terrestrial objects in the same focal plane as the moon or the sun in twilight or darker conditions. Just like this. This composition is a tough one to capture in this low light/long focal field combination. 📸

2×3 aspect to 3 feet. Rested 1200 mm lens on “Clever Girl’s” drivers window.

Location: near the Bliss Dinosaur Ranch, Wyoming/Montana borderlands

Title: Lone Tree Moon Silhouette

!– The text field –>
Posted on by

Lone Tulip Battling Spring

Lone Tulip Battling Spring
Lone Tulip Battling Spring

Lone Tulip Battling Spring

Living in a remote secluded ranch for 20 years, I’m sort of used to isolation. Many of you are battling this “stuck at home base” period of our lives feeling alone. If you feel you are battling the elements here, you know, swimming upstream, up the creek without a paddle or are just plain isolated, I understand trust me. There are not enough hours in the day as it is up here, just add more on top lolol……

To keep my equilibrium, I try to put my world into perspective daily then isolate each problem I come upon placing it into it’s own little box. Take those boxes off the pile one at a time to deal with it. Funny how some boxes disappear on their own… This lovely flower, at the prime of it’s labors, covered by an overnight chill and snow trying to kill it. Just one little box in it’s life. What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. 👀

The ability to shrug off these burdens that we usually put on our own back is a learned skill. It’s easier to sit back and analyze arm chair quarterback others but we sometimes drift to our own foibles under this assault around us. That is a mistake and causes depression. I find it’s the second guessing that causes the most stress in life. Regret, buyers remorse…etc. So I try like heck not to do it. Worrying about something that has past is a waste of energy. The Flower took the insult shrugging it off knowing that it would be warmer later. The earth relenting to the innate ability of the species to know when to hibernate and when to grow. Like most things that seem terrible as they are happening. The tulip somehow understood the melting snow and the warmth would be coming that morning.☯

“May you live in interesting times. ” variously attributed to: Chinese Curse? Austen Chamberlain? Frederic R. Coudert? Joseph Chamberlain? Diplomatic Staff? Albert Camus? Arthur C. Clarke? Robert F. Kennedy? Hillary Rodham Clinton?

Location: Bliss Dinosaur Ranch, Wyoming / Montana borderlands.

Title: Lone Tulip Battling Spring

Posted on by

Full Moon Lone Tree

Full Moon Lone Tree
Full Moon Lone Tree

Full Moon Lone Tree

When I see a Full moon rising at the horizon, I’m all about getting it behind and in focus with terrestrial objects. It’s always a good thing when this particular tree lines up with astronomic objects (sun moon). This particular lone tree up high on a ridge has faced the worst wind/weather this high country can throw at it. It is a true old soldier. (April Egg/Fish/Pink Moon 2020)

The Lone Tree on a Ridge is about 1/4 miles out from the parallel ridge is was working in the dark for this capture. The moon is a little further behind the ridge.

Photographic Musings: Clear as a bell this evening. I worked the sunset but this moon rose about 80 minutes after that. It was dark and a true night sky. About half the game of photography is knowing when you got the shot and it’s time to move on. Otherwise you spend too much time at the site and miss other opportunities. I move pretty rapidly from interesting situation/alignments of the sun or the moon by driving along parallel ridges. This I captured only because I was moving along at an operational tempo most seal teams would envy lolol. Light is VERY fleeting.

I work the Moon’s “Shadow” line on parallel “opposite” ridge by driving along it and “seeing” what develops as I move. This is where the cool stuff suddenly pops up to photograph as in “I know it when I see it”. There are times I see lighting that is virtually impossible to capture with the technology. This moon is relatively easy by comparison lol. Of course, a full moon behind trees is a very common occurrence. It happens every time a full moon is up, at many angles millions of places around a woods. It’s being in the right place at the right time with the right gear to catch the image. That is the hard part.📷

Location: Bliss Dinosaur Ranch, Wyoming/Montana borderlands. (Wyotana)

Title: Full Moon Lone Tree

Posted on by

Lone Tree Lamp Shade

Lone Tree Lamp Shade
Lone Tree Lamp Shade

Lone Tree Lamp Shade

Up here in the backcountry I use what ever is handy to reduce the glare from that big Light Bulb in the sky.

Lone Tree on Veiled Sun. When I get a heavily veiled sun, I’m all about getting it behind and in focus with terrestrial objects. It’s always a good thing when this particular tree lines up with astronomic objects (sun moon). The Lone Tree on a Ridge is about 1/4 miles out in this capture. The sun is a little further behind.

Photographic Musings:

The clouds were very thick and obscuring with the sun blinking in and out from behind the veil. I am as always, reactive to the light with only a bit of premonition to guide me to the next spot from here. Half the game of photography is knowing when you got the shot and it’s time to move on. Otherwise you spend too much time at the site and miss other opportunities. I move pretty rapidly from interesting situation/alignments of the sun or the moon by driving along parallel ridges. I work the “Shadow” line by driving it and “seeing” what develops as I move. The cool stuff to photograph as in “I know it when I see it”.

There are times I see things that are virtually impossible to capture. A fully lit sun behind this tree is a common occurrence but without neutral density glass filters in front of the camera, even these Sony Super Cameras , this would be impossible. The tree limbs would be totally washed out. I never use glass filters or even do I use a pretty much standard UV haze filter. I find they get in the way of the image more than “fixing ” what they do. A UV filter does protect your lens glass from scratches though and is probably worth it for what you would do mostly. I point cameras at the sun a lot and glass in front of the lens has been an issue in the past for me. Just saying….

Disclaimer:

Don’t point a DSLR camera into the sun. It can blind you if you look into the eyepiece and it will probably burn a spot in your digital image chip in the camera. I use a full frame mirrorless Sony Alpha 7R 2’s ,3’s and 4’s which I routinely point at the sun. Resultant… no apparent damage to the cameras over several years of this.

Location: Bliss DInosaur Ranch, Wyoming/Montana borderlands (Wyotana)

Title: Lone Tree Lamp Shade

Posted on by

Lone Tree Golden Background

Lone Tree Golden Background
Lone Tree Golden Background

Lone Tree Golden Background

I admire the strength and tenacity of a lone tree on a ridge. They are alone in their survival subject to the wild Wyotana weather. 80 mph winds here just about every year. Cold cold cold windchills. Drying winds with only 14 inches of precipitation a year.

The hardships for this tree have been ongoing for at least 100 years for this isolated survivor. Pine trees grow where their pine cone opened and released the fertile seed after a local grass fire triggered it. The heat causes the cones to release their seeds. I haven’t done a ring count but 100 years seems right for it’s size. Such can be deceiving though. Really big Pines here are hundreds of years old. By comparison, this is not a huge pine, about 30 feet high but very wide for it’s height. This shot was from across a canyon from a parallel ridge to the east. (behind me)

The Contrast of course is what this photo is all about. The lighting was diffuse so the sky wasn’t terribly interesting that day . Flat light can make for big contrasts between darker shades and mid-tones. The golden fields of grass ready to bale this last fall provide the backdrop for this old warrior of the ridges.

Many of the trees in this local area were burned in the late 1930’s by “fires that burned until the first snows fell. This tree is certainly remote on this hill with the closest other tree being several hundred feet distant. I believe this field has been cleared of sage early on. They did a lot of that clearing by hand. Horse and pulled single row plow back in 1906 when what was to become this ranch, was first settled.

Lone Tree Golden Background

Posted on by

Savanna Tree High Backcountry

Savanna Tree High Backcountry
Savanna Tree High Backcountry

Savanna Tree High Backcountry

I took this a week ago as this posts with quite a Twilight Behind a Lone Tree on a Remote Ridge. This one of about a dozen favorite lone trees of mine being on a very high ridge that is approachable from both sides at least on foot from this side AND I can get far enough away to fit it all in to the frame. These are all requirements for me to get this kind of capture. Topography and astronomy has to coincide with Botany. That’s a lot of coincidence lol.

Twilight skies are notoriously color boosted by many artists. I would suggest to you that if anything, the real show was actually much more vivid in person. I stopped a bit light on saturation finalizing this as I’d like it to be photorealistic to what I experienced. It was beautiful. It’s easy to be enamoured with silhouettes of lone trees against an active twilight sky show. I keep them real though and will tell you if I seriously mess with color. It’s seldom I mess with the highlights of an image. My tendency is to bring hidden detail out of the shadow in the digital darkroom. . I did none of that with this image for the silhouette effect. It is pretty much as raw out of the camera.

This capture has the triangle formed by the clouds and the hill slope. Geometry formed in an image is always a bonus “hero”. Every photo needs a few heros. Hero’s defined here as something that draws the eye, brings forth a memory, or is just a nice series of colors or gradients. Something attractive.

Location: Ridge 1, Bliss Dinosaur Ranch, Wyoming/Montana borderlands.

Savanna Tree High Backcountry

Posted on by

Lone Tree Sky Gradient

Lone Tree Sky Gradient
Lone Tree Sky Gradient

Lone Tree Sky Gradient

While I admire the tenacity of this lone tree. Living with out the benefit of the group shelter from the incessant Wyoming/Montana winds. Here on the high ridges all things are buffeted by hurricane winds yearly. The slopes leading up to them will enhance and focus the wind at times worsening the situation. Having an unparalleled view is a benefit, of this old sentinels exposed existence.

If this tree is certainly 100 years old (probably 200+), it has seen a mininum of 36500 sunrises and 36500 sunsets. I’ve only photographed well over 1000 from start to finish during my photographic travels. I’ve seen virtually (almost) every shade on the pantone color swatch book in the natural sky. And many of those missing color representatives created by others using excessive “filters” to enhance their highlights posted on the internet.. Some of the colors I’ve seen created by others are certainly un-natural. ART. The use of that color slider control on the phone are definitely missing in nature lolololol. I try REALLY HARD to be a photorealist. Blue Snow is a classic example. I’ve seen blue snow twice in my life. Both circumstances were in EARLY Civil Twilight. I see it daily posted in the forums. Generally I live in a blue snow free zone.

The color gradients I see in this image are the Alpenglow equivalent of a rainbow. It’s sort of the wrong order of colors as a classic rainbow but there are refractions here going on. I have to get up to the ridges at least 1/2 an hour early. Getting into position this time of year is always in question and often in doubt. I’m on foot for this particular location for this shot. .

Location: Bliss Dinosaur Ranch, Wyoming/Montana borderlands

Title: Lone Tree Sky Gradient

Posted on by

Lone Tree on Veiled Sun

Lone Tree on Veiled Sun
Lone Tree on Veiled Sun

Lone Tree on Veiled Sun. When I get a heavily veiled sun, I’m all about getting it behind and in focus with terrestrial objects. It’s always a good thing when this particular tree lines up with astronomic objects (sun moon). The Lone Tree on a Ridge is about 1/4 miles out in this capture. The sun is a little further behind.

Photographic Musings:

The clouds were very thick and obscuring with the sun blinking in and out from behind the veil. I am as always, reactive to the light with only a bit of premonition to guide me to the next spot from here. Half the game of photography is knowing when you got the shot and it’s time to move on. Otherwise you spend too much time at the site and miss other opportunities. I move pretty rapidly from interesting situation/alignments of the sun or the moon by driving along parallel ridges. I work the “Shadow” line by driving it and “seeing” what develops as I move. The cool stuff to photograph as in “I know it when I see it”.

There are times I see things that are virtually impossible to capture. A fully lit sun behind this tree is a common occurrence but without neutral density glass filters in front of the camera, even these Sony Super Cameras , this would be impossible. The tree limbs would be totally washed out. I never use glass filters or even do I use a pretty much standard UV haze filter. I find they get in the way of the image more than “fixing ” what they do. A UV filter does protect your lens glass from scratches though and is probably worth it for what you would do mostly. I point cameras at the sun a lot and glass infront of the lens has been an issue in the past for me. Just saying….

Disclaimer:

Don’t point a DSLR camera into the sun. It can blind you if you look into the eyepiece and it will probably burn a spot in your digital image chip in the camera. I use a full frame mirrorless Sony Alpha 7R 2’s ,3’s and 4’s which I routinely point at the sun. Resultant… no apparent damage to the cameras over several years of this.

If your buying gear soon….

Mirrorless Cameras: I’m not blind now because I look through the a Mirrorless cameras eyepiece which has a video screen behind the glass so no direct path of light to blind you. Newer mirrorless cameras do this video thing. Older Designed DSLR’s don’t show you your image until AFTER YOU CLICK. Mirrorless Cameras show you your settings changes live on screen and you get what you see when you click not after. If your shopping for cameras, I would tell you to buy mirrorless. Particularly if you work outside with cameras. Studio it’s not critical either way.

Location: Bliss DInosaur Ranch, Wyoming/Montana borderlands.

Title: Lone Tree on Veiled Sun

Posted on by

Lone Tree Ridge Sunrise

Lone Tree Ridge Sunrise
Lone Tree Ridge Sunrise

This is called Lone Tree Ridge Sunrise. The Clouds were such that I could point the camera into the furnace and actually see details on the edge. Such conditions where I can catch a sun surface like this are not common. The necessary glare filter here is natural cloud cover. I have a lot a captures from this morning using that veiled sun but this is one of my favorite Lone trees. It’s actually alive but it looks pretty scraggly lol.

My arrival at this alignment here is about 15 minutes too late. If the sun was lower I would have moved back from the ridge to keep the angle. Thusly more of Lone Tree would have been above the ridge . The tree is just behind the crest from this angle. Still the effect was very interesting to my artsy side so I finished the image. The yellow sun is natural as the camera saw it. It is way to bright for me to say what color it was outside the cameras protective video environment. Looking at this scene through anything but a mirrorless camera (not a DLSR) could blind you . Pick the wrong camera and you can also burn a hole in your sensor chip. Double trouble with less expensive cameras so be aware.

I worked about 15 locations over a 10 mile stretch of Wyoming Backroads that morning. It was way to muddy to go into the backcountry and tear up my two track roads. I’ll wait until it’s frozen again to venture up into the backcountry.

Location: Bliss DInosaur Ranch, Wyoming/Montana borderlands.

Title: Lone Tree Ridge Sunrise

Posted on by

Twilight Behind A Lone Tree on a Ridge

Twilight Behind A Lone Tree on a Ridge
Twilight Behind A Lone Tree on a Ridge

I took this a week ago as this posts with quite a Twilight Behind a Lone Tree on a Remote Ridge. This is a favorite lone tree of mine being on a very high ridge that is approachable from both sides at least on foot from this side AND I can get far enough away to fit it all in to the frame.

Twilight skies are notoriously color boosted. I would suggest to you that if anything, the real show was actually much more vivid in person but I stopped a bit light on saturation on this one as I’d like it to be believable lolol. It was beautiful.

Location: Ridge 1, Bliss Dinosaur Ranch, Wyoming/Montana borderlands.

Posted on by

Hot Cherry Sunset

Hot Cherry Sunset
Hot Cherry Sunset

There the Smoke Veiled Sunset was all about a “Hot Cherry” look. I think this image channels Japan very nicely lolol. Not bad from the borderlands….

This is ridge 1 taken from Ridge 2 looking into a terribly summer forest fire smoke filled sky. This is what it really looked like. Remember I try REALLY hard to be a photorealist.

Location: Bliss DInosaur Ranch, Wyoming/Montana..

Posted on by

Lone Tree Sunset

Lone Tree Sunset

The Lone Tree on the remote back country ridge line has been a sentinel there for decades of high winds and exposure.. The soil he’s growing on is clay and rock with just scrub brush and sage around it. Nothing special for it, but this tree is one of my favorite subjects. He has a 180 mile wide horizon to horizon view from it’s perch. I can see him from close to far away both sides of the ridge for both sunrise and sunset.

If you like what I do, you might follow my social media pages, or my personal Facebook page where I answer questions and respond to comments.

Location: Bliss DInosaur Ranch, Wyoming/Montana borderlands.