Dots of color.....

A few days ago I was in northwest Wisconsin on my way to Pattison State Park. I wasn't familiar with the road I was on and found myself driving past a prairie like grassland with individual pine trees sprinkled across the landscape. Every so often I thought I was seeing vibrant dots of orange amid the green grass.  

 

I slowed down to better see what the color was, and finally pulled over to find beautiful wood lilies in full bloom under big billowy clouds.

 

 

 

Lucky for me the flowers were growing at a state wildlife area and the land was publicly owned.

 

 

 

So I grabbed a camera and a couple of lenses and went to see what I could do.

 

 

 

I had a 180mm macro on, but quickly realized I wanted to capture the flowers in their environment not tight images of the blooms.

 

 

 

I switched to a 10-22mm lens and got low to the ground to try and capture the color of the flowers and the drama of the sky above.

 

 

 

It was 75 degrees and got pretty hot laying in the grass and waiting for interesting clouds to form and blow over.

 

 

 

I tried a few images with fill flash and a reflector off to the side to bounce some light under the flowers.

 

 

 

I spent almost two hours trying to capture the colors and skies.

 

 

 

Before I left I did take the time to isolate individual flowers with the macro lens.

 

 

 

The breeze was pretty persistent and it took some patience to make sharp images but,

 

 

 

the time was well spent and I was really happy with the images I captured.

 

 

 

I'm thankful for happy accidents. Like taking an unknown road and finding vibrant dots of color.

















Reflections...

 

My dad and I spent the afternoon by Lake Namekagon and I finally got some nice water lily photos. 

 

 

This yellow water lily (Nuphar advena) looks ideal in the pleasing afternoon light. 

 

 

 

By laying on the ground at the edge of the pond with a 700mm lens and the camera resting on a beanbag I could isolate the flower and get the reflections I liked. 

 

 

The mosquitoes were bad. It was 83 degrees, and I was hot wearing jeans and a long sleeve shirt to keep the bugs off, but this set up worked a lot better than my last attempt at water lilies. 

 

 

About a week ago I tried to use a shorter lens and went into the water after some white water lilies in Madison. 

 

 

It didn't work out to well. I didn't get any pictures and I got wet, but I did keep the camera dry as I learned that the lake was deeper than I thought. 

 

 

When we first saw these flowers I was hesitant to get out and shoot them because of the bugs and the heat.

 

 

 

I'm glad I eventually took the leap, tried using a long lens, and embraced the bugs. If not, I wouldn't have learned how to shoot water lilies.











 



Sometimes it hurts to do this.....

 

This may look like an idyllic northern Wisconsin lake on a beautiful summer afternoon.

 

 

 

And it is....

 

 

 

but it was also my own personal bug hell. By that I mean that I was accosted by thousands of black flies and then later by hoards of ginormous and persistent mosquitoes.

 

 

 

It had rained the day before and I was lucky enough to have some rubber boots with me so wet feet weren't going to be a problem. The thing is, I was wearing shorts and as soon as I got out of the car I had swarms of black flies buzzing around me and biting any and all exposed skin. 

 

 

 

The sky looked promising and I thought the lake might make for some beautiful images, so I took my camera and tripod and headed off into the woods. So far so good, the bugs weren't that big of deal as I walked towards the lake shore.

 

 

 

It was only once I reached the shore and began to set up my tripod that the real assault began. The black flies were swarming in such numbers that their buzzing started to affect me. The incessant humming up and around my head and face almost made it seem like my body was actually vibrating. Meanwhile dozens of their kind were feeding on my exposed skin. Not only on my thighs, and knees, and upper calves, but inside the boots down to my ankles and up under my shorts. Their bites were painful and caused red welts and marks that lasted more than a week.

 





 

But the light was good, and the view was better so I stuck with it long enough to make these images. Once I made it back to the car I was relieved to be out of the bug swarm but kept shivering (almost like when you've seen something really scary and get the heebee jeebees). I seemed to be having bad feeling flashbacks to my bug experience.

 

Though the light had left my little lake there was still light in the sky as I drove down the road searching for another lake to reflect any possible sunset.

 

At Clam Lake I walked down to the shore and was fed on by an even larger hoard of mosquitoes. These weren't any regular sized mosquitoes, these were super sized.

 

 

Notice the many dots and specks in this photo...

 

 

 

each and every one is a mosquito, and I think every one of them bit me before I finally left.

 

I set the camera on a tripod, composed the image, focused, used my hat to wave it in front of the lens in order to move all of the mosquitoes, and  pressed the remote shutter release. There were just too many, no mater what I did the ridiculous number of bugs remained in the images. All the while an equal or greater number of ginormous mosquitoes were biting me everywhere imaginable. 



If nothing else, this was a new personal record for number of bug bites sustained and discomfort tolerated.

P.S. I don't know if it's true or what it means, but I looked up both species of bugs after I got home and read that it's only the females that bite.

Only a day or two

This mayfly will only live for a day or two as an adult.

Just long enough to dry its wings and look for mates.

 

 

 

 

I only spent a few minutes making these images before this mayfly flew away to live its very brief adult life.

It's All a Matter of Perspective

Trying to see familiar things in a different and pleasing way, that's what I've been after lately.

In the past I looked for green grass and foliage to provide an out of focus background for colorful flower images. So it was a leap for me to point my camera towards the nearby gravel road in order to create these images of Indian Paintbrush flowers(Castilleja coccinea).

The flowers were in prime condition and I'm really pleased that I didn't shoot it in my usual way and then leave. By spending the time and trying to imagine a different view I ended up with some beautiful images.

By way of comparrison, here are some Indian Paintbrush flowers I had shot a little earlier.

Though I don't think these images are bad, I much prefer the almost painting like quality of the earlier ones.

Whatever your preference, you really can't go wrong when photographing Indian Paintbrush. The colors are amazing.











It was late and the bugs were bad, but I'm glad I stopped...

Well after sunset on Fish Creek and Lake Superior.

I've been trying to figure out how best to photograph a certain area of Lake Superior for a few days now. With mixed results.

Tonight's plan was to wear my swim trunks, take my camera and tripod and stay in the lake.

After just a few minutes I found this painted turtle. I tried to get some photos, but it was tough going. There was no dry land or shoreline to speak of. There was no good place to put the turtle down and get to work.

It took some effort, but eventually I found a log out in the water and made a few images.

Things didn't start out smoothly. Or end smoothly, for that matter. I was kneeling in water about 2 feet deep and working with my camera on a tripod just above the water.

I used to be a lot more cautious with my cameras and water. At some point I realized that the cameras were only tools and of little value if I couldn't take them where the best photos were possible. 

So I'd set the turtle on the log, capture a couple of images and it would slide off and swim away. I'd catch the turtle and do it again. After only a couple of times I realized it wasn't the answer, but as I stood up to catch the turtle the sand under the tripod shifted and the camera was heading towards the drink. I grabbed it quickly.

The lens and body were a little wet, but I caught it before the entire thing was submerged. I used my cotton t shirt to dry it and blew the water off of and out of any places I could. After the camera was about as dry as I could get it I took a photo to see if it was still working. Jackpot! It seemed no worse for wear.

So I set the turtle free and made a few images of it in the shallow water as it left.

The timing was pretty good and when I looked up I saw this cloud to the east. 

To the west the sun was almost at the horizon.

I kept scanning the sky for good looking clouds, color, and compositions as the light quickly changed.

These clouds presented a more subtle view to the east.

And red, blue, and black to the west.

When I got done I was standing knee deep in the lake a couple of hundred yards from the nearest land. It was well after dark when I carefully put my camera into its mostly dry case and picked up my tripod to walk back to the car. I had at least a half a mile to walk through the lake and I couldn't see the bottom now that the sun was gone. I was leaving a different way than I had come in and didn't know how deep it was. The water was warm and it had been a hot day, so it was still a pretty good place to be.

I walked through the water back to the nearest shoreline. There were reeds and plants all the way into the water, no beaches to walk on. So I walked next to the land in the lake until I got to a point where the bottom dropped out. It went from knee deep to waist deep in one step and it was only getting deeper. So I chose to backtrack.

Plan B was to cut across a fairly wide river channel at its mouth where it met the lake. If I got across I could walk along that shore up to a road that would take me back to the car. I didn't know how deep it would be and any concern I had was for my camera. So I held the camera bag on my shoulder with my left hand and put the tripod over my right shoulder. If it got too deep I'd drop the tripod and do whatever it took to keep the camera dry.

With that I headed across. It never got deeper than my chest and I made it to the other side with my camera and tripod still dry. As I walked in the water along that shore I noticed the sky to the west and stopped to get the camera out again.

It was late and the bugs were bad, but I'm glad I stopped.

This is what I saw.