I could watch clouds all day long. For my soul, being able to see the big sky is like what oxygen is to the lungs. And Alaska, with its epic vistas and prolific mountains create weather that is frequently dramatic, sometimes treacherous, and commonly spellbinding. Cloudless days are boring. During my recent trip in Denali…
The wet autumn season in Alaska has coughed up only a few clear sky days. My nine day stint in Denali Park during Aug/Sept saw many dark gray clouds and rain. However, there were a few moments of brilliance, with an emphasis on the “few”. The fall colors in the park were magnificent, vibrant and…
One Giant Salad Bull moose in August are finalizing their summer season of gorging themselves on vegetation to fuel the growth of their massive antlers which will serve them in establishing dominance during the autumn rut (or mating season). I photographed this bull moose browsing on alder leaves along the drainages in the tundra landscape…
I’ve had a few recent posts on panoramas, so I will continue in that format. In the near future, I’ll share my protocol for shooting panoramas, and the process of stitching them together. If I’m shooting a scene that merits a panorama format I try to capture it. With landscapes, this is a bit easier,…
Alaska’s big landscapes are hard to fit into a 35mm 2:3 ratio format. Sometimes, they beg for a 3:1, or more commonly referred to as a panorama format. I used to use a Fuji 6x17cm film camera especially designed for this, but now I simply blend images with a stitch program. Currently that is Photosphop…
It can be a challenge to photograph in the late morning on a sunny day. The light gets hot and harsh. However on this morning, the sunny foreground was complimented by some dramatic cloud action in the distance and the perpendicular lighting, although contrasty, made for some drama in lighting. At 10:30 am, this bull…
Photo gallery from my July 2010 float trip down the Marsh Fork of the Canning River, in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
Veterans of river travel know that waterways can be a creature of movement in more ways than one. In mountain country, rainfall in the hills all goes downhill by gravity and ends up ocean-bound via the river system. In Alaska’s arctic specifically, most river flow is dominated by snow melt or rain, unlike many of…
Contrary to what many non-photographers think, the bluebird day, cloudless skies are generally not welcomed by the landscape photographer-not me anyway. They might ensure first and last light upon the land, but there is little art in the sky without some shapes and lines offered by broken clouds moving dynamically overhead. It is these latter…
During a raft trip down the Marsh Fork of the Canning river, a long day hike up into the mountains led me to some vociferous plovers that nest in the region. While I have a number of Plover photos that I consider better than this one, I did photograph the bird because of the specific…