Conform to the norm and simultaneously express your individuality? Be the same but be different? Separate from parental influence and at the same time show you love them and the security they provide? The high school years are full of these dichotomies as teens grow and become individuals. Continue reading
One of the greatest achievements a young man can achieve is earning his Eagle Scout award. It requires learning outdoor skills, physical fitness, good citizenship, and demonstrated leadership ability. It also usually takes the support of friends and family over a period of several years. Continue reading
Pocket cameras give us the freedom to move around, compose quickly, and avoid using a heavy tripod. However, like almost everything in life, there are tradeoffs. One of the most critical is keeping the camera steady. Continue reading
In mid-July I taught Pocket Camera Wildflower Photography for the North Cascades Institute at the NCI Environmental Learning Center on Diablo Lake. It’s a beautiful facility and I had a sold-out complement of fifteen students for the better part of three days. We started with the technical foundation of understanding camera settings and controls. Next I introduced aesthetic concepts, followed by a full-day field trip hike to Easy Pass where everyone practiced what they learned and I worked with each student individually to help them solve problems and improve their images. In the evening we projected favorites from each student and I critiqued their work in a positive and supportive way. On the third day we hiked and photographed on Sauk Mountain and I continued the one-on-one instruction. Continue reading
Every garden should have at least one plant that makes every visitor stop in their tracks and ask “what’s that?” Maybe its even one your spouse questions why you’d grow it. Continue reading
There may be a handful of hermits out there who hole up away from the rest of society and shun connections with other people. The rest of us crave relationships and for most people family connections are the ones that matter the most. Those connections run deep – think about all the people doing genealogy research to learn about their ancestors. Relationships span time and distance. The return of a parent or child after an absence is a joyous occasion and cause for celebration. Continue reading
Last Saturday I made a trip up the North Cascades Highway to scout out locations to take my Pocket Camera Wildflower Photography class at North Cascades Institute on Tuesday. The trail I used the last time I taught the class, Heather Pass and Maple Pass, was reported to still have a lot of snow. So I chose the Easy Pass trail, which climbs reasonably gently for a couple of miles through wonderful forest and then breaks out into the subalpine and alpine splendor.
Since I was teaching pocket camera photography, I only carried my Canon S70 with me to photograph the flowers. My idea was to create a video slideshow to introduce my students to the trail they’d be hiking and to show what can be done with little cameras.
The class has now come and gone, with 15 delightful students who learned a lot. I learned from them, too. The North Cascades Learning Center on Diablo Lake is a great place to have a class, with comfortable facilities, a splendid setting, and outrageously good food. The evaluations are coming in and they’re looking good. I hope to be able to teach the class again next year.
In addition to hiking to Easy Pass, we also hiked and photographed on Sauk Mountain, one of my all-time favorite easy-access wildflower hikes. Following our Tuesday hike and photo session everyone chose three favorite images and we had a group critique with their photos on the big screen. Some of the students had some very nice photos to share.
The slideshow was created in ProShow Producer, a Windows-only program. I used the random effects tool, and then manually adjusted image movement and transitions when the auto feature produced something that I didn’t like. All the images were processed in Adobe Lightroom 3 before bringing them into Producer.
We finally got our first day of summer on July 7, right on schedule. It was the evening of the Birchwood Garden Club July members-only private garden tour, a delightful opportunity to visit four very nice Bellingham gardens. If you’re not a member of an active garden club, like Birchwood, you’re missing out on seeing gardens you otherwise wouldn’t get to see. Thank you, Sheri Lambert, for organizing the tour.
The four gardening families that welcomed us included Ira Penn and Dee Dee O’Connor, gardening on Alabama Hill; Lynette Jensen and Joan Wayne, each gardening on south hill; and garden designer Susann Schwiesow, gardening in Edgemore. Each garden is unique, appropriate to the site, representative of the personalities of the owners and designers, and a joy to explore. There were plant surprises and nice design elements in each garden.
As has become my custom on garden tours, I did all my photography with my iPhone 3G. This very sunny evening with strong contrast pointed out the limitations of the camera. Everything is completely automatic except for where you hold it to compose the image. Auto everything works pretty well in even light, but with bright highlights and deep shadows the camera tended to overexpose, washing out the bright spots and opening the shadows more than I like. Auto white balance doesn’t always know what to do with flowers and foliage, either. The tradeoff is that the camera is small, light, and already in my pocket.
I processed all the images in Adobe Lightroom 3, adjusting brightness and contrast, sometimes tweaking color balance, and applying a vignette to emphasize the center area. I spent less than a minute on each photo. I’ll be talking about the process and showing the technique in a program at the Garden Writers Association annual symposium in Dallas this September.
Nooksack Falls is a popular tourist destination along the Mount Baker Highway just a few miles east of the tiny town of Glacier, Washington. The usual vantage point is from the north side of the river and at the top of the falls. There’s a stout fence to keep people from accidentally falling off the cliff and to discourage people from getting too close to the edge.
I’ve photographed the falls several times in the past 20 years and we almost always take out-of-town visitors there when we head to the mountains. It’s the largest waterfall in the county and very accessible.
However, you can’t see the whole falls from the standard observation point. For years, I’ve looked across the river, and across Wells Creek which flows into the Nooksack at the base of the falls. There’s a moss-covered boulder field above the creek and river, drenched in spray from the falls. I’ve thought that there should be a way to get to the south side of the river, and down those mossy boulders to river level. I tried once a few years ago and didn’t make it, probably because I failed to plot a compass bearing to follow through the woods.
Today, pretty much on a whim, I decided to head to the falls again. This time I plotted a bearing on the topo map before heading out. I drove up the road to the Skyline Divide trailhead and parked at the second righthand switchback. From there it’s only a quarter mile, and about 400 feet down, to the base of the falls. Following my compass I headed through the woods, carpeted with a dense layer of stairstep moss and decaying logs.
I came to a vantage point on the canyon rim overlooking the falls and photographed from there. Then I scouted a route down the cliff to the boulder field below. I scrambled down and photographed from several vantage points. The photo here is one of my favorites.
I haven’t processed them yet, but I shot a couple of multi-frame panoramas to stitch together. I’m thinking a big print might be nice. Since I knew how big my subject was, I only carried two lenses, 24-105 and 16-35, and used them both. Scrambling down and up with a tripod in hand was a little dicey, but never really dangerous and well worth the effort.
Now I can cross “see Nooksack Falls from the other side” off my to-do list.
The Skagit Symphony Orchesta’s annual fundraising garden tour, Gardens of Note, was held last weekend. This is the second year I’ve headed down to our neighboring county to check out some wonderful gardens and I wasn’t disapointed. Here’s a condensed visit to the gardens.
