Tag: landscape

Thursday Throwback – 20

A view from a past commute using the byways, allowing me to appreciate scenic views like the somber beauty of Fruitlands Museum on a rainy day.

We’re staying out in Nature this week, even though it is a rather rainy day. There are those times when you’re happy to have a camera with you, so you can capture the mood that the landscape is presenting. A lot of my more local commutes have provided me with those opportunities, as they tended to allow for staying off the highways and partaking of the byways. For me a lot of my commute time was about making that switch from home to work and vice versa.

Here’s an image from one of those commutes in 2016…

Fruitlands’ Rainy Day

On my commute from Westford to home, one of the options was to take a road that goes past the Fruitlands Museum in Harvard, Massachusetts. At one point, a wonderful vista presents itself to look across the hills into the distance. On a clear day, mountains are visible. On this warm, rainy day low-hanging clouds presented themselves in many of the valleys, creating a somber, autumnal landscape.

Hope you get to stay dry and enjoy your day!

Thursday Throwback – 17

In September 2009, I explored the Harvard Forest in Petersham, Massachusetts, capturing its vibrant colors.

For this week’s edition I’m going back almost 16 years to September of 2009. During a day of exploring the colors of New England and finding interesting spots to photograph, I traversed part of the Harvard Forest in Petersham, Massachusetts.

Let’s take a look at what I captured there…

Harvard Forest Pond

This forest is an ecological research area of about 4000 acres that is managed by Harvard University. There are two major programs that are run on this property. The first is the Long Term Ecological Research (LTER) program, which is funded by the National Science Foundation to sturdy New England’s natural ecosystem. The second is the National Institute of Global Environmental Change program funded by the United States Department of Energy, which emphasizes the study of physical and biological processes in relation to climate change.

These are key programs to further our understanding of the impact that we’re having on our environment. We can hope that they are not affected by the current set of changes, but I do have concern about that.

Monday Moment

A look at “Driftwood Convergence”, an image that continues to draw me in, despite its flaws.

Over the past week or so, I’ve revisited some of my beach-themed images, which has been a lot of fun. So when I thought about today’s post, I decided to go with another beach image, albeit it an iPhone shot.

Let’s take a look…

Driftwood Convergence

Even though I see technical issues with this shot (Sun is blown out), I still like the overall composition effect, every time I see it. The convergence of driftwood, ocean, horizon and cloud cover just pull me in. Add to that the details of the shells on the log and I still like it.

For this post, I made some adjustments to the image, as I reduced the amount of color in the clouds quite a bit and also took out some of the exposure in that area. Overall I like the effect of the blue transition from water to clouds this way a bit better.

Sunday Serenity

The recent snowfall inspired a reflection on Doane’s Falls, a series of five waterfalls in Royalston, Massachusetts, along Lawrence Brook.

Getting snow over the past couple of days has reminded me of how wonderful it can look. I went through some of my photos that have snow in them and found an interesting one from 2016.

This was an interesting little waterfall that I found…

Doane’s Falls

Doane’s Falls is a series of five waterfalls along a 0.2 mile section of Lawrence Brook. They are located in Royalston, Massachusetts, and Lawrence Brook feeds into the Millers River.

The falls are named after Amos Doane, who operated a door, sash and blind mill on Lawrence Brook. Only the foundations of the mill remain nowadays.

It is a great place for hiking and exploring. Just be aware that swimming, wading and diving are prohibited, as a result of a series of injuries and deaths.

Spring will arrive soon!

Spring is almost here in the Northern Hemisphere; as we await Nature’s renewal, here’s a taste from Italia!

Only 10 or so days for the arrival of Spring in the Northern Hemisphere! As I’m eagerly awaiting the budding of trees and the greening of Nature in my area, I’ll continue with a Spring theme. Don’t worry, InfraRed photography will come back, as I’m looking forward to trying out my latest conversion.

For this week, let’s go back to 2017 and Italia…

Fields of Summer

Even though I titled this image ‘Fields of Summer’, I took this photo while it was still Spring. It was taken on May 25, 2017, outside of Montepulciano. On the way into town I had noticed these lovely fields but the sun was not in the right spot. I knew that there would be a better opportunity to get this shot after our visit. Luckily, the afternoon light came in pretty nicely and resulted in acceptable wallpaper for my system. There’s nothing like using your own images for background wallpaper for inspiration!

Strokkur Geysir

Today we visit the Strokkur geyser. Observe the blue bubble indicating impending eruptions and catch the right moment!

I’m confident that many of you are by now expecting that we travel to Iceland for Tuesdays. I’m planning to keep this theme going for a good while until you either have seen enough Iceland photos or I run out of them. The latter is just an excuse to go back for more photography! This week we’re visiting one of the iconic geysers of Iceland: Strokkur.

Here’s an eruption sequence for you to enjoy…

During the August 2022 trip, we got to spend about an hour at Strokkur, which gave me enough time to get a sense of its rhythm. The eruptions occur about every 8-10 minutes, but not every eruption reaches the same height.

I figured out that the important aspect is to keep an eye on the blue bubble. You can almost feel the geyser breathe through the expansion and contraction of the bubble. After several smaller eruptions, I had a sense that this might be the one!

I was definitely not disappointed. As a matter of fact the height was even more than I anticipated! This sequence of 7 images was shot over about 2 seconds. It may have been a gray, rainy day, but the spectacle was worth it nonetheless!

Will Spring Appear Soon?

A visit to Bear’s Den Falls in New Salem, Massachusetts, seeking to capture its snowy beauty after recent snowfall.

As we’re getting to the tail end of Winter, I took a drive out to New Salem, Massachusetts. I had the goal to explore what Bear’s Den Falls looked like in the snow, as we had a good bit of snow over the past week, and the sun was out! I also took into account that we had some warmer days, and was hoping for a bit of volume.

This is what I found…

Bear’s Den in Winter

As you can see, the falls are still ice and snow covered, which reduces their effect in a photo. Also, there was still a lot of debris from the high winds that went through the treetops over the past week.

I will definitely want to return to find something closer to this…

Bear’s Den Summer

There will be more opportunities in the months ahead!

Regardless, it was a nice day to go for a drive and hike the ice and snow to see Bear’s Den. And in my explorations, I did find another photo opportunity.

I will post that one in a little while!

iPhone Friday

That must be a really good camera! A striking image of Joshua trees at Gold Butte National Monument

You must have a really good camera! I’m confident that each of you have heard that from someone, when they looked at a particularly successful image of yours. It’s a comment that always makes me snicker (at least internally). I have heard this in all forms. As we all know, the best camera is the one you have with you!

In this case, I took this shot with the lesser of my 2 cameras…

Joshua Tree Sun

During my Valley of Fire State Park trip from two years ago, we took a side trip to Gold Butte National Monument. This area is best known for its stunning rock formations. There also were some amazing looking Joshua trees to be found.

The trees in this shot struck a wonderful pose for me, and the Sun cooperated as well. It was much quicker to take this shot with my iPhone, so I went for convenience.

And, no, I didn’t crop this shot, as I like it just the way it is. To my eye, it has a nice balance and lines and shapes that work. It’s just a really good camera…

Nubble Light in Snow

Come join us on Cape Neddick to admire Nubble Light in the snow. A beautiful, albeit chilly day along the Maine coast.

A rather fresh image for today! Yesterday, my wife and I took a drive up to Maine to do some shopping for our upcoming trip. We both had the day off, so it was nice to get away and not have either weekend or summer crowds. On the way back, I suggested we stop by York Beach, as I wanted to see how the snow looked.

As it was a gorgeous day, I found this…

Nubble Light in Snow

With this beautiful, although chilly day, the blues looked stunning with the relatively calm sea surrounding the lighthouse.

And yes, my wife was much more successful in her shopping than I was!

Silhouetted Sunrise

Another stunning sunrise moment at Cadillac Mountain in Maine to warm your day.

A couple of weeks ago I posted about my experience of seeing the very early sunrise from Cadillac Mountain in Maine (The Sun Shall Rise). I’ve never taken so many photos of a single sunrise, so there are lots more to share! We were lucky enough to get a gorgeous day for this event, which provided plenty of opportunities.

Here’s an image that I took a little later than the one in the other post…

Sunrise Silhouette

As the sun was getting higher into the sky, I noticed this couple admiring the amazing view over the water. This immediately gave me the idea for this shot, so I took my tripod and camera to find the right spot. Lucky for me, they were mesmerized and didn’t move!

If I could have posed them, I would prefer them to be a bit close to each other, but beggars…

What I enjoy most about getting shots like this is the sense of scale that we can provide as humans. We’re wanderers within a vast universe. I’m always filled with awe about how much there is to discover and learn about our cosmos, so let’s keep exploring and learning!