Summer may be my favorite season in the north country, but is this really summer? It has been a cold and sometimes wet May and June. However, the late spring and early summer flowers do not seem to mind too much.
What is my favorite part of summer? Daylight that stretches to almost 10:00 p.m., green leaves on the trees, thunderstorms, sunsets, no shirts, no shoes, birds singing, wildflowers and oh yes, hopefully it is warm.
I have many plans for capturing images this summer. Just ahead is a trip to Michigan's Upper Peninsula and the Porcupine Mountains Wilderness. It is over the bridge and through the woods to the UP we go. Having never been to the "Porkies", it will be another grand photo expedition and adventure.
Seeing and Capturing Images
While
driving to the monthly Traverse
Area Camera Club competition I spotted a fantastic photo
opportunity. Yep, another drive-by shooting. A garden of irises, daisies
and other bloomers, with a great background right on the side of the
road were potential targets for my camera. Stopping by later revealed a
wealth of photo subjects with colorful ornamental shrubs as a
background. As I was composing the images, I thought about how important
it is to be able to see what will make a good image. Sure, the flowers
were great subjects, but I saw the mixture of colors, along with the
shapes
and lines. I started to try out different compositions by moving closer
or further from the subjects. Different tripod heights gave different
angles. Here is one image that resulted from the session. There
are more flowers that will bloom later, perhaps some daisies with a
fantastic gold background!
Seeing the image is just the first step. Familiarity with my equipment and a basic understanding of photography techniques made it easy to see the image and then to capture the image. During my art shows this summer I am sure to be asked - what kind of camera do you use? Well, I use a Nikon D2X and a new Nikon D700 with a full assortment of lenses, filters and other attachments. Both of these are fantastic cameras. However, seeing the image, composing the image, using knowledge of photo techniques and having good equipment that one is familiar with results in better images.
Its Showtime
2009 Art Shows
These are the shows I will be doing this summer -rain or shine. There will be more images than ever available.
New Images
Frequently
as I am traveling, or just have a few moments I post new images up
on my blog at
http://www.tomhaxbyphotos.blogspot.com/. Check it out. Comments are
always welcomed. Later, as time allows, many of
the images are included in the galleries on my website at
http://www.tomhaxbyphotos.com/
. The HTML gallery is usually the first to get new images and later the
flash gallery as it requires more photo processing. The
images to the left and right are in the Michigan Gallery. To find out more go to
Abstract Tulip or
Dune and Cirrus Clouds.
If you know of someone whom you think would like to subscribe to my newsletter please e-mail me with their e-mail address. The newsletter is free, hopefully informative and subscriptions can be discontinued at any time. Also, comments are always welcome. Finally, I am going to resolve to take more early morning walks.
Sleeping Bear Dunes, September 2008