Goodyear Heights at Midday

The middle of the day is the worst time to take landscape photos - but today at Goodyear Heights Metro Park I snapped a few anyways. The sky was the pretty fall blue with puffy white clouds and the trees were beautiful. Laura and I are continuing on our mission to complete the hikes in the Fall Hiking Spree(you only need 8 to complete it but we want to do all of them). There were a lot of people out on a perfect Fall day - everyone is starting to get the fear that it could be the last nice weekend, I believe. Plus it is peak time for Autumn foliage. 

Hopefully the forecast is wrong for this week and we get a few more chances to get out and enjoy the colors...

Another Fall Morning

I can stop taking Fall morning photos anytime I want too - I just don't want too.

The Park is Open

The Republicans finally caved so I headed out to my muse, Indigo Lake, first thing this morning. Lets be clear on one thing - the House had the votes to end the shutdown the whole time(it would have been a bi-partisan vote) Boehner wouldn't allow the vote to happen. Its not the President or the Democrats who held things up by "not negotiating" - but the radical, crazy, right-winger, Tea Party-types in the House. These are the facts, the simple facts, no matter what your beliefs. Anyways - I'm glad the stupid shutdown is over and we can all enjoy OUR parks again.

The Hard Way On Purpose

David Giffles new book The Hard Way on Purpose is available for pre-order now. Earlier this Summer I took the above author photo for the book jacket. I shot it at David's house and lit it with two Speedlites and shoot-through umbrellas. David isn't a big-center-of -attention guy aka not entirely comfortable in front of the camera - which I can relate too - I prefer to be on my side of the lens. Friendly conversation over a couple of beers and constant shooting eased the mood - I was happy to come away with shots that look so natural. 

I don't doubt my technical, portrait skills as a photographer - but all that means nothing if you can't make the subject comfortable enough to take a flattering shot.

Furnace Run Redux

The above photo is a remake of a photo that is hanging in a museum in London that I took a few years ago - really. The other version won a contest by a museum about couples called 'Coupling Up' I recieved a book with the photo in it and a spot in the museums permanent collection. When Laura and I went for a hike today we decided to take a photo from the same bench. We also stopped at Country Maid to get some apples - but Laura convinced me to get some of their amazing ice cream too. Their ice cream and atmosphere can't be beat(and helps make up for the abysmal customer service!).

Salinger

A little break from magic hour autumn photos....

The other night I was looking through the list of documentaries on Netflix for something interesting to watch. I saw 'Salinger' - a movie about - wait for ....J.D. Salinger and decided to check it out. A little of the way through the film I realized that it must have been made fairly recently so I paused it and went to Wikipedia - turns out it was just released on September 6th and was 9 years in the making in total secrecy. I found the movie to be pretty interesting - lots of interviews with people who hadn't spoken before and some very cool previously unreleased photos and videos. I think any Salinger fan would find it very compelling but if you're not it wouldn't be more than of passing interest. Anyways the big take-away was that the documentary claimed that Salinger never stopped writing and starting in 2015 new books and stories will be released - including continuations of all his work(more about Holden etc.) I though to myself, "how wasn't this news?", so I Googled it and it turns out it was news - I just missed it somehow.

I find this to be pretty exciting - enough so to take a photo and write a blog post....

Light in Autumn

I know - more colorful, digital, fall photos during the magic hour(evening this time) - trust me - I'm ready to get out and shoot some gritty black and white photos on Tri-X....and I will soon. I just have about 7 years of pent-up vibrance, clarity and saturation that I'm dying to use on the fall foliage. My work schedule is finally allowing it and I'm taking full advantage. These were all taken last night at the Bath Nature Preserve - the light was beautiful - I hiked until the sun dropped below the trees...

Hinckley in the Morning

This morning I got up nice and early and headed out to Hinckley Reservation. This government shutdown has me searching for other places to hike during the 'magic hours' - and its kind of been working out for me(but don't get me wrong - it still pisses me off). Today was the first time I have ever hiked around the Hinckley Reservoir - and I picked the absolutely perfect Fall morning for it. There was a fog hanging over the lake as the sun rose - and the trees foliage is near peaking. It was amazing - one of those times where you can point your camera in almost any direction and take a great photograph. I think I shot around 100 images - I had a hard time deciding which ones to edit and post...

The Gorge

Who doesn't like The Gorge? Everyone likes The Gorge. I went there tonight and didn't even take one photograph of the dam - notice I didn't say "post" - I said "take".  For real, besides, I already did it perfect, right?

Fall Leaves Study

Various fall leaves in morning light - you can't be mad at that!

Silver Creek and Apples

Yesterday Laura and I decided to knock out a couple of Fall activities. We are in the middle of Summit County Metro Park's Fall Hiking Spree so we decided to go for a hike at the beautiful Silver Creek Metro Park. Silver creek is a great place to enjoy the fall color - we also had fun nerding out with all of the tree identification signs along the trail. After the hike we drove to the nearby Rittman Orchards - which we had never been to before. You can pick your own apples there, but we opted to pick them out of the apple bins in the market(the above photo is staged). They also had a wide selection of other fall goodies and produce at reasonable prices - definitely somewhere we will be returning too. The light wasn't that great for photography but the views from the orchard were very pretty as it sits up on a hill overlooking a pond, farm fields, and fall foliage in the distance.

#Selfie

Lately I've been working on organizing some of my photos into galleries and slide shows for this website - the goal is to try and display them in some kind of coherent fashion. One of the sets I organized is a collection of all of my self portraits over the years. You can check out the #selfies page here. Most of the other pages on this website are now finally functional - I just have a few more things to finish up. I've designed the website so I can easily change and display different projects as I complete them. Right now all the slide shows are based on flash, which I know presents a problem for certain mobile users - I hope to rectify that soon. I'm open to suggestion for any ways to fix or improve this website(aside from the design -I'm personally happy with the new, clean layout).

Fall Shutdown

Thanks the Republican Party's inability to tame the crazies on their right flank the Federal government is partially shutdown. Here in Northeast Ohio this means that the Cuyahoga Valley National Park is "closed". Being a sprawling 33,000 acre park between Cleveland and Akron, though, this is hard to do. This morning I went and surveyed some of my favorite spots to see how effective the closure is. Places like Virginia Kendall and many of the Towpath parking lots do have gates that were locked - but parking in pull-offs or at nearby private lots was an option. I ended up parking in Peninsula and walking to the Towpath. I can't be stopped - I need my fall photos!

Colorful Morning Downtown

I woke this morning and decided to try and capture some sunrise photos - the question was where? With the government being "partially shutdown" I decided I didn't want to risk driving to the Valley only to not be able to get into a parking lot. I decided to head Downtown instead. I parked at Cascade Locks and walked into town and towards campus. I've had the newish parking deck on Exchange Street in the back of my mind for a while and I climbed its stairs right as the sun began to rise. I managed a few golden hour images that I really liked - and here they are. Unfortunately the bit of fog that was hanging around added a hazy look to some of the photos that otherwise would have turned out pretty good.

Lady Grey

As I mentioned yesterday I shot some black and white at the Ohio and Erie Canal Reservation - it was Lomography's Lady Grey 400(which is Kodak TMax 400). These shots are from a grouping of old farm implements that were left in the area from a no-longer-existing family farm. The light was really perfect for this kind of thing - these are just a few of the images I made. Old rusty machinery falls into the category of train tracks and old barns, a bit cliche I know, but hey - I like to look at classic black and white photography and I like to shoot classic black and white photography - you really can't be mad at that!

Expired in Hidden Valley

I loaded a roll of expired Fuji Pro 160C film in my Pentax K1000 and headed to the Ohio and Erie Canal Reservation a few morning ago. I had never hiked the part of the Towpath Trail that runs through this part of the Cleveland Metro Parks - and I had never shot any Pro 160C - both turned out to be beautiful. From what I've read the film is supposed to be a modern color film along the lines of Kodak's Ektar - very sharp, low grain, wide exposure latitude & dynamic range, and very good for scanning - my expired version showed a decidedly green color cast but definitely hit on the dynamic range and low grain marks. 

The part of the Canal Reservation I hiked is known as Hidden Valley - the area runs under a huge train bridge, has many historical signs, and the canal is watered. I found it to be educational and scenic - it was hard for me to choose a spot to turn around at - I kept going and going. I definitely will return to the area - I also shot a roll of black and white here which I will be posting soon.

Zeiss in the Park

I took my Zeiss Ikon Contaflex Super BC out for its first roll on a few hikes - at Blue Hen Falls and down to the Towpath - loaded with a roll of Kodak Ultra Max 400. I use this film as my test color film for a camera because it is relatively cheap but still looks decent. The Zeiss has a light meter but the battery compartment on mine is quite corroded so I used an external light meter - besides the meter the camera is fully functional mechanically. All of the cameras controls are on the lens - shutter speed, aperture and focus - which took a bit of getting used to. The focus was super simple and precise with a split-image prism combined with a sharp 50mm lens. I'd like to clean up the battery compartment and shoot the camera again with its own light meter - but everything else seems to be in perfect working condition - those Germans build 'em to last!  

Langes Study - Autumn

I seem to have made a study of the seasonal changes at the Langes Run Bridle Trail off the Wetmore Trailhead since last Spring. When the snow flies my cycle will be complete - I'll have to do a retrospective post I guess. There is just something about this part of the Cuyahoga Valley that I love  - the old barns, the drops and climbs, the varied kind of trees, ponds, overlooks, wildlife and the fact that I've never passed another living sole while hiking here. This evening's hike was a short one, but long on beauty - as evidenced by these photos. Should I say that I love Fall again? - yeah why not.
I added some gradient filters in Camera Raw to a couple of these photos - darkened the skies and lightened the foregrounds - its a perfect effect for these shots....and it saves me having to go buy expensive gradient filters for my large lens. I'm not lazy - just cheap.  I wish camera manufacturers were putting most of their resources into improving dynamic range of their sensors - they still can't touch good old film on that front(without lotsa Photoshop tweaking anyways).