A little while ago a friend and I were out near Bodega, shooting sunrise along the Sonoma coast. Because we were getting some morning fog rolling inland, any kind of shoot along the water was a no go, and we headed into the rolling hills just off the ocean. Here we had great views to the south as the sun side-lit the undulating farmland, punctuated by scattered forest.
The early rays of sun peak through a dissipating fog along the Sonoma Coast
I love opportunities to shoot fog, whether it is filtering through trees, or defining separation between mountains or hills. The added atmosphere can lend a certain drama to the photo.
Once the sun had risen, I chose to shoot directly into it, knowing the fog would help filter the direct light.
The early rays of sun peak through a dissipating fog along the Sonoma Coast
Here I loved the way the fog helped the trees separate into layers. I worked the composition and exposure, trying to balance the direct sun, low contrast fog, and back-lit grasses so that they could all add elements to the same photo. Once I was satisfied with some of the larger elements of the landscape, I moved into the macro realm to capture detail.
The rising sun backlights the golden grasses of a Sonoma Coast hillside
The back-lit grass itself captured my attention and demanded further photographic exploration. Moving from a small aperture to a very large one gave me the ability to amplify the fine detail of only the few grasses that remained in focus. The rest of the grass blended into a nice evenly colored backdrop.
Soon the sun had risen higher and the fog began to burn off in the rapidly warming day. I packed up my gear, happy for the fog that forced us up into the hills.
In honor of Valentine’s Day, I want to share the more cuddly moments of the mating ritual of the American Avocet, which remains one of the most interesting and unexpected behaviors of birds I have witnessed first hand. I have written about this ritual before, but recently I was able to acquire much better photographs to illustrate this strange little dance.
After the male chases the female around for a while, the female finally signals her acceptance of the male by flattening out her body parallel to the water and jutting out her neck. The male stands next to her and splashes water over her head, signaling his intent.
A female american avocet assumes the mating position while the male splashes water next to her
After the couple have their special “moment” together, then begins the truly unusual and surprisingly sweet interplay between the genders. The male keeps one wing wrapped around the female and crosses bills with her.
As the male american avocet dismounts after mating, he crosses bills with the female as part of a post-mating ritual. They walk in a circle with bills crossed and then walk in a straight line, side by side.
As soon as the male is back in the water, he leads the female in a 360 degree turn, the entire time keeping their bills crossed. Every time I have seen this, this part of the ritual is the same. I’m not sure if this is to somehow solidify the bond between the two birds, but it seems to be a necessity.
Two american avocets cross bills as they walk side-by-side in a circle, part of their post-mating ritual
Once the requisite turn is made, the two march off in a straight line together, side by side.
As the male american avocet dismounts after mating, he crosses bills with the female as part of a post-mating ritual. They walk in a circle with bills crossed and then walk in a straight line, side by side.
Soon after, each bird goes back to whatever they were doing before expressing their partnership. The couple remains together throughout the nesting season.
May you have a wonderful Valentine’s Day – hopefully you get to spend it with your sweetheart!
As I said in an earlier post, the trees were the real stars of the show on my recent trip to Grand Teton National Park. Fall colors were bursting from every leaf, and the mixture of coniferous and deciduous gave the changing leaves a nice backdrop from which to pop.
Composing coherent tree photos is not easy. It is the epitome of finding patterns in chaos. In some cases I was able to juxtapose the shapes and colors of tall, white, narrow trunks with the round colorful leaf canopy as seen in the photo below. Given that I wanted to stack the trunks against one another to create a continuous pattern of lines, I shot this one from a distance with a telephoto lens.
A stand of trees in full fall color, Grand Teton National Park
There are other occasions where I want to be closer to the trees, and seek patterns just in the trunks. In the following photo I was inside an aspen forest, and really liked the character of the boulder that these trees were growing around. But the real thrust of this photo is again a linear pattern created by the trunks.
This photo took quite a while to compose, as I wanted to avoid conjoining trunks in order to maintain that clean linear pattern throughout the photo. As you can see in the background, the distant trunks were carefully placed in between the tree in the foreground, so as to avoid any overlapping.
Fall colors dot a grove of aspen, Grand Teton National Park
Weather played a part in my tree photographs, as it did with the grand landscapes as well. After a storm passed through, I had a nice rainbow to play with for over an hour. Moving up and down a riverbed, I found this stand of trees that I could compose the rainbow behind. I was careful to run the rainbow up into the right corner of the photo, to create a strong corner.
A rainbow forms in the midst of a moving storm, Grand Teton National Park
Of course there were those foggy mornings as well. When I took this photo, I was up above the Snake River, and watched for a while as the changing fog moved like a living thing among the trees and distant hills. Landscape features were hidden, revealed, and back again, as if controlled by a grand magician working his craft.
Bright fall colors show through the dense fog that shrouds the landscape, Grand Teton National Park
I’ll leave you with one of my favorites – Aspen Embrace. There were many things I loved about these two photogenic trees. Not only does the aspen look like it is hugging the lone fir, welcoming it into its grove, but texturally, I love the stark, solid fir needles against the ethereal aspen leaves. Here the composition was straight forward – I only cropped it to a more traditional 4×5 aspect ratio as I felt the subjects’ spacing worked better with that framing. (Careful observers will note that this fir tree also makes an appearance in the first photo above.)
A fiery aspen wraps its branches around a lonely fir, Grand Teton National Park
Even though the nearby forest fires cause some smoke issues on the first few days of my trip, the timing of the fall colors couldn’t have been better. I’d love to spend more time in this part of the country next fall – there were definitely a lot of great opportunities there.
A few weeks ago, I attended a landscape workshop with Jack Dykinga, co-lead by my friend Jerry Dodrill. I was able to arrive early, and spent several days before the landscape work began to check out the local wildlife.
It was a good time to shoot wildlife, because there was quite a bit of smoke in the valley from nearby forest fires, and the famous views of the mountains were more or less obscured. I was happy to quickly find many of my target species, including bison, moose, elk, and even antelope toward the end of my trip. I’m still processing many landscapes from the trip, so they’ll be coming soon. For now, enjoy some of the local fauna that I encountered during my six days in the park.
Bison
Bison graze in the grasslands of Grand Teton National Park
Several herds of bison could be found fairly easily. I had two extended photo sessions with two different herds, and by the end of my trip, I was driving past bison along the road without a second glance. However commonplace these animals can become over just a few days, up close and personal they are amazing beasts.
A bison shows his appreciation for the nutritious grass available for grazing in Grand Teton National Park
Their antics were framed by the beautiful fall colors that adorned their world. As I was watching one herd, one by one bison would drop to the ground and start to roll in the dirt, kicking up huge clouds of dust.
Bison kick up dust as they roll in the dirt, while others graze in the open grassland of Grand Teton National Park
The sun finally peaked through the smoke and haze, and lit up the field in which they were grazing. I had to make sure to keep one eye on the viewfinder and one on the herd. I knew how fast they could charge if they so desired, so I stayed close to the truck at all times!
The setting sun illuminates a bison grazing in a Grand Teton grassland
Elk were seen only in the early morning hours, when it was still very dark out for wildlife photography. In most cases, I just left my camera beside me and enjoyed the company of these graceful animals. One morning I found a buck out late, and was able to get a photo. He was swimming across a small river, and by the time I got out of the truck, we was out of the water and sauntering across a field.
A male elk struts through a field in early morning, with a fall color backdrop, Grand Teton National Park
There were quite a few birds around that I don’t typically get to photograph, but to be honest, I was keeping myself very busy with landscapes and the larger mammals, so I didn’t spend any time focusing on avian photography.
While photographing oxbow bend late in the morning (sunrise saw that area completely shrouded in fog), I saw several Canada geese swimming along the shore under a beautiful grove of aspen, all in their autumn finery. I knew if I could get at the right angle close enough to one of the birds, I might get a shot of it swimming through a sea of abstracted fall color reflection.
I dropped off my landscape gear and went for my big lens. After about 20 minutes of waiting, one of them finally swam through the best color on the river, and I was ready.
A canada goose swims through glassy water, reflecting it and the fall colors of Grand Teton National Park
One of my most anticipated target species was moose. I had only ever seen one from a distance, and had never photographed one before. I was not disappointed by this trip! I was able to photograph moose on three occasions, some at very close range.
A young bull moose stands at attention as me makes his way through an open field
On one such occasion, I saw a bull walking across a field parallel to a small side road. I pulled over and set up my tripod. Then the moose turned in my direction, and walked directly toward me, ultimately crossing the road I was on about twenty yards away. As he was crossing the road, he stopped and posed for me, giving me the photo below:
A young bull moose walks through tall grass, pausing to check his surroundings
I was ready to pay him a modeling fee, but he continued on before I could get my checkbook.
Another time I spent some time with a cow and her calf, this time with about 30 other photographers. The calf quickly disappeared behind some trees, but the mother stayed out in the open.
A moose cow eat greens from the bottom of a shallow pond, while surrounded by the fall colors of Grand Teton National Park
It was also rutting season, and I saw a young bull performing an interesting display. He stopped eating the branches in front of him, extended his neck and bared his teeth. I’m not sure if this display was meant for courtship (there was a female nearby), but I snapped away all the same.
A young bull moose lifts his head to make his presence known to females
A pronghorn mother watches over her fawn. Fawns are very vulnerable when they are young, and spend most of their time bedding down and staying out of sight.
Lastly, I finally found a herd of pronghorn on my last morning in the park. Amongst the small herd was a doe with a fawn, sticking very close to each other. At one point, the fawn bedded down next to its mother, hiding itself in the grass. A few minutes later however, it popped up when some inconsiderate tourists started traipsing across the field, ignoring the many signs posted throughout the park that told them not to approach any wildlife.
A pronghorn mother stands with her fawn, Grand Tetons National Park
Further down the road was a solitary buck foraging along a small rise. He was kind enough to pose just long enough at the ridge line to allow the photograph below.
A pronghorn buck stands at attention on a small rise. The pronghorn horn sheath is shed annually and made of compressed hair around a bone core.
