Photographs by Frank

28 September 2013

Pondicherry NWR

Filed under: Autumn,Landscapes,the White Mountains — Tags: , — Frank @ 11:30 PM

Yesterday, we (Joan, her cousin Margie and I) took a drive to the Pondicherry NWR in Jefferson, NH.

I can report that the foliage in the White Mountains is just about at its peak for this year.

The two ponds that make the centerpiece of Pondicherry are an easy hike from the road. The route is mainly along an old rail bed.  Cherry Pond ((the larger of the two) offers spectacular views of the Presidential Range*. Little Cherry Pond is also worth the extra walk as it is a very different habitat than Cherry Pond.**

This was our first visit to Pondicherry and I am certain that it is not our last; highly recommended.

Here is the crop of photos, all but the last one made at Cherry Pond. The last one was made from a pull off on Bear Notch Road in Bartlett on the way home.

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*From Cherry Pond (looking south east), the peaks of the Presidential Range are Madison, Adams, Jefferson and Washington (left to right, or north to south).

**The light was not very good during the time we spent at Little Cherry Pond, so I do not have any photos from there that are worth showing.

22 September 2013

A Windy Day in Early Autumn

Filed under: "Camp",Early Fall,Landscapes,Monadnock Region — Tags: , — Frank @ 9:00 PM

Late this afternoon, we took a quick “spin” on the lake in the kayaks. It was breezy and cool but the interesting clouds made for good photography.

September Skies #1 (Gregg Lake Near Our Camp)

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September Skies #2 (The Gregg Lake Shore)

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A Hint of Things to Come

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21 September 2013

Moon Light Madness

Filed under: Early Fall,Landscapes,Monadnock Region — Tags: , — Frank @ 7:00 PM

Thursday was the full moon for September… the harvest moon.

I spent the evening at a Monadnock Camera Club meeting and therefore did not have time to photograph. However, I was so smitten by the moonlit drive home that, yesterday evening I headed out so see what I could photograph.

In preparation, I spent a bit of time in the afternoon using a wonderful program called The Photographer’s Ephemeris. This program shows you in what direction the sun|moon rise|set will occur on any day at any location. It is an incredibly useful tool for landscape photographers.

After a bit of exploration with this program, I decided that the view looking east across the south end of Gregg Lake was a good candidate for a moon rise photo. So I packed up my gear and made the roughly a quarter mile walk from the house to the lake shore. I arrived shortly after 6 PM and caught the last of the days sunlight on the shore as it disappeared behind the ridge to the west of  the lake. Sunset was 6:48 PM yesterday. As I waited for the moon to rise (7:17 PM), I enjoyed the peace and quiet and a loon out on the lake kept me entertained.

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Things did not work out perfectly. The moon did not begin to appear over the ridge and trees to the east of the lake until about 20 minutes after it rose; the sunlight was completely completely gone by this time. Thus, there was no light on the foreground as the moon rose.

I really should have tried this a day or two before the full moon not the day after… next month!

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I packed up and headed home in the dark… LED head lamps are a wonderful invention!

After dinner, I decided to head down to the bridge and the “civilized” end of Brimstone Corner and see if I could make photos of the north end of the lake by moon light. I think that I got a keeper… what say you?

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Technical note: This is a 1 min exposure (at f/8 and ISO 400). The only processing applied is noise reduction… and a lot of it!

The same is true of the moon rise photo (30 sec at f/8 and ISO 400)  immediately above.

12 September 2013

Retirement, Taking Advantage of

Filed under: "Camp",Early Fall — Tags: — Frank @ 1:00 PM

Yesterday (Wednesday)  was a hot, sticky, summer day.

After lunch, we decided to take full advantage of retirement and headed down to camp. We had the lake to ourselves.

I took the “ode rig” along, but saw only seven or eight odes (all on the wing) over the few hours we were out. Ode season is coming to an end and there are signs of autumn everywhere.

I spent some time wandering the woods near camp and practiced my photographic “seeing”.

Here are the results:

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Yes… the colors in the first photo (Decaying Bole #1) are “true to life”.

7 September 2013

Three Days in the White Mountains

Filed under: Landscapes,Summer,the White Mountains — Tags: — Frank @ 2:00 PM

This past week, Joan, myself and both kids  spent three days in the White Mountains. (At ages 28 and 30, “kids” is probably not politically correct, but hey, it is my blog!)

Back in May (when I retired) I had teased my former colleagues that I was going to go on vacation the day after Labor Day (i.e. the day fall semester begins). Thus, with this trip, I made good on my “threat”!

On Tuesday, we drove north to Franconia Notch and spent time at both the Basin and at the Flume. We were the last folks admitted to the Flume before they closed for the evening. After we finished the hike in the Flume, we headed to the Dry River Campground in Crawford Notch where we set up camp and ate dinner in the dark.

On Wednesday, we took the Cog Railway to the summit of Mount Washington and then hiked to Arethusa Falls (the tallest in New Hampshire).

On Thursday, we broke camp and headed over to Pinkham Notch. There, we did a fairly easy loop hike that took us to Brad’s Bluff and to Lila’s Ledge; both places have spectacular views of Mount Washington. I took no photos on this hike as I was out of “juice” for the little Nikon V1 and had left the charger at home. I have definitely put Lila’s Bluff on the list of places to return for some serious photography in the future.

Day 1 (black and white work):

(Please note that “Pemi” is the nickname for the Pemigewasset River which has its headwaters in Franconia Notch.)

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Day 1 (color work):

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Day 2:

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2 September 2013

A Loon and (Intimate) Landscapes

Filed under: Birds,Summer — Tags: , — Frank @ 1:00 PM

On Friday afternoon, I headed down to the lake and put the kayak in the water. I specifically left the “ode rig” at home and took only my little Nikon V1.

My intent was to force myself to look of things, other than odes, to photograph.

My thought was to cruise the shore line and to look for details that might make interesting photographs.

My inspiration  is the book “Intimate Landscapes” by Eliot Porter, in which the photographer concentrates on “details” in the landscape rather than broad, sweeping views. Porter was also a pioneer in using color film for landscape photography.

While on the lake, I had a close encounter with a loon, I had seen this loon on the surface a number of times, but was pretty much ignoring it since I had the 10-30 mm lens on the camera. However, at one point “he” popped up very close to me (and the shore). I was able to switch to the 30-100 mm lens and make a five or six  frames (in about 90 seconds) before he was gone.

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