While the weather holds, I’ve been trying to get into Spearfish Canyon as much as possible to capture the autumn colors. I really like the way the golden colored aspens are framing Spearfish creek in this image.
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This image was made for a Real Estate agent I do photography for and it’s the view from the back patio of a home near Hill City, SD. One of the best views of Black Elk Peak you’ll ever find.
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On a day that was forecast to be in the nineties it was sure cool on this particular morning in Spearfish Canyon (about 42F). It was an early September morning when this image was made and the reddish color of the grass tells me Autumn isn’t far off.
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Last week’s post was an image of Roughlock Falls in Spearfish Canyon shot in early morning and converted to black and white. This is an image captured a few days (nights) later as the Milky Way core was moving across the falls and canyon. With a little bit of light painting on the falls and some long exposure photography to bring out the Milky Way, I think it’s just as beautiful.
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This image of Rough Lock Falls in Spearfish Canyon was made in August when most of the grass, shrubs and trees are green. It’s pleasant to look at in person but doesn’t photograph particularly well without some directional light (which there wasn’t when I took this shot). Black and white on the other hand plays up the contrast between the shadows and highlights more effectively giving the image a grungy pop.
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This table at the Rough Lock Falls picnic area looks pretty lonely but I’m sure in a few hours after this image was made it got plenty of business, especially with the Sturgis Rally going on and this being one of the more popular tourist spots in Spearfish Canyon.
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This is another image of the Milky Way passing over Devils Tower, Wyoming made on the same night as my last blog post, but from a different vantage point.
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I can’t remember a more comfortable and quiet evening at Devils Tower, Wyoming. It was in mid July and the temperature was around 70f and not even a hint of a breeze. Absolutely tranquil and beautiful.
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I took this panoramic image of Bear Butte in 2021 just before twilight and right after a fresh blanket of snow had fallen. It was a windless and cold evening and the silence was broken only by an occasional truck or car passing in the distance. After shooting about a dozen photos that would eventually make up the pano, it was quite relaxing just to linger until dark.
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The rising sun casts a fiery glow behind a sheet of rain produced by this summer thunderstorm.
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Since there’s a lot of water flowing through Iron Creek in Spearfish Canyon, I’m spending a lot of time around these small falls trying to compose as many shots as I can while these watery conditions exist. I only wish there were more wild flowers around to add a little splash of color.
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I’ve seen other photographers capture small waterfalls and the patterns the bubbles make as they circle and swirl about before finally heading downstream. I think there needs to be a bit more water flow in this image to really churn up a lot of bubbles, so I’ll keep going back to Iron and Spearfish Creeks in search of more favorable watery designs.
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These very dramatic thunderstorm clouds developed to the north of Spearfish, SD and were really impressive as the storm moved off to the east. The only problem was that I didn’t have an object or landscape of much interest to photograph with them, so I just made the sky the main attraction.
This is the same composition of a shot I posted a couple of week ago, but the difference is the foreground is lit by artificial light. The first post was ambient light brought out by a very long exposure. is this one better? I don’t think so, just another version.
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The total lunar eclipse was visible over Devils Tower, Wyoming on May 15 of this year, so I wanted to make sure I didn’t miss the chance to photograph it. I used two cameras, one for the tower and foreground and the other to capture the phases of the eclipse. Total shooting time was over four hours. Obviously this image is made up of several photos blended in post production, so it’s considered a composite.
Many photographers consider composites fake and not “real” photography, but I believe that if you’re honest about it with your audience and try to stay as true as possible to the scene as it existed at the time of shooting, then I don’t have any issues. Anyway, let me know what you think. To like or comment, click the title above.
This year I really wanted to capture the milky way rising above Spearfish Creek, but the problem was finding a spot in the canyon that provided a reasonably good opening to the southern sky. After stopping at all the car pull-offs that looked promising, I found this location and returned when the milky way core was visible over the canyon walls and surrounding forest. With no wind the conditions were perfect for long exposures of the sky, ground and creek.
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We had pretty good rain in the Black Hills recently and this always seems to produce a mist of fog that moves rather rapidly through the peaks and valleys which, as any landscape photographer knows, provides some dramatic effects and contrast. These pine trees stood alone atop a rocky knoll and the fog in background provided some very good color contrast. The only challenge was waiting for the right moment to release the shutter because the fog was drifting in and out and varying in intensity. I wanted to be able to make out the trees in the background, but one second there was no fog at all and the next everything was completely obscured from view. (The fact that it was raining off and on didn’t help either).
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My mother always told me never to eat snow and now I know why. From my back deck the snow looks white and pristine, but up close, not so much. This macro image shows what lurks just out of eyesight. I think it makes a good abstract image, but not very appetizing.
I found a new vantage point for photographing Spearfish Mountain near Spearfish, SD and tried to make a panorama, unfortunately I got a little rushed because of bad weather moving in and I didn’t overlay the photos enough for the software to stitch. This was the best framed shot out of the series, so I converted to B&W and called it good. I’m looking forward to returning to this spot in the future and hopefully not make any more rookie mistakes.
