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Big Hunting Creek

It goes without saying, Big Hunting Creek is big with hunters. However, the only thing I was hunting for was a waterfall.

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Big Hunting Creek

In fact, I was looking for Cunningham Falls State Park. As it turned out, it’s just up the creek, which I eventually got to, without a paddle.

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This is a long exposure that I made using a tripod and an aperture of F-22. It’s a good thing it wasn’t windy; otherwise, the leaves would have come out blurry. Scenes like this are gratifying for me, and exactly why I love photography in the first place.

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Forest Carpet

I took this a couple of weeks ago on a walk through the forest. Autumn came late this year, and only about half the trees had changed colors.

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Forest Carpet
The forest floor on an autumn day in Annapolis, MD – click on image to see full resolution

It’s pretty cool how the forest floor is carpeted with leaves while the afternoon sun shines through the trees. It was an amazing walk, and I was so happy to be in Maryland, which has all kinds of forest trails like this.

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To get this photo, I held the camera close to the forest floor and used a small aperture; that way, both the foreground and the background are in focus. That same aperture setting is what causes the sun to give off the starburst-like rays.

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Forest Highlights

It’s a late fall in Maryland and walking through the forest; there are only smatterings of color here and there.

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Forest Highlights
A smattering of colors in a Maryland grove

I expected the deciduous groves to be rich in autumn hues, but it’s mostly green. But here and there, one tree has broken from the crowd.

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To be sure, there are areas within an hour’s drive of Annapolis that are more colorful. Walking through a nature trail is reward enough. And when I do see a flash of color, all the better.

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Cunningham Falls

The colors are here in the Northeast, so a few days ago, I drove to this random park called Cunningham Falls; it turns out it’s not so random.

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Cunningham Falls
An autumn scene in Maryland

I don’t know the area, so; I picked a random place to visit on Google Maps. Little did I know this is a popular spot because there were a lot of other photographers that showed up as well. I took all kinds of shots from different angles, including this, which is a twelve-shot panorama.

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The scene consists of twelve shots, four groups of three that I processed in AuroraHDR, and stitched in Lightroom. The result is a very high-resolution landscape of a not so random Maryland park.

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Sunday Reflections

Most Sundays, I take a drive along country roads. Sometimes the most significant thing to see is the river, clouds, and reflections.

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Sunday Reflections
A simple image of the landscape on a Sunday drive.

With all the urban growth, I started driving further out. The funny thing is that if I drive far enough, I’ll end up approaching the outskirts of another metropolis. Open spaces are dwindling.

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I’d like to think other places are still wide open. Like maybe some of the western states, or the prairies. But in reality, every little inch of space from coast to coast is owned. Or at least we like to think so. But I am reminded that the land is much older than our relatively new claims upon it.

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Pacific Trail

The Wild Pacific Trail is just as it sounds, on the Pacific and wild. Wild, as in hiking or trekking in BC’s Vancouver Island.

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Pacific Trail
A section of the trail on Vancouver Island, BC

The image uses HDR techniques, meaning I combined three frames of different exposures and blended them. Also, I used f10, so most everything is in focus.

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I love trail shots for the sense it creates of going somewhere and, a natural desire to know what’s just around the corner. This trail, in particular, is especially good for that; it has hundreds of turnouts that open on amazing views of the pacific.

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Rainbow Falls

This photo is just below Rainbow Falls in North Carolina. It’s on a trail with a waterfall payoff at the end.

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Below Rainbow Falls
Taken on the trail to Rainbow Falls in North Carolina

I think the word rainbow sums up those fall colors. North Carolina is famous for its autumn tones, which, as I write this, is still a couple of months away. It was nice to hike in the mountains and get a break from the humidity back home.

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This is another old photo I pulled from the archives. Old images are veritable breadcrumbs leading back to forgotten details. For instance, from the picture, I recall the hike took longer than expected and, was a little more strenuous. So when we got back to the hotel, we ate pasta and dinner rolls, leaving only, …you guessed it, breadcrumbs.

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Hidden Gem

Mulholland road in Parrish, oddly enough, dead-ends at a bridge. Because of that, it feels remote, even though it’s in the middle of a housing boom.

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Hidden Gem
the scene along Mulholland Road in Parrish, Florida

Living in suburbia as I do, the trick to doing local landscape photography is finding gems tucked away in plain sight. Even though I think I’ve found most, I’m pretty sure there are more. They are, by their very nature, not easy to find.

more images with reflections from the gallery

I took this photo about five years ago, and today, as I drove by, the road is under construction. That means it’s probably going to get more traffic and, extend past the bridge; meaning no longer hidden. But I’ll keep searching for more spots like this in the suburban jungle.

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Babbling Brook

This photo is a little brook on the trail to Dutchman Falls. It’s about as idyllic a trail as you could hope to find.

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Babbling Brook
A stream above Multnomah Falls in Oregon (click on image to see full resolution)

The midday light through the overhead branches created a latticework of shadows, which is slightly confusing to the eye.

The brook feeds Multnomah Falls, which is perhaps the most photographed waterfall in the Pacific Northwest, if not the country. I came here on holiday and found crowds of people visiting at the base. So I hiked up to the top of the falls and found a quiet trail with this stream.

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I recommend hiking to the top, although it’s strenuous with many switchbacks. But once you get there, you’ll be glad you did. From there, I walked up to Dutchmans Falls, which is another picture for another day.

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Faerie River

In my imagination, this is a place where you might find the fae folk. The stream is part of a river in a state park, but I had the idea little invisible beings were all around.

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Faerie River
A stream adjacent to the Hillsborough River

The image is from the Hillsborough River State Park in Florida. Maybe it was my mood or the setting, but parts of it seemed nothing short of enchanting. There are places inside forests like this that have an ephemeral quality of nature about them.

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I experienced the same thing in the forests of Oregan a couple of weeks ago. Some sections of the trail had a subtle quality that you could easily miss. I have no idea if nature spirits exist; I’ve never seen one. At the very least, encountering these areas in the wilderness gives me pause and stokes my imagination.