October 21 - Busiek State Forest

As part of a "Day of Nature Photography" hosted by Art Daniels at the Nature Center, I traveled to Busiek today to take a few pictures. While the conditions weren't great, there were some nice macro opportunities, and the foliage was just fantastic in places.

The sky was cloudy when we arrived, but the sun poked through for a brief moment and lit this hill with just a little bit of light.


Berries from a Wahoo tree.


One of the numerous and really tiny mites in the area - I think it's a Red Velvet Mite. They're about the size of a grain of rice.


And a little more foliage from Springfield Lake on the way back home.

October 12 - James River Leaves

I went for a short drive down to the James River this evening - just an excuse to get out of the house, really. While the trees around this area are still a long way from being colorful, the underbrush is putting on a nice display. Their leaves, which are already falling, sometimes continue their journey on the graceful current of the James River. Here are a few that are resting for a spell before heading further downstream.

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September 20 - More Zoo Photos

Time is flying by this month, and I've only been out once with my camera since the zoo trip and didn't get anything worth posting. But I did process a few more zoo pictures - two more portraits of some very interesting animals.

September 9 - Dickerson Park Zoo

I spent the morning with the Southwest Missouri Camera Club in the Dickerson Park Zoo. The director, Mike Crocker, let us in a little early for a few pictures behind the scenes. Many thanks to Mike for letting us in for the photos.

This giant turtle is always easy to photograph since they don't move around very fast.


This alligator was pretty still - and we hoped he stayed that way!


I had quite a bit of fun playing around with this photo of a mother and child elephant. Click on the image for a larger view.

September 2 - Springfield MO

After a few hectic weeks things are starting calm down - at least for a while. So tonight was a good time to go take a few pictures. I didn't go far - just to Jordan Valley Park. I missed the SWMCC field trip to this location a couple of weeks ago, but liked the pictures that came out so I had to take a few of my own.







I'll also pass along another bit of information. This week, Michael Brothers - a reporter for the Springfield News-Leader - did a story on blogs and photography. I am quite flattered that the artical featured a few photos from this blog. Here is a link to the story. (it may not be active for a long period of time).

August 10 - Construction in Springfield

Highway 65 has been under construction between Sunshine and Chestnut Expressway lately, and I thought it made an interesting picture at night.

Here are a couple of the photos:

July 28 - Springfield

There was a warm South breeze last night, and I headed over to the Commercial Street Bridge to see if I could catch some of the sun as it was setting. I just missed the sun, but I found a few other compositions that were interesting.

July 22 - Branson

I was in Branson on Friday night at the Radisson and up on the 9th floor, there's a pretty good view of the sunset. You might think there would be a lot of headlight trails during a long exposure such as this, but this is Branson, and the cars didn't move much!

July 18 - Additional Rocky Mountain National Park

It's been so warm (Ok, really HOT) here lately and I haven't been out to shoot much. So I thought I'd go back through and process some of the shots from the recent vacation that I passed over the first time through.

I'm still fascinated by Monument Rocks. Here's another composition of the arch, but this time just looking up into the sky with the wide angle lens.


Here's another Columbine, but a very young one that hasn't opened all of the way. Very alien-like.


On our last afternoon, the clouds near the tree line started breaking up after a rain.

July 6 - Rocky Mountain National Park

On Thursday, we started with a quick trip up to Bear Lake - which is conveniently located right next to the road. The conditions were good for photography for about 5 minutes and then the wind started really blowing.


Later in the afternoon, we visited a nice creek on the way to Bear Lake.


Not long afterwards, we were up on top of the world trying to get above the clouds. But the clouds weren't cooperating. They were still interesting, though, and a fresh rain made everything look great!


There hadn't been much in the way of sunsets down in the Morraine Park. Though there were some great clouds this evening, they didn't become part of any fantastic sunset. It was still fun watching the sunlight fade for the day.

July 5 - Rocky Mountain National Park

We drove the length of the park today - just to see what was there. On the way down the west side of the park, I photographed my first MOOSE! Really cool. This was a young mommy moose, and here calf wasn't far away (but out of sight).



Later in the afternoon, we found some Columbine growing on the side of the road. It was great to see this beautiful flower. They were all over up there, ranging from blue outer petals to white.

July 4 - Rocky Mountain National Park

Rocky Mountain National Park (RNMP) is a great destination. It really has it all - wildflowers, mountains, wildlife, water, snow... I've always enjoyed my stays there. We arrived in the afternoon and after securing a camp spot for the next three nights it was up into the mountains to see if there was any sunset light.

It turned out that there was a little bit of interesting light. The next three pictures were taken from the same location - not too far from the Alpine Visitor's Center.






These clouds engulfed the road entirely before we could get back down, and it was kind of a weird trip down the mountain with visibility less than a car length. Made it down safe and sound, though!

July 1 - Monument Rocks, Kansas

On a trip out west to Denver to visit a few friends, I had a chance to stop by Monument Rocks in Kansas. I'd been to a similar site last year (Castle Rocks) and this one was just as interesting but still different enough to make it worth the trip. This formation is a series of fin-like rocks sticking out of the ground.

Wile wandering around the base of the rocks, we spotted a small owl. Unsure if it was alive or dead, we approached quite close before we spotted small movements. We took a few pictures and left it alone.



In one of the fins, there is a big hole. In the background is the other range of fins - it's probably only 200 yards away, but this wide angle lens makes it look further.



There had been a storm brewing to the north all afternoon, and I snapped a few pictures trying to catch the lightening. It wasn't very spectacular lightening, but I did manage to get one little bit. You should be able to see it if you look closely.



After Denver, we were in Rocky National Mountain Park for a few nights and I'll be posting those as I have time.

June 25 - Busiek State Forest

I needed a hike today, so I headed out to Busiek to walk a short loop. There's a nice size hill in the bottom corner of this natural area (I had to huff and puff a bit to get up it today), and I found this cone flower going down the other side.



I've also been working up a few more pictures from my recent trip to Mesa Verda and Canyonlands. This is Cliff Palace from the opposite side of the canyon.


And this is Mesa Arch.

June 14 - Springfield, MO

Not much to post lately, but I did get out this evening for a few flower pictures. This one is a "Cup Plant" (Silphium perfoliatum) also known as "Cup Rosin Weed", or "Carpenter's Weed".

June 2 - Mesa Arch

An early morning start (3:30am) meant we could get to Mesa Arch before the sun would. I've seen many beautiful images of this arch and was quite thrilled to be in front of it with good light and a camera in my hand.

Here are the images in the order in which they were taken. (OK - I know it's a lot of pictures of the same arch, but I really like them!)

June 1 - Dead Horse Point State Park

After driving around Canyonland National Park during the heat of the day (had a nice hike or two, despite the sun) we stopped by Dead Horse Point State Park. This park is just North of Canyonland NP and contains some pretty views of the Colorado River.

I started at the observation area and took a few pictures, but a bus full of teenegers arrived not too long afterword and I moved on (literally, a Greyhound-sized bus pulled up and teenagers carrying pizza and drinks walked up to the observation area).

Here's the picture I took from that viewpoint. Legend has it that cowboys herded horses onto this mesa and blocked it off forming a corral bordered by some very formidable fences. For whatever reasons, the cowboys took a few of the horses and left, letting the rest die of thirst with the Colorodo River in sight. (Gruesome, isn't it.)


I moved on and took a few more pictures from the same area as the sun went down...

One of the other sunset observers was in the way, so I included him in the picture.


A close-up view of the sunset.


A little bit of a different take on the view towards the sunset - that's the 1/4 moon in the upper left.


And finally, back towards the river after the light was nearly gone.

May 31 - Arches National Park

It was late afternoon by the time we arrived at Arches NP. While it was certainly incredibly beautiful, I couldn't really grasp how one would approach the massive structures of rock with a camera in hand. I always like sunsets, though, and when it finally arrived, I was ready.



This just means that I'll have to return to Arches someday and take some real pictures.

May 31 - Mesa Verde

Mesa Verde was the next stop. It's a beautiful area with incredible buildings that the early Americans built into the sides of cliffs. There is so much to see and do. As always, being at the right place at the right time of day means everything to photography.

We took a tour of Cliff Palace, but my best shots came the next morning when I could set up a tripod and think more about what I was doing. Here's a small part of the dwelling:

And here's the entire Cliff Palace - I'd seen it treated this way in a gallery and thought I'd imitate that effect.