Mesa Arch View, Canyonland National Park

When taking this picture I was looking for a different view from this Iconic site. I liked the color contrast between the rocks in the foreground and the formations in the distance. Canyonlands is a very diverse park, with a different type of formation everywhere you turn. The park seems to have it all with canyons, arches, hoodoos, native american ruins, and big sky.

Park Avenue, Arches National Park, Utah

This was my favorite view in Arches National Park. The arches are beautiful, but Park Avenue formation just amazed me. We got there in time for sunset the first day, and the second day we had a terrible storm, which chased us out before we could really see to much of the park. Traveling on a tight schedule can lead to disappointment if mother nature does not cooperate.

Bryce Canyon, Utah

Bryce Canyon is a very beautiful and unique park. There are amazing views at every turn and the park is set up very well to give access to most of the canyon by road and short walks. There are many trails through out the park to give you different perspectives. The rock formations are know as Hoodoos and they were formed by water and ice.

Yellowstone National Park

I fell in love with the colors at Yellowstone National Park, from the turquoise pools to the yellow and orange hot springs. Shortly before arriving at the park my camera took a spill snapping off my wide angle lens, fortunately the camera survived, the lens did not. During this trip to the park I was forced to use my long lens causing me to view the park a little differently that I would have with a wide angle lens. 

Yellowstone National Park, Orange Spring Mound

This spring in Yellowstone really caught my eye, the colors, the contrast, and the trees the fell prey to the toxic minerals. The weather was beautiful this particular day, the light was great. I was surprised at the small number of people at many of the pull offs. I hope to publish a few more images of the park in the near future.

Chapel of the Transfiguration Episcopal, Grand Tetons, Wyoming

I loved this small church with the Grand Tetons in the background. The church is very quaint on the inside and has a large picture window behind the alter with an amazing view of the mountains. The church still holds services and I would like to have attended. 

Grand Tetons and Jackson Lake

This is a view I could never tier of, the majesty of the mountains and the color of the water was amazing. To my disappointment I left us only one day to travel through this amazing place, I could have worn out the shutter on my camera in this park. There were a thousand places I wanted to set up my tripod, but no time to do it, I will be back.

Mesa Arch, Canyonlands National Park

This Image is the typical view from this spot, I didn't want to be the only one not to put my tripod in the same spot as many famous photographers have. I can see why this angle is so popular, the way the arch frames the beautiful rock formations in the distance. I would like to be here at all different times of the day to capture the light that falls on this spot in the morning and at sunset. This particular day the light was very flat, so I tried to bring out the details and shadows a bit, in HDR.

Great Sand Dunes National Park, Colorado

This wonderful place is southwest of Colorado Springs and well worth the trip. It has huge sand dunes with mountains in the back ground. There is a creek you must cross, part of the year, to walk the dunes. The creek is Little Medano Creek and it develops small waves part of the year when there is enough flow. The waves are caused by water passing over the sand, it is a unique phenomena.

Babcock State Park, West Virginia

I only had a half hour to see this park and got very lucky that the light was this good. It had been raining the entire trip from Pittsburgh and only stopped a few minutes before I arrived. This image was made with 3 shots in HDR post processing. I tried to use a lighter hand while working with the photo, as HDR can look to surreal. I hope to return to the park and spend more time, there are many possibilities here I would like to pursue.   

Garden Of The Gods, Colorado Springs

This place amazed me because of the color of the rocks, it varies from red, orange, pink, and gray. If in Colorado Springs it is a nice stop. The park is accessible by road with easy pull offs. 

Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado

This park is huge area of land and I regretfully only allowed for one day to visit on this trip. We had overcast weather, so the scenic shots were very limited. To me, this shot was the most intriguing image of the visit to this park. Might try to get back here on a future trip to Colorado.

Pittsburgh from the PNC Park

This is an image I captured of Pittsburgh from Heinz Field . I was happy with the image and have printed it several times, but decided I wanted something more dramatic. I used the original RAW file and increased the contrast further than I would for a normal print. Then the image was then moved Photoshop, with the help of a couple filters and a little tweaking I achieved the effect I was looking for.   

Lily at the Beach

This is a Lily I found while walking near Virginia Beach, I liked the muted colors of this  particular  flower.

The Tea Shop, Renaissance Faire, Mount Hope Winery

I found this small tea shop at the faire and thought it was a cool building. The Renaissance Faire is a nice place to visit, if your in central Pennsylvania. They have shows, shopping, and plenty to eat and drink. A must is, a turkey leg and a glass of Mead.

Well for not being a flower guy, I seem to post them a lot. This was an image I liked as a straight photo, but I felt like getting the creative juices going in CS5. This is a combination of a couple filters, a bit of extra saturation, and luck. The end result seems to me to be more of a graphic design than a photo, but I think I will print it 16x24 and see if it's art or a mistake

Snow Falling at Tioga Pass, Yosemite Park

This image was taken on Tioga Pass, north of Yosemite Park. The snow was falling, but I loved the view, so I tried a slow shutter speed to hide the snow. The single photo was adjusted in Photomatix and a slight adjustment in Photoshop. 

Ruby Beach sea logs, Washington

This was some big drift wood, many of the beaches on the northwest had huge piles of very large logs that have washed up as drift wood. Some beaches even warned to beware of sea logs. From a photographers point of view they were amazing, but I would be a little weary of them if I were in the water. This is a single image processed in Photomatix. I wanted to add a little mid tone contrast to the logs and it worked very well in this situation.  

Hurricane Ridge,Olympic National Park

Though impossible to see in this image, it was in the 30's with very high wind and sleet. This gave me an opportunity to use a trick I read about for protecting your camera. You use one of those cheap shower caps, that are in some hotel bathrooms. Take it and put it over the back of your camera and use a gum band to secure it to the front of the lens, you can still see in the view finder and work the controls. It was surprising how many people asked me where I got it.

Hoh Rainforest, Olympic National Park

While hiking in the Hoh Rainforest I came to a spot where the sun was breaking through the canopy and lighting this small bunch of Ferns. The light lasted only a few minutes, just long enough to set up my tripod and get the shot. The image was a little to dark in the surrounding trees, so in Adobe Camera Raw I brought out the shadows slightly which lessened the contrast a bit.

Ruby Beach, Olympic Peninsula, Washington

This image of Ruby Beach was taken on an very overcast day. I was pleasantly surprised by the color of the image, my white balance was on Auto at the time. If on the Olympic Peninsula, on the west coast, this spot is well worth the visit. I had an itinerary for this trip and could not spend near the time this beach deserved.

Lake Arthur, Moraine State Park, PA

This was a very cold, but beautiful morning at Lake Arthur in Moraine State Park. This image is a HDR photo made with 3 separate exposures. I do realize this is a little heavy handed, but I do like the effect on certain images. After merging the images in Photomatix, it required very little work. 

The Sunflower

My neighbor plants many varieties of sunflowers, and let me photograph a few of them. This one was directly into the sun , which washed out the sky to pure white. I had to do very little work to this image, just a bit of saturation in CS5 to bring the flower's colors back to how I saw them when it was shot. Thanks to Mike and Sarah for letting me take this photo.  

Madison Falls, Olympic National Park

This was the second waterfalls we found in the Olympic National Park, and my favorite. I loved how the water took several paths down the side of the cliff. This park is the greenest place I've ever been, very beautiful, I could spend weeks hiking around this place looking for more spots like this.

Ruby Beach with the help of HDR Processing

Most of the time I prefer to shoot RAW files and bring out the detail with the sliders in Adobe Camera Raw. I was shooting into the overcast sun, the contrast was way to great for the camera or ARC to repair. With this in mind, I decided to take 3 exposures and try the HDR on this scene. I like the effect, but it seemed to soften the image a bit.

Lake Tahoe, Between the Snow Flakes

Lake Tahoe, has a beautiful shore line, with mountain ridges, huge boulders, many types of evergreen, and the color of the water, it is a photographer's paradise. But as luck would have it, the weather was not with us on this visit and the sky and water took on a grey cast. So in a attempt to save the photographic part of the trip, I went with moody type shoots. This image attracted me because of the texture in the rock and the tunnel in the distance.

Northern California coast

The northwest coast of, California, Oregon, and Washington  are truly beautiful. This scene was taken on a very overcast day and the exposure was set for the sky to create silhouettes. I tinted the image sepia to give it the appearance of late afternoon. We had just a very short time at this beach, but this view will stay with me for a long time.

Marymere Falls, Olympic National Park, Washington

While traveling through the Olympic National Park we found information on a few water falls.  Marymere Falls  is a short drive from RT 101 near Crescent lake and then a 3/4 mile beautiful walk through lush forests. 

Yosemite, from Tioga Pass

This view of Yosemite, from Tioga Pass. A late year snow storm was just starting to clear when we found this view. I had to wait a with about 150 other people for the falls to make an appearance, it lasted about 20 seconds and disappeared completely. Guess I got lucky.

Post Process Techniques for Children's Photography

This picture of my Granddaughter was taken at a local park, and though I did like it, it was missing the mood I was hoping to create. A sepia layer was added and the image was desaturated slightly, to give it an timeless feel. Later I added a texture, created from a wall in my house. With PS5 burn tool the edges were darkened a bit, which gave it the feel I was originally looking for.

El Capitan, Yosemite

El Capitan, 3000 feet of granite. It seems almost impossible to capture it's grandure in a photograph. I know my image misses
the mark a bit, I could not find a way to show the scale of this titan. I have several shots and this one seemed the best, so it made the post.    

Half Dome from Yosemite Valley

This is Half Dome at Yosemite Park, it rises 4,737 feet above the valley floor. It is an amazing wall of granite  with great tonal separation in the veins of the rock, that lends itself to black and white. I love B&W, but like many images of this trip I decided to leave them as I saw them.  

Yosemite Valley

This was my favorite view of  Yosemite Park, although we did miss Tunnel View and Glacier Point, guess will save that for another trip. This image was photographed using a polarizing filter to deepen the blue in the sky and to green up the foliage a little.  My intention was to convert this image to black and white, but when I opened the photo on the computer  the color had me. I believed  when I went to Yosemite I would  see it in black and white and tones as did Ansel Adams, but I was drawn to the color. I guess we all have our own vision, and in this case mine was in color.

Lake Tahoe in a late May snow

The weather on the last weekend of May at Tahoe was a bit unseasonable, 32deg. and snow.  We ran around in shorts and
t-shirts, but enjoyed it anyway.  Even in the bad weather conditions, the colors of the water in the lake are amazing.
 This image is not as sharp as I would like because of a longer exposure and the wind, but I still like the moody feel of the shot.

Tioga Pass just as the snow stopped

 For those few, that follow my blog, I'm sorry to be away for as long as I have. The next several Images will be of  trip to the northwest I took with my wife and son, California, Oregon, and Washington. This photo was taken while crossing Tioga Pass towards Yosemite. The snow let up long enough for me to set up the tripod and camera and take this image. I was drawn to this scene because the mountains in the background are almost black and white and are in contrast to the greens of the grasses in the foreground.

Valentine's Day and Lilly in red

I'm always looking for new poses, but some of the best just happen . My model (granddaughter) was very sober on this particular day, and smiles were far and few between, but this expression really touched me. This image is an example of taking what is offered. I could have never set this up and got this expression at the same time,  it was just pure luck. I will be taking a trip to the northwest (Nevada,California, Oregon,and Washington states) shortly and hope to post a few images from that trip by mid June, so please stop back.

Foggy Fall Morning, @ The Buzzard Swamp, Pa



On a beautiful fall morning, I arrived at Buzzard Swamp in western Pennsylvania for the sunrise. I had been hoping for a few clouds to catch the light from the sunrise, but no luck this particular morning. This image was made with a long exposure on a tripod before the sun peeked over the horizon. Though I feel the shot needed more of a point of interest, I loved the colors and the fog that rolled in.

The Magic is in the Eyes

This is the second appearance this young lady has had on my blog, she is my favorite model and also my niece. I wanted to try a few things to draw attention to her eyes. The intention was not to be realistic, but to invoke a sense of mystery. 

Mix Bar,Las Vegas, Nevada

This image was taken hand held of the view from the Mix Bar atop Mandalay Bay Hotel. I placed the camera directly against the glass to attempt to keep blur out of the photo. I have always had a fascination with night photography, it is amazing how film or digital sensors record the many colors of artificial light.

Taking High School Pictures

These images are of a pretty young lady I photographed through her four years of high school dances. I wanted to make each set of prints different, so that each time it would  would be a surprise. I would like to thank C.J. for allowing me to be a part of these events in her life and  for the use of her photos on my blog.

The Little White Church, PA



This church is one I have passed in western PA many times. I almost passed it on this particular day when I noticed the breaking storm clouds and I had my camera and tripod. A small aperture was used to get the depth of field I wanted but this slowed down the shutter and I had to use the tripod. This image is the only print
I have, that was published (Pennsylvania Magazine 2010).



Pittsburgh from Hienz Field (Steeler Nation)

This image of Pittsburgh, though not one of my best, has been by far my most popular. It was a preseason game and a nice evening. When the sun started to set, a golden glow lit the buildings. This is another example of looking away from the sunset to see what that beautiful light is doing to the world around you. This image was taken a few years ago, and I tried to take it again with my newer cameras, but with little success. In later attempts the light was never right, I read once that it is not the scene we photograph but the reflected light.

Lilly pictures, Infant Poses



These are a few of the images of my granddaughter, from a few weeks to 14 months. I have taken thousands of photos of her but these are a few of my favorites. When I do a shoot I give all the photos after I adjust them, to the parents, because I find that the images that appeal to me are not always the ones that the family  likes. Taste in a child's expression or pose varies greatly, so keep them all, and keep everybody happy.

HDR Photography with Photomatix, and the Canyon de Chelly

HDR  photography has changed the way we can  record the world. The human eye is very sensitive, and when we view  a scene we can see the shadows and the highlights. Film and sensors of modern DSLR have a much narrower range than what we see and this can be disappointing when we view the pictures later. The sky is blown out or the foreground is to dark. High Dynamic  Range,is
a combination of 3 or more images, at 3 or more exposures. This is usually done with one at normal exposure and one each, 1 or 2 stops above and below. These are combined in one of many softwares, I prefer Photomatix. This image was taken at about 1:00 with the sun high in the sky, which blew out the light places in the rock and ruins in the cave where completely dark. HDR brought out details in both and allowed for a photo that is closer to what I saw.

Spider Rock, Canyon de Chelly, Arizona

While traveling through northern Arizona we stopped at Canyon de Chelly.  This was a destination I knew very little about, but was   glad we made the effort. This spot is called Spider Rock, which is actually the tall spire, and the shorter tower is known as Speaking Rock. Spider Rock is the home of Navajo deity Spider Grandmother , whom is the protector of peaceful men. The other side of the of the story  is a bit spookier, the legend has it that the Spider Grandmother devours evil people and white rock on top of the tower are the bones left behind.  The tallest spire is 800' above the canyon floor, which helps put some scale to the photograph.

Photographing Children

When Photographing children, I usually start with a pose just to get them in line with the background I want, but in the end I let them be themselves and work around their energy or in the one image lack of it. Kids are tough to get posed in one place, so just go with the flow. With children keep your photos light and bright, I also prefer a soft feel to the image (not out of focus). This collage is of a sweet little girl I have photographed several times during the last 2 and one half years. She is always a joy and full of energy. Also Thanks to her parents for giving me permission to use her images on my Blog.

Grand Canyon @ Daybreak



It was day break on the south rim of the Grand Canyon, when I noticed the sun bathing this tree and outcrop with a warm light. I decided to include the silhouette of the foreground in the shot, I'm not sure if I like it or not. The light changed within seconds after taking the image, so I only had time to take the version with the foreground. Maybe it gives the image depth to include the foreground, but I wish I had both versions to compare.

Nubble Lighthouse, Maine







This is a place that has been photographed many times, and I was hoping for a stormy day with big waves crashing against the rocks. Well as luck would have it I got a beautiful day, with calm seas, guess I should not complain. Maine has a wonderful rocky sea shore, and I would like to get back some day.

Death Valley, CA(Protect your Camera)



This image was take on a recent trip to death valley, this walk way runs along a creek that exists part of the year and actually contains fish. Though it does not look like it in the picture, it was well over 100 deg. on this particular day. When temperatures get this high not only do you have to take care of yourself, but your camera can suffer also. Image sensors in digital cameras can develop more noise at higher temperatures, so keep your cool and your equipments also. I have used a cooler in places like this or at the beach to protect my equipment from severe heat.

The Beach and Pier @ Santa Monica, CA



Santa Monica, California is a really vogue place. It has a huge beach, a cool pier, and tons of places to eat. This image was taken about a hour before sunset, and the clouds rolled in, which masked the sun (I'm not so sure it was clouds, could have been smog). Whatever it was it made for a good silhouette. The color was not altered, this is how the camera's auto white balance  saw it, so I left it as is.