NC Trip: Day 1.

I didn't expect it to take me this long to post photos! I am ashamed.

On the bright side, I've been kinda busy at the 'business' blog (check out the link, righthand column), redecorating and rearranging things. And I've been learning studio photography and how to shoot people. :) (With my camera) I've also been to the Chinese Lantern Festival at the botanical garden. So there is plenty to post in the coming days and weeks. Hope you enjoy!

Okay. Day 1.

I made it to Asheville in 8 hours and 45 minutes. I am awesome. I managed to sleep a bit before packing up the car and heading out by 1 am. So with no pit stops for sleep - yay! - and two stops for gas (boooo), I showed that stretch of highway who's boss.

We had quite a first day (we being my photog friend Jennie and her husband Randall. I know. I'm always the third wheel). We went to: Looking Glass Falls, Graveyard Fields, the Richland Balsam area, and stopped at a multitude of overlooks all along the way.

I had uber-prepared, as I think I've mentioned here on the blog, by purchasing two more ND filters, both a +4. So stacking them along with the +2 I already had, meant that I could finally, really get those waterfall shots. It also meant that I came to understand the limitations of my camera better, and while I love my entry-level DSLR, I am no longer an entry-level player.

So here's Looking Glass:



Yellowstone Prong along the hike to Graveyard Fields:



A zoom shot of the lower portion of the lower falls (more on why in a sec):



And a portrait-style orientation of the lower falls:



Notice. The people. They were everywhere. In the water, on the rocks, at the top of the falls, at the bottom, crawling up, crawling down...it made me wish I'd packed something other than my camera. Now, the weather was great, and it was a cloudy day for about half of it so prime time for people to get and enjoy their beautiful state. But all the same...I guess I just never though of waterfalls as places to go frolicking in a bathing suit. I thought you were supposed to stand in awe of nature, and get a few great shots. (And believe me, the crowds were worse at Looking Glass)

So there are a few folks in the photo above - but at least they're wearing nice colors. ;-)

A few pretty shots, from the Graveyard trail and from an overlook:







Funnily enough, though I'd gone on this trip with one singular goal besides re-connecting with my friend, that being to capture some great sunsets, I didn't take into account the perfection of the clouds until we were up in the Richland Balsam area.

It was stormy looking...



Then the light began to break through...



And then the heavens opened up.



A great final image for a great first day.

El zoologico.

That's Spanish for 'the zoo.'



I realized there are only so many photos you can take of the same animals. And every visit will be different. Some days the animals will be alert and enjoy the humans. Other days they'll stay inside the one tight little space allotted for them where they can't be seen, ever. That was kind of the experience this past Sunday, which was a little sad because it was my friend Josh's first visit to the St. Louis Zoo.

However, we did see a few really cool things! One being a gorilla getting all ticked off at all the people staring at him, and then standing up and beating on his chest. Like in a real jungle!! Did I get a picture of it? Nooooo.

So you'll have to settle for these.









I'm gonna try not to make a big deal out of this, sooooo......

THE PEACOCK SPREAD HIS FEATHERS!!!!! O!!!! M!!!! G!!!! FINALLY!!!!!!!!!!



YEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!





Ahhhh. Moving on.

I hadn't been to the reptile house ('herpatarium') in a few years, and I wanted to get a shot of the brilliant green snake they have. But he was alllll curled up and antisocial.



So I found others to love. :)







And now...the tulipgasm.

Santa Cruz.

Another place that I found courtesy of Flickr was Natural Bridges State Beach in Santa Cruz. It's about an hour and forty minutes south of Berkeley, a really beautiful drive that wound through mountains and gorgeous fir tree forests. At one point there was a dazzling lake vista - but alas, I was the driver, and I was alone. (Next time I'm pulling over)

When I got to West Cliff Drive, I hung a left and drove along the cliffs for a bit before parking. It was absolutely wonderful to be in the warm sun and the light wind and have this ridiculously amazing vista in both directions. Though I came ultimately for the natural bridge, I took some time (as it was still a few hours before sunset) to just soak it all in.









There were surfers! AWESOME.



The birds even like taking in the view.



There were lots of birds, as you'll see. It was the coolest thing to hear the waves - they really do "crash" against the shore, and when they hit the rocks they really do "thunder." I'd be walking along, unable to see the shoreline at certain points, and then the gigantic spray would be flung up almost near the top of the cliffs. Really, an amazing thing to see.

Okay, so funny story. When it was time for me to scope out the scene I'd come for (the natural bridge), I asked a pleasant-looking couple passing me if they knew which direction it was. The woman said they'd found it further west, but that it sadly had already crumbled into the sea.

Horrors!

I mean, this was, after all, the reason I drove all the way to Santa Cruz, right? I kept a brave face. I asked if they were sure, since I'd just seen a picture from about a month ago and it was standing tall and strong. She said yup, there were some people taking photos of it but it's days of glory were behind it now. So I said, 'Well, that sucks!' and thanked them for the info and headed despondently further west to see the death of the bridge. This is what I found:



Pretty pathetic. So I took a few photos, gamely, and then decided to just make sure that they were right after all. I walked maybe fifty more yards - and there it was in all it's splendor, right past the big sign none of us saw pointed toward Natural Bridges State Beach. It was literally the right turn I should have taken.





It. Is. AWESOME.

However, there used to be three bridges; the outer and innermost ones really have crumbled, the first at the turn of the twentieth century, and the second in the early eighties after a bad storm. All the erosion from the constant pounding of the surf means that this remaining bridge is, too, in danger of crumbling and likely within our lifetime. That will be a very sad day. So I'm glad I got to see it now. =)







And here we have arrived at the photo that I had in mind the entire time. Yes, I'm simply imitating the one I found on Flickr, and with inferior equipment it is probably a pale imitation indeed. But for me, it kind of represents a new high for my craft. It involved travel, new accessories, shooting in manual mode, and even learning a new post-processing technique. Everything had to come together the right way, and in the end I came away with this one single shot that worked.



Hope you like it. =)

How I got the water to look that way is I went into manual mode, set the aperture to f/25, and then experimented with long shutter speeds. In the end, this three-second exposure took the cake. (It's possible to do thirty-second exposures and longer, which results in the water looking as smooth as the surface of a mirror) When you leave the shutter open so long a lot of light gets collected, which can blow out the scene, so I bought a 2-stop neutral density filter a couple of weeks ago just for this purpose. The filter darkens the scene somewhat so that more light can be collected during the longer exposure. Then, in order to capture the flow of the water, I waited for it to recede from the shore, which captured the lines you see. (It did take me a while to figure that out; I thought I was supposed to get the water coming toward me - but no!)

I did, however, get a few sand particles inside the camera while changing lenses sooooo they were visible on the photo, about five of them. So I learned how to clone stamp in post-processing. Basically you take a part of the photo very near what you want to erase and clone it, and it is then stamped onto the area you're erasing. So, voila! No sand particles in the picture. Yay!

All in all, a very rewarding day, a great new experience, and lots of nice photos to commemorate it all.

Another golden moment.

I want to share a pic from my photographer friend in NC. It is, clearly in a word, superb.



Her camera is from the Canon Rebel series and is responsible for all the beautiful photos she's taken around her state. Also, I have a weird thing about the way a shutter sounds - as in I love it - and her camera's is so great, it's like a tiny Transformer sneezing.

Anyway, just wanted to share another golden moment. (Check out her website Vengiletti when you get a chance)

My favorite photo of the year.

I thought about showing all of my favorite photos from the year, then realized it would either be an annoyingly long list or I'd be anxious leaving out certain shots in the interests of brevity. So, just showing the one. :)

I am so glad to have had the experiences I've had this year, and that I was able to get a new and much-improved camera in the nick of time. North Carolina was an Eden of opportunity, and during my unfortunate out-of-work stint, I found a lot of wonderful places in my hometown, and learned to look harder (and work harder) for the capture.

This photo continues to stand out amongst them all:



(Nikon D3000, f/3.5, ISO-800, 1/2 sec.)

I never cease to be amazed at how symmetrical the photograph is - when I wasn't even trying. In addition, the feet of Jesus on the cross are ridiculously close to the edge of the picture - I have no idea how this happened. Hmm. Maybe it was a miracle. ;-)

Going back to work has meant much less time for photography. I can hardly put into words the sorrow I feel every time I see an opportunity, and have to let it go. There is so much beauty around us and yet the world demands that we keep moving, keep going faster, don't deviate from the routine. It is a sorrow on my heart, and no less.

The sunsets are much improved (though I only see them through the glass of the office front door); yet they have also prompted me to notice how much of the city skyline, even into the suburbs, obstructs an open, wide-angle view of the sky. There's always a cluster of trees, or a building, or a store, or houses - always something, sprung up to aide the progress of civilization. It's hard to have it both ways, I see.

Maybe one day I'll live in a place like those you see in winning photographs, where there's always a quaint ship in the harbor, always horses trotting in the pasture, always a farmhouse or one-room church nestled in the snow. Maybe one day I'll have time.

Happy New Year. :)

At the end of things.

Floating on
a slow-moving river

in the spring
or fall

stretched out on a raft
eyes to the sky

watching the light
blink through the leaves

perpetual afternoon

and I'm heading for

a mountainside cottage
nestled in green and yellow grass

or a turn-of-the-century
house on the plains

or open arms

and it may take me
an eternity to decide

***

that's what

heaven

will be.

Where to now?

I found out this past weekend that one of my favorite places to visit, Doughton Park, will likely be closed down in a sense for two years while restoration projects are undertaken along that section of the Blue Ridge Parkway. Really not cool. It's become a perennial favorite, and I had big plans to catch the sunrise at Wildcat Rocks one morning next year and capture the awesome fog rolling over the mountainsides.

For a location as important as the Parkway, I know it's crucial for them to maintain it, to keep it safe, to keep it beautiful. So restoration was inevitable. I guess I just wish it could have been further down the road. No pun intended.

Oh well. I suppose this frees up a few days to visit a new place, and make new memories.

Blue Ridge Parkway.

There's plenty to see along the BRP. With an abundance of gorgeous open-air views, trails, waterfalls, overlooks, wildflowers, and the unexpected, it is one of the most scenic drives in America, and you'll stay occupied: it winds through multiple states. It's perfect for those who, of course, love nature, and aren't easily bored by what at first seem to be repititious mountain landscapes. You have to look closer.

Plenty of guidebooks provide a list of attractions accessibly by the Parkway; Doughton Park, Crabtree Falls, and the Jeffress Trail are just three of them. I have so many photos from many days spent winding the curves of the Parkway that simply a random selection is all I can afford you. You should see it for yourself. :)