Mt Timpanogos Via the Timpanookie Trail, Sept. 13, 2010

Had the wonderful opportunity to hike with a good friend and Brutha of a 'notha Mother, Jason Hewlett. We have been wanting to repeat a hike we did a couple of years ago with some younger friends that tried to hike us old dudes into the ground. Did a pretty good job too....

Anyway, we took off at 6:00 AM last Monday the 13th. and hit the trail about 7. These are some shots from along the way. If any of you are interested in a description of the trail click here.

As always CLICK ON A PHOTO TO MAKE IT LARGER they look better that way!

This is Scout Falls, a very minor diversion from the trail, there is not a lot of water in Utah, but we crossed several seeps and very small flows on the trail, good to know there is a little water up there.

This is looking back up the trail/canyon to American Fork Canyon and the Alpine Loop. It was such a perfect day for the hike.

North Peak of Timpanogos, less climbed and just a bit shorter.

Main peak of Timpanogos from the North East, the trail leads around the hill to the Right and you go up the ridgeline in the middle of the photo.

East Basin, there are places to camp up there, that would be a fun overnighter.

There were a lot of bees at 10,000 ft, really surprised me, but I guess where there are flowers there are bees to pollinate them.

Our First Mountain Goat sighting. He seemed to be both curious about what the heck we were doing and a little snooty about being above us....

These Baaaaad boys were everywhere!

Mostly they ignored us unless we got too close, then they would just mosey away, picking their way across the most uneven/broken up terrain.

I don't know if they are herd animals, but they didn't seem to mind the company.

This is at the Saddle where you first get to glimpse the Utah Valley side, once you have reached the ridge you have about 1 mile and 45 minutes to 1 hour to go.

My non-patented foot to Horizon Shot, probably would work better with a Fisheye, but my Trusty Sigma 10-20 does a great job.

The final slog, this is slow and uncertain of footing, you go 60 feet, stop and pant for a second and curse yourself for wanting to do this, then go another 60 ft and repeat... till you get there, then it is all worth it!

Looking back into the East Basin. If you click on the photo to enlarge it, you can see the trail cutting across to the saddle on the Left.

Looking South from the peak. You can go down that trail and then slide down a very dirty snowfield to Emerald Lake, wouldn't recommend it though, most of the injuries on the mountain happen there. I wouldn't recommend hiking out on a broken ankle.

This guy just wandered along the ridge towards us while we were eating lunch.

Not really sure what these dudes eat...

Yeah... thats me......

Sir Jason Hewlett

Looks a little more sketchy going down.......

Like I said, lotsa bees!

Some color starting, next week will be better!

Thanks for looking! Comments always welcome!

Photomatix Fusion Function

Guess it is time to pay for Photomatix so that I don't have to keep cloning out the watermarks that Photomatix puts on my photos when I use the Fusion function. All of these were done with that function which I feel does a much better job with the shadows and highlights than the regular HDR tonemapping functions.

So... here are three photos of my local temple, 5 shots at -3, -2, 0, +2, +3 and blended, straightened, and cropped. All at 10mm with my Sigma DC EX 10-20 f4-5.6 on my Pentax K200d.

My wife and I have been wanting to capture the fountain in front for awhile (It has been off for repairs, or turned off for MONTHS!) so I took my camera and tripod for an attempt after our session.

This is the front of the Temple.

Nearly the exact same spot, but with a more extreme angle of view.

This is a square crop of the shot above after a LOT of perspective correction.

This is looking 180 degrees away from the last shot and on the other side of the fountain. I think that I need to repeat this on a day when there is a nice sunrise. Or at sunset with cool clouds over the mountains and the mountains lit up with the alpenglow.

Salt Lake City, UT, August 30, 2010

Trying to do more street shooting, abstracty stuff. So I took the opportunity to play a little bit on my way home from work the other day.

200 South
X-Marks the Spot: DuoTone

X-Marks the Spot: Color
Radiators got Ridges?

Framed!

Amsterdam?

Datails

Sometimes you have to take what you can get...

Some days you can plan things and they work great, other days you try to plan things for photography and you get nothing. This is my usual modus operandi. If I plan it I usually don't get what I planned. Improvisation and being prepared (i.e. carrying a lot of stuff I seldom use but when I leave it home it is the one piece I need!) are what get me by.

Case in point. Thought about taking my camera to work Friday after missing the sunrise cuz I slept in. Figured it was too big of a pain. Well if I had had it I could have gotten a much better shot than this one. With a Full double all the way across..... ggggrrrrrrr!

This this morning I go the lake hoping for a sunrise like there was on Friday, did I get it? Nope, but I did get a few interesting shots. This is the panorama I went to shoot, but was hoping to have more vertical to shoot.

As I left, thinking it was over and a fizzle, it started to heat up, but not in a way that my original spot would help. So I grabbed this on the way back to the truck.

And went to my best local vantage point and snapped off the rest of these. I do like them, but just wish my plans would work some better sometimes!!!

Assorted and Sundry Shots from A week ago last Saturday.

Went to a family re-union recently. As I gadded about with my camera I took a few shots that I wanted to share.

This little lamb was a curious and energetic fella/gal. She/He stood out from the darker folks she was around. (Sigma 17-70)

Even cuter (but dirtier) close up. (Sigma 17-70)

This guy has some pretty wacky horns, but was tough to get a decent photo of, he liked to hide in the shade. (All with Pentax 55-300)

No matter what I do with the photo he still looks kinda funny. Still love my bro. no matter how funny he looks!

My cousins husband, not the best lighting, but thought is was fun how sharp my new/used Pentax K35mm f3.5 is. With dramatic blur added.

There is an elusive concept called "Bokeh" I am not sure how fantastic this lens is (K35mm f3.5) but it isn't bad either, I figured that the out of focus stuff in the background would look terrible, but it ain't that bad.

I really liked the contrastiness of this shot.

Quintessential kid food shot, Ice Cream with Gummi Bears!!!!