March 9, 2010 – Mt. Shuksan
Posted by Dave in Mountains, Picture of the Day, Washington State on March 9, 2010
Mt. Shuksan
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=631
I don’t like this picture. I mean, I *really* don’t like this picture. The foreground is all muddled up with a shapeless mess of green stuff, and not only does it not nicely frame the mountain in the background, it actually partially blocks it. I really really don’t like this picture. But for some unknown reason, it seems that everyone else does. At the time I’m writing this, it’s got 53 votes, with an astronomical average of 8.96!! What?!? I mean, I can understand the odd high vote here and there, but normally by the time a mediocre picture gets 53 votes, sanity has prevailed and the average rating has fallen to a more reasonable level. But not with this one.
Am I wrong here?? What do you people see in this picture that I’m missing? There’s got to be something, right? Anyone??
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel XT, 18-55 mm kit lens. 1/200s, f/5.6, ISO 100. Focal length: 22mm.
Popularity: 46% [?]
March 8, 2010 – Sawtooth Valley
Posted by Dave in Picture of the Day on March 8, 2010
Sawtooth Valley
Monday, March 8, 2010
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=1363
Welcome back everyone! It’s Monday again, and Mondays are AWESOME! So is my false enthusiasm!! WOOOO!!!
Over the past several weeks, I’ve been trying to make my way through all of the pictures I took a couple summers ago (that’s 2008 for those of you who lose track, like me). It’s been a bit frustrating, because all of the pictures I took from that period were using the lens that I have since decided was pretty crappy. (I think I’ve covered this a couple times already.) A lot of the images are recoverable with post-processing, but they’re still just.. not as nice as I’d like. I did some cool stuff that summer, like taking a road trip out to Colorado to visit my wife’s family. (And, well.. okay, I visited my own family too while I was there..) So it’s extra frustrating to not be happy with the pictures I got from some really pretty areas that I’ll in all likelihood never see again. Sigh.
Today’s picture was from that trip. This was taken in the Sawtooth Valley somewhere in the middle of Idaho. It’s a little ways north of Sun Valley along highway 75, just outside of a town called Stanley. That area is AB-SOE-LOOT-LEE GOR-JUSS! I’m definitely going to make it a point to get back there someday. But man, it’s a pain in the butt to get out there. I headed east on I-90 to Missoula, then south through the Bitterroots. I got there late in the afternoon of the 2nd day, if that gives you any indication. To make matters worse (as if the crappy lens wasn’t bad enough), I got there at the worst possible time as far as the quality of the light goes. There were all of these super huge unbelievably jagged peaks jutting straight out of the valley (very reminiscent of the Tetons, actually), but they were backlit in the most horrible way. So I got pictures of those peaks that were good enough to remind myself what it looked like (and whet my appetite for going back), but not good enough for any other purpose. I got others that are passable, like this one, but this doesn’t capture the magic of the place, not even close. (This isn’t even one of the nice looking mountains, it’s looking the completely wrong direction.) Sadly, it wasn’t my destination, and I didn’t have time to linger. So I just had to add it to the list of places to make it back to before I die, and move on.
So, there it is. You’ll undoubtedly see more pictures from that summer floating through from time to time, but I probably won’t call them out, so you’ll only know them by the faint sense of oversharpening.
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel XT, Tamron 28-300 mm VC lens. 1/20s, f.22.0, ISO 400. Focal length: 42mm.
Popularity: 85% [?]
March 5, 2010 – Fallen Leaf
Posted by Dave in Fall Color, Macro, Picture of the Day, Winter/Snow on March 5, 2010
Fallen leaf
Friday, March 5, 2010
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=1296
And just like that, another week comes to a close. It’s funny, until my Olympic special last week, I hadn’t felt any particular urge to use any Vancouver/Whistler shots for awhile. But now that I promised not to use ANY Vancouver/Whistler shots this week, those are suddenly the only ones I can think of. Seriously, the first three pictures I wanted to use for today were all ineligible. Sigh.
Fortunately, I was able to find something to work with today. I stumbled on this leaf about a month ago. I was fairly surprised actually, for a number of reasons. First of all, it’s a really pretty leaf. It was an odd color, that kid of sandy brown, and it was kind of translucent. There were several of them lying around, and they all looked super fragile, like tissue paper, but they were surprisingly resilient. Next, it was.. umm.. February. Clearly the leaf had just recently fallen, it was quite fresh. It didn’t fall, get buried with snow, and then become exposed as the snow melted. (As you can tell, it was pretty warm – the snow was definitely more slushy than powdery – this was at a pretty low elevation on the eastern side of the Cascades, on a pretty warm sunny day, which was itself part of a fairly long streak of warm sunny days.) But, why would the leaf hold on all through the winter, just to ingloriously drop on a random sunny February day? Don’t know. But I’ll happily take a picture of it.
Have a great weekend!
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel T1i, Tamron 17-50 f/2.8 lens. 1/250s, f/5.6, ISO 200. Focal length: 50mm.
Popularity: 75% [?]
March 4, 2010 – Iceberg Ridge
Posted by Dave in Picture of the Day, Washington State, Winter/Snow on March 4, 2010
Iceberg Ridge, Crystal Mountain Ski Resort
Thursday, March 4, 2010
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=359
As many of you know, I tend to really really dislike having people in my pictures. (Well, with the obvious exception of pictures of my family which generally aren’t intended for public consumption, blah blah blah…) I’m not sure why I shy away from it so much. Maybe it’s because the fashions that look good when you take the picture can look horribly dated before much time passes (seeing somebody wearing some ridiculous outfit in an otherwise really beautiful wilderness setting completely changes/ruins the picture, in my opinion anyway), or maybe it’s just because I only know ugly people. But whatever the reason, I really try to keep my pictures people-free. It’s a shame though, because having people in your pictures can definitely add value, it’s really good for adding scale, and it can really draw the viewers in, help them imagine themselves actually being there. Or so I’ve heard, not sure if I’m buying it.
All that being said, I’ve always had a bit of a soft spot for this image. It may only be that nice deep blue in the sky. Blue makes me happy. Not sure. But whatever it is, I think I’ve always liked this one more than other people do. Stupid other people. Not you, of course. Like, *other* other people.
Notes: Canon PowerShot S500 (Point and shoot). 1/1500s, f/7.1.
Popularity: 86% [?]
March 3, 2010 – Pollination
Posted by Dave in - Best of Dave's POTD -, Flowers, Macro, Picture of the Day, Washington State on March 3, 2010
Insect and Flower
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=985
Whoa, not sure what happened there, I completely missed yesterday. I guess I was just.. kind of busy, so I sort of.. completely forgot to post a picture. Sorry about that! I’d say “I won’t let it happen again”, but obviously I will.
I realized today that it’s been almost a month and a half since I posted a picture of a bug. How could I let this happen?? Clearly, I had to remedy that situation immediately. I don’t really know what kind of bug this is (my first guess is always “bee”, but that’s based only on the fact that it’s standing on a flower, so clearly I’m not the authority), but it was willing to hang around for pictures, so it hardly matters.
As I’ve mentioned in the past, taking pictures of bugs like this is purely an exercise in patience. Obviously, they move. A LOT. Also, you’re dealing with microscopic depths of field, so if you tend to sway back and forth when you take pictures like I do, you might think you got the perfect shot only to find out later that you accidentally got the hindquarters of the bug in focus instead of it’s head. Depending on what macro method you’re using – as in, super-expensive-macro-lens, ordinary macro lens, macro kit (like this one), reverse-mounted lens, etc – you may get a larger or smaller depth of field, but it’ll always be super small. So, to counter both of those issues, you end up just needing to take a TON of shots, and hopefully a handful of them will turn out okay. (When I got this picture, for example, I took about 40 frames, and got 5 or 6 that were decent enough to hold on to.) So don’t get discouraged, just keep shooting, and be ready to dig through piles and piles of crappy ones to get what you want.
Notes: Camera: Canon EOS Rebel T1i, Tamron 28-300 mm lens with Hoya Macro Kit. 1/200s, f/5.6, ISO 200. Focal length: 109mm.
Popularity: 84% [?]
March 1, 2010 – Diablo Lake
Posted by Dave in Mountains, Picture of the Day, Washington State on March 1, 2010
Diablo Lake, North Cascades National Park
Monday, March 1, 2010
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=1333
How sad, the Olympics are over. And it’s Monday. Double whammy. Sigh. Here’s a picture of a mountain to cheer you up. This is the view on Diablo Lake, in North Cascades National Park. It’s actually a man-made lake, with dams on both ends that generate a significant chunk of Seattle’s power. Technically, the lake itself is outside of the national park boundary, as is the road that goes “through the park”, but if your shoes touch dirt, you’re probably standing inside the park. (The park is split in two pieces, one north of the highway, one south, but it extends basically just up to the roadway on either side.)
This picture was actually taken on the Seattle City Light boat tour. They take you up the lake all the way to the dam that holds back Ross Lake, and back down to the dam that makes Diablo Lake a lake. There’s even a dinner option, although that’s not the one we did. It’s a great way to spend an afternoon, although it’s a bit of a drive to get there from Seattle (2-3 hours each way.) The unfortunate thing as a photographer is that the tour takes place right smack in the middle of the day, so you can basically forget about getting any interesting light for pictures. You get bright noonday sun, with the corresponding haze that brings. That’s okay though, because I’ve heard rumors that there are actually people out there that enjoy getting out into nature for reasons other than explicitly to take pictures of it. I don’t know who these people are, but I know they’re out there.
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel XT, Tamron 28-300 mm VC lens. 1/200s, f/6.3, ISO 100. Focal length: 42mm.
Popularity: 98% [?]
February 26, 2010 – Cheakamus Lake
Posted by Dave in British Columbia, Mountains, Picture of the Day on February 26, 2010
Cheakamus Lake
Friday, February 26, 2010
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=1099
So I mentioned yesterday how I already had today’s picture picked out. That was true, but this isn’t it. I realize earlier that, while I absolutely LOVE that picture, the version I had online was a little bit over-sharpened. (This one is too, but it’s not quite as drastic.) So I need to revisit it, and maybe I’ll use that one in a week or two. Instead, you get this one, which was actually taken on the same day as that other one. Blah blah blah, I realize that it’s really all the same to you guys, as long as I post a picture at all. But this way I’m keeping it straight in my own head.
This is the view over Cheakamus Lake from the backside of Whistler Mountain. You can’t ski to where I was standing when I took it (well, you CAN, but it’s out of bounds, so it would require hiking all the way back up to where you started), but you can hike there. This was along the High Note trail on Whistler mountain. (Which makes a big loop, although you can shorten the loop to something easy to do in 2-3 hours by taking the Half Note trail which branched off about a quarter mile from where this was taken.) This spot is a little ways below the top of the Symphony Express, if that helps you place it at all. Obviously, it’s a pretty nice view from up there.
This trip took place very soon after I picked up my awesome super-wide-angle lens this summer, the Tokina 11-16. Since I wasn’t very happy with my other lens at the time (the super-zoom Tokina 28-300), I ended up putting the wide angle on the camera for the entire hike. Which was kind of an interesting experience. The pictures you can get with a super wide angle are way different from any other kind of lens, so it really makes you think differently about framing your shots. But it was definitely fun. Although now that I’ve gone to the Tokina 17-50 as my workhorse lens, I haven’t found myself reaching for the wide angle as often. (When your workhorse lens starts at 28, that leaves a LOT of ground on the wide-angle side. At 17? Not so much.) But that’s okay, it’s still there if I need it.
Hahahahaha, I just took a look at the EXIF data on the image, and it turns out that everything I wrote in the last paragraph is basically totally wrong. Whoops. Turns out this was NOT taken with the Tokina, in fact it was taken with my Tamron 28-75, which means I had ALREADY swapped out my 28-300. (And then I eventually traded the 28-75 for the 17-50, which is basically the exact same lens except that it’s more wide-angle). And, that’s the lens I used for this picture, which means that what I said about not changing my lens at all during the hike was also a complete lie. Ha!
This brings to a close Whistler/Vancouver week on the Picture of the Day, thanks for reading! Come back next week for the rest of the world.
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel T1i, Tamron 28-75 mm f/2.8 lens. 1/250s, f/10.0, ISO 100. Focal length: 28mm.
Popularity: 74% [?]
February 25, 2010 – Shannon Creek
Posted by Dave in British Columbia, Picture of the Day on February 25, 2010
Shannon Creek
Thursday, February 25, 2010
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=1249
As promised, here’s this week’s shot of Shannon Creek. See? I always follow through with my promises, even if it’s for something that’s not particularly interesting or even desirable. Well, most of the time. Some of the time, at least. Whatever. This is another result of one day a couple summers ago on the way up to Whistler for the weekend. We stopped at Shannon Falls park, and I spent a fair bit of time playing around in the rocks in the creek below. I got a huge number of decent shots (although very few if any great ones), so they make great Picture of the Day filler. Like this one!
To remind everyone: this week is Vancouver/Whistler week on Picture of the Day. Loosely using the Olympics as inspiration, I’m using only pictures from around Vancouver and Whistler. Although, since I have already picked out the picture for tomorrow, I can say with authority now that my set of Whistler and Vancouver pictures will include zero pictures from in or around Vancouver. It will be 3 from on Whistler mountain, 1 from Blackcomb, and this one, from just outside Squamish (which, to be fair, is probably closer to Vancouver than to Whistler.. but it still doesn’t count.)
To really get the anticipation going for next week, I’ll go ahead and say now that I’ve picked another theme: I’m going to post only pictures that are NOT from Whistler or Vancouver. Ohh man it’s gonna be CRAZY. I can’t wait!
Notes: Camera: Canon EOS Rebel XT, Tamron 28-300 mm VC lens. 1/40s, f/9.0, ISO 200. Focal length: 154mm.
Popularity: 66% [?]
February 24, 2010 – Changing Leaves
Posted by Dave in British Columbia, Fall Color, Macro, Picture of the Day on February 24, 2010
Changing leaves
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=1088
Rather than suffocate all of you with a neverending set of mountain vistas from the twin peaks of Whistler and Blackcomb, I figured I should mix in some other stuff too. Like this one. This could have been taken anywhere, really. But it wasn’t, it was taken a little ways up the Singing Pass trail, which starts up the hill from right near the Whistler gondola. I really really wish I had gotten the bottom of the leaf in focus too, but I didn’t. It’s a textbook example of one of the really annoying things that can happen with digital. The shot looked great on the camera’s little screen, so I moved on, confident that I got the image I wanted. It wasn’t until much later (when I got home) that I realized my mistake. I was working with a pretty small depth of field as you can see, so what I *should* have done was gotten more square on that leaf in front, such that the whole surface would have been within range. Instead, I came in from a little bit above, so the bottom was just out of reach. (That, and the leaf was a bit curled in on itself.) Careless, careless, careless. Sigh.
Still a beautiful couple of leaves though, so it’s not a complete waste of time. Check back tomorrow, that’s going to be the day that I’m going to get the picture of Shannon Creek out of the way. (You didn’t think I’d go a whole week of PICTURES OF CANADA without tossing one of those in there, did you??)
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel T1i, Tamron 28-75 mm lens. 1/125s, f/3.5, ISO 400. Focal length: 59mm.
Popularity: 87% [?]
February 23, 2010 – Hiking on Blackcomb
Posted by Dave in British Columbia, Mountains, Picture of the Day on February 23, 2010
Hiking on Blackcomb Mountain
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=1335
As I mentioned yesterday, this week I’m going to be posting only stuff from around Vancouver and Whistler. In honor of the 2010 Paralympic games. You heard me right, the Paralympics. Eff the regular Olympics, I’m doing this in honor of… the games that won’t start until March. But whatever, they will happen, and they are awesome, even though they don’t get the love and respect that the regular Olympics get. Or, maybe I’m doing it for ALL of the athletes who are only in it for the love, and not for the opportunity to put themselves in front of tv cameras so that they can build a public persona and score sponsorship deals. Or, perhaps the only reason is that I’m sitting on a lot of pictures from around the area and this way it makes it easier to choose which picture to use each day. Hmmm…. yeah, I’m pretty sure it’s the last one.
And, all that being said, I don’t actually have any pictures from around Vancouver. Mostly just Whistler. Actually, I think I have one or two, but they’re not online yet, and it’s even money on whether I’ll get around to digging them up before the end of the week. So, you get Whistler. And.. Blackcomb, like this one.
This is a picture that I took while hiking around the top of Blackcomb. They’ve always had the gondola on Whistler mountain open for hiking and mountain biking in the summer, but only last year did they actually start promoting hiking on Blackcomb. They did have one of the glaciers open for skiing though, but it was either not allowed or not encouraged or maybe just not publicized that you could go up there just to walk around. So this was the first time I ever actually got around to doing it. It’s a moderately less convenient experience than the Whistler option. On Whistler, one gondola ride and you’re up there. (Although you can also walk over to the base of the Peak chair and ride that up to the actual summit..) On Blackcomb, you have to start on the Wizard chair from the upper village, then you hop on the Solar Coaster. From there, you board A BUS that drives you over to the bottom of Seventh Heaven. You ride up that one too, and finally you’re at the top. Takes a good 45 minutes to get up there all in all. Then the skiing drops off the other side of the ridge from the Seventh Heaven chair. I heard they had recently designated a couple hiking trails up there too earlier in the summer, but I only had a little bit of time, so I just farted around the top of the lift for awhile. Definitely cool, but I think Whistler is better for hiking. If you’ve got enough time, definitely do both, but if you’ve got to choose, go with Whistler and hit up the Half Note trail.
That’s it for today! Have fun watching the games, just don’t buy anything that they’re selling.
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel XT, Tamron 28-300 mm VC lens. 1/160s, f/10.0, ISO 200. Focal length: 55mm.
Popularity: 100% [?]
February 22, 2010 – Black Tusk from Whistler Mountain
Posted by Dave in British Columbia, Mountains, Picture of the Day, Winter/Snow on February 22, 2010
Black Tusk from Whistler Mountain
Monday, February 22, 2010
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=869
Wow, Monday again. Not totally unexpected, but still. I decided that this week, I’m going to post only pictures from around Vancouver and Whistler in honor of the Olympics. This probably would have been more appropriate to do LAST week, but you know how it goes – with the time-delay broadcasting and everything, it took this long for the idea to reach the west coast.
Today, you’re looking at the million dollar view from the top of Whistler Mountain: the view out toward Black Tusk. (Yeah, that little cliff-thing poking up there on the left.) Given the predominant weather patterns we get here in the Pacific Northwest, it’s never a sure thing that you’ll be able to see it, but when you can it’s pretty cool. You can basically see it from anywhere along the top ridge (basically anywhere between the top of the Symphony Express and the Peak Chair), and I think this particular view was most of the way from the Peak Chair to the Saddle. (Blah blah blah, yeah, I realize you probably haven’t been there and thus these names are all meaningless. I’m totally just showing off how well I know the mountain at this point. Because I am awesome, obviously.)
Honestly, I’m fairly surprised that they placed the ski courses where they did. They put them all way down at the bottom of Whistler Mountain. But if you’ve been to Whistler more than once or twice, you know that the lower mountain sucks way more often than it’s good. I mean, you’re dealing with more than 5,000 feet of vertical here. The top of the mountain is nearly always fantastic, and the bottom of the mountain is nearly always crappy. So… why put the courses down where it’s crappy? Not only that, imagine how much more awesome the views would be as the cameras followed the racers down the hill if they had this kind of background instead of just grubby trees everywhere? I mean, sure, the visibility tends to be better down low (because when the fog rolls in, the upper mountain is worthless), but still. Hmm. Whatever, I’m sure they have their reasons. Grumble grumble grumble.
See you all tomorrow, right?
Notes: Canon PowerShot SD850 IS (Point and shoot). 1/400s, f/11.0.
Popularity: 70% [?]
February 19, 2010 – Purple Coneflower
Posted by Dave in - Best of Dave's POTD -, Flowers, Macro, Picture of the Day on February 19, 2010
Purple Coneflower
Friday, February 19, 2010
http://www.davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=1325
See? We’re back on schedule, just like I promised. This is a purple coneflower, I saw it when I was walking around my neighborhood late last summer. It was just before sunset, so the light was doing some really cool stuff, both giving a nice warm glow to the petals, as well as lighting up those little spiky things in the middle, making them seem like they were lit up from within. I thought it was a pretty cool effect. The difficulty comes in because of the short depth of field I was using. Depending on if you focused on the very tip of the spiky things, somewhere in the middle, or back on the petals themselves, you’d end up with wildly different shots, some of which just.. didn’t look right. In this one you can see that I went right in the middle, but I have examples of the others that I may post here someday so you can see the difference.
Back to the illumination for a minute… having that warm light come in from the side and a little bit behind can make for some really cool effects. The most dramatic use I’ve seen for it is with fall colors. If you can get the light just right, the colored leaves (or flowers, or whatever) really shine out with color, it can be really spectacular. On the other hand, if you just have the light shining directly on the subject (ie if the sun is behind you), they just look flat and kind of dirty. You can get a similar illumination effect by having the sun directly in front of you (as in, behind the subject), but that has other issues; you lose your shadows, and it can be so bright that it can wash out the colors you want, or you’ll lose your blue sky, stuff like that. Of course, like any supposed “rule” in photography, even if something in general is undesirable, there are absolutely cases where you can use it to great effect. So, whatever, ignore everything I just said. If you see something nice, take a shot from every angle you can think of, in front, from behind, off to the side, whatever. We’re all shooting digital, right? (Right???) so who cares if you waste a few frames? Take them home, and see what you like best. Here’s a dirty little secret: a lot of the time when I’m taking a picture, I don’t actually have the exact picture I’m going for in mind. I just see that there are a lot of interesting elements, and I know that they can fit together somehow to make a great picture, so I take a whole bunch, trying out different sets of parameters in each one, hoping that I’m able to find the magic mix. Sometimes things look a lot different once you look at them on the big screen, you’ll see some detail that you missed before, that can really pop and make the whole picture. I’m rambling. I’m going to stop now. Have a great weekend!
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel T1i, Quantaray 70-300 mm lens. 1/200s, f/5.6, ISO 800. Focal length: 300mm.
Popularity: 83% [?]