Archive for category Colorado
October 30, 2012 – Ophir Pass
Posted by Dave in Colorado, Fall Color, Mountains, Picture of the Day on October 30, 2012
Approaching Ophir Pass in Autumn
Tuesday, October 30, 2012
Okay, enough of a break, back to the bright yellows from my Colorado trip. This is another one from the approach to Ophir Pass, a bit south of Telluride. And, this is another shot that would have been better had my equipment not been giving me problems. Specifically, this is yet another victim of the corner/edge softness in my Tamron 17-50. (If you’ll remember – I ended up sending it in for warranty repair after this trip. They apparently did indeed find some things wrong with it, so I’m currently waiting for it to get back here in the mail.) You can see what I’m talking about along the top ridgeline. And, I also had to crop the image some (pained me quite a bit to do that – as I felt that the original composition was better) because the stuff that used to be along the right edge and in the top right corner were just too distracting in their blurriness. Sigh. Oh well.
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel T1i, Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8 lens. 1/250s, f/6.3, ISO 200. Focal length: 43mm.
Subscribe to the Picture of the Day via: October 16, 2012 – Driving into Telluride
Posted by Dave in Colorado, Fall Color, Mountains, Picture of the Day on October 16, 2012
Autumn drive in Telluride, Colorado
Tuesday, October 16, 2012
So.. umm.. yes, yet another shot from the Colorado trip. Not sure how you’re feeling, but I’m getting to the point where I need a break from bright yellow. I *love* bright yellow fall color, but it’s getting a bit overwhelming. Need to figure out what to do about that. Also, I’m getting a tiny bit tired of looking at that same right-side-softness from my Tamron lens day after day after day. It’s just a constant reminder of the pictures I *should* have gotten on the trip, but didn’t quite. So frustrating.
Anyway, this is the view from the road right outside of the “Mountain Village” part of Telluride. I didn’t know this until I was there, but Telluride is split into two pieces – the town and the “mountain village” part (which is purely part of the ski resort). That part in and of itself is not uncommon – especially in Colorado where you have old mining towns that later open up ski resorts – you’ll have the town itself that is a bit removed from the ski resort, sometimes 10 or 20 minutes apart. Telluride is pretty unique in my experience though, because the ski hill sits literally right between the two. As in, both sides (city and resort village) have access to the mountain, and there’s a gondola that takes you from one to the other, right over the ski hill. So if you’re staying there, either side will get you walking distance access to skiing. Pretty cool. So, as I mentioned, this is the road just outside of the resort village area. Gorgeous country out there, I’d love to go back.
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel T1i, Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8 lens. 1/250s, f/7.1, ISO 200. Focal length: 31mm.
October 15, 2012 – Ruby Peak
Posted by Dave in Colorado, Fall Color, Mountains, Picture of the Day on October 15, 2012
Aspens and Ruby Peak, near Kebler Pass
Monday, October 15, 2012
Another shot from Colorado today. In fact, another shot from near Kebler Pass. I can’t help it – that’s where I found the aspens. Today I did something that I generally find a bit distasteful. A lot of times when you see people posting panoramic images, it’s because they couldn’t figure out a way to get an interesting composition using a standard frame size. I immediately start to suspect that there was uninteresting stuff either on top or on the bottom, so rather than take a better picture, they said eff it, and just lopped it off.
For this picture, it’s a totally different story, you see. I really liked this view. But I just couldn’t seem to find a way to frame it that didn’t have a bunch of boring stuff at the bottom of the frame. So I cropped it. Totally different. Uh huh. Yeah.
Whatever. This is Ruby Peak, near Kebler Pass, as I mentioned. And lots of aspens. In the fall. You may notice some softness on the right side of the frame. You will *definitely* notice it now, even if you didn’t before. Assuming you’re reading this, which you may not be. That’s a problem with my lens. I’ve suspected it for awhile, but I did some testing to verify that, yes, the right side of the frame in the photos I take with this lens is all effed up. So I’m going to send it in for warranty repair. Hope that takes care of it. Sigh. It makes me sad to think of all the photos I took that could have been so much better without that issue, especially those from this trip. Poop.
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel T1i, Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8 lens. 1/250s, f/8, ISO 200. Focal length: 28mm.
October 11, 2012 – Cliff Creek Trail
Posted by Dave in Colorado, Fall Color, Picture of the Day on October 11, 2012
Cliff Creek Trail, near Kebler Pass
Thursday, October 11, 2012.
After a 2 day hiatus from pictures from my Colorado trip this fall, we’re back where we left off. This was taken along the Cliff Creek trail, a bit west of Kebler Pass. That wasn’t the trail we were originally aiming for – but there was a bit of confusion on the map, so this is where we ended up. Turned out to be a pretty nice trail – the first half a mile or a mile hiked through some really nice aspen groves, and there were some nice views to be had all the way up to whatever pass you go over.
In other news, I think I figured out what was wrong, that caused the majority of the Colorado pictures that I was so excited about to not turn out. I believe that one or more of my focus points are on the fritz. I’ve long known that if you use full-autofocus, my camera body gets confused and will end up focusing on.. nothing at all, really. And, one point in particular (the top right) just plain won’t focus at all – it will just search back and forth endlessly. So, for a significant portion of the trip I used one particular focus point (lower right), and I think that’s why so many of the images came out blurry. The problem occurred with each of my 3 lenses, so I was able to (mostly) rule out any of them in particular being the issue. (Although it was particularly prevalent with my telephoto, so there might be further issues there.) Anyway, I think that’s just yet another sign that it may be time to upgrade. So now the decision comes down to either the T4i (available now) or wait and see if they replace the 7D anytime soon. (I’ve heard rumors about January, we’ll see. And, it’s quite likely that I wouldn’t have the cash for that anyway, so in all likelihood I’ll end up waiting for that, and then just springing for the T4i anyway.)
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel T1i, Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8 lens. 1/250s, f/5.0, ISO 200. Focal length: 42mm.
October 8, 2012 – Marcellina Mountain
Posted by Dave in Colorado, Fall Color, Mountains, Picture of the Day on October 8, 2012
Fall Colors and Marcellina Mountain
Today’s picture is another one along Kebler Pass Road. This one was taken from the road itself – it winds itself right around this peak, which I’m fairly sure is called Marcellina Mountain.
I’ve realized over the past few days that I’m not going to be able to keep this one-picture-a-day-from-my-Colorado-trip thing going as long as I hoped to, because a lot of my pictures just plain didn’t turn out. Multiple equipment malfunctions, it turns out. Specifically, just about every picture I took with my telephoto is complete garbage. Like, not even close to in focus, stuff like that. I think a lot of it has to do with the new polarizer I got for that lens, but I can’t yet put my finger quite on why that would have made such a drastic difference. I mean, it’s not totally unexpected – since it had been so long since I had really been out taking pictures, I figure there’d be hundreds of little things that I’d just be forgetting about (forgetting to compose pictures in certain ways, forgetting about little tips and tricks to make things come out better, etc), but it’s still superbly frustrating, seeing pictures that I was *sure* I had nailed turning out not quite right, or in many cases, not turning out at all. Sad. Very sad. Sigh. Oh well, I think I’ve got at least a couple more in me, we’ll see.
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel T1i, Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8 lens. 1/200s, f/5.6, ISO 200. Focal length: 42mm.
October 5, 2012 – Aspens at Kebler Pass
Posted by Dave in Colorado, Fall Color, Picture of the Day on October 5, 2012
Aspen grove at Kebler Pass, Colorado
Friday, October 5, 2012
The next entry in the series of shots I got on my fall color trip to Colorado last weekend comes from Kebler Pass, west of Crested Butte. A lot of the state was past the peak for colors, but the west side of Kebler Pass was flat-out unreal. HUGE aspen groves that were just bursting with riotous color. The phrase “breathtaking” gets tossed around lightly a lot these days, but it truly applied here – the views gave me tingles. Amazing, amazing, amazing.
I’m going to take a break over the weekend, then next week I’ll post some more shots from my trip.
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel T1i, Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8 lens. 1/250s, f/8, ISO 200. Focal length: 42mm.
October 4, 2012 – Ophir Pass
Posted by Dave in Colorado, Fall Color, Mountains, Picture of the Day on October 4, 2012
Approaching Ophir Pass in Autumn
Thursday, October 4, 2012
Another fall picture from Colorado today, from my trip last weekend. This one is approaching Ophir Pass from the west. Ophir Pass is a fairly rough road that crosses the mountains south of Telluride, cutting through to a point just north of Silverton, in the San Juans. We attempted to drive over it, but it got pretty gnarly pretty quickly, and I wasn’t sure how much clearance our rental car had. I’m pretty sure we could have made it, but I’ll admit that I got a bit spooked, and at one particular river crossing I decided that we had pushed it enough. We got just about to the end of the aspen groves though, so while we definitely missed some great views higher up, we had seen about all the color there was to see, at least on the west side of the pass.
I’m seeing some corner softness in today’s and yesterday’s pictures. This is frustrating for me, I’m not sure why I’m noticing that a lot more now than in the past. Maybe it’s always been there and I just never knew. Maybe it’s time for some new equipment. Hmmmm.
Oh, and: yes, I used a polarizer on this one. Duh.
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel T1i, Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8 lens. 1/320s, f/5.6, ISO 200. Focal length: 42mm.
October 3, 2012 – Autumn in Telluride
Posted by Dave in Colorado, Mountains, Picture of the Day on October 3, 2012
Fall colors in Telluride, Colorado
Wednesday, October 3, 2012
Well, umm.
I’m going to try to start posting again. At least in the near-term future anyway. Because, see, I finally got to take some pictures. That doesn’t happen too often anymore. But, I just got back from a trip to Colorado, where I got to see some cool stuff, like this. So I’m going to hopefully be posting a few of the pics. And, thus, here’s the first one.
This was taken from the ski area at Telluride, which sits between the town and the little mountain village area. It was fall. It was colorful. Those are aspens. Hooray!
It’s also worth noting that I’ve (finally) decided to change my strategy for what to do when somebody clicks on the image. Up until now, I’ve had it open up my blog in a new tab. The thinking there was that people viewing the entry via email or an RSS reader would then arrive at the webpage proper, where they could then click around and discover all my other content, for whatever that’s worth. But now, I’ve instead decided to make available larger versions of the images (which, let’s be honest, look a lot better). So if you click on the image, you’ll see a larger version. I think I settled on 1200xwhatever. Maybe tomorrow I’ll go all the way to 1600 so you could actually use it for your wallpaper and stuff. And maybe I’ll get around to doing the same for some of my historical updates too, if I get bored. We’ll see.
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel T1i, Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8 lens. 1/250s, f/10.0, ISO 400. Focal length: 22mm.
June 21, 2011 – Echo Lake
Posted by Dave in Colorado, Flowers, Mountains, Picture of the Day on June 21, 2011
Echo Lake
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
http://davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=1631
Yeah, I forgot to upload those pics again. Sigh.
So, instead, here’s a picture of Echo Lake, with Mt. Evans in the background. This is in Colorado. You can actually drive to the top of Mt. Evans, and it’s paved the whole way. That’s noteworthy, because you can *also* drive to the top of another sort-of nearby fourteener, Pikes Peak, but *that* road is *not* paved the whole way. Pikes Peak is right outside Colorado Springs, which is where I grew up. Now you know.
So, right, Mt. Evans is not Pikes Peak, so that’s the last mention Pikes Peak will get today. Mt. Evans is near Idaho Springs, which is a little ways up I-70, west of Denver. Echo Lake is on the way up, but it’s before the spot where you have to pay. Because yes, you have to pay to drive up Mt. Evans. It’s worth it though. If you’ve got an afternoon to kill, it’s a great way to get up into the high country. And you can get some really nice photos after only barely getting out of your car. My kind of place!
Canon EOS Rebel XT, Tamron 28-300mm VC lens. 1/60s, f/18.0, ISO 400. Focal length: 65mm.
June 13, 2011 – Mayflower Gulch
Posted by Dave in Colorado, Mountains, Picture of the Day on June 13, 2011
Mayflower Gulch
Monday, June 13, 2011
http://davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=1046
Amazingly enough, I actually made it out to take a few pictures late last week and over the weekend. And no, this isn’t one of them. But I figured it’d be worth mentioning, so you can know what to expect once I finally get around to tossing them online. This weekend the weather appeared to finally be nice enough to allow the bugs to start coming out to play. So, I spent some time trying to take pictures of bees flying as they were either preparing to land on flowers, or just taking off from flowers. Turns out, it’s really hard. More on that later.
Also, late last week I went on an epic 14-hour adventure, chasing the northern lights. There was an aurora forecast that suggested that they should be visible from my latitude, so I went driving, hoping to find a location that was a) away from city lights, b) had a view of the northern sky, and c) wasn’t cloudy. I basically succeeded in those three after a lot of effort (I ended up at a location that, were you to drive straight there, would be just under 5 hours from where I live), but there were no northern lights to be found. BUT, I got some decent pics along the way, so you’ll see some of those eventually.
In the meantime, here’s a shot from Mayflower Gulch in Summit County, Colorado that I grabbed today just so that I’d have something to show you.
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel T1i, Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8 lens. 1/250s, f/6.3, ISO 100. Focal length: 39mm.
June 7, 2011 – Hahn’s Peak Trail
Posted by Dave in Colorado, Picture of the Day on June 7, 2011
Hahn's Peak Trail
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
http://davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=1568
Man, I still haven’t gotten out to take a picture in just about forever now. The motivation just isn’t there, and on top of that the weather has been pretty much crap for as long as I can remember. So, I’m still just tossing out pics from the archive, random stuff from years past. Here’s one from near Steamboat Springs, Colorado, from the trail that goes to the top of Hahn’s Peak. Some nice yellow flowers I guess, as the trail approached treeline. A reasonable trail, if you find yourself in the area. If not, well, I guess you’ll just have to find another trail to hike.
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel XT, Tamron 28-300mm VC lens. 1/30s, f/10.0, ISO 200. Focal length: 30mm.
May 9, 2011 – Maroon Bells and Maroon Lake
Posted by Dave in Colorado, Mountains, Picture of the Day on May 9, 2011
Maroon Bells and Maroon Lake
Monday, May 9, 2011
http://davefry.net/rate/index.php?viewimage=650
Hey everyone! This is the last post that you’ll see for a couple days, just so you know. So you’d better enjoy it. This is, of course, the Maroon Bells (and Maroon Lake), near Aspen, Colorado. You’ve all seen this before, so no reason to talk about it too much, right?
Okay then, have a great day!
Notes: Canon EOS Rebel XT, 18-55mm kit lens. 1/320s, f/5.6, ISO 100. Focal length: 55mm.