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Another photo from the archives today… I’m not sure exactly where I took this one from, but it was more than three years ago and Pilot Rock can be seen in the distance. I should hike back up Pilot Rock before the end of summer as it has been a few years.
I have trouble sleeping on vacation. I don’t know if it’s the different bed or what, but my vacation insomnia allows me to get photos like this when I’m travelling as I’m usually up and about before dawn. I only had my wide angle lens with me at the time, which is a bit of a shame as a close up of the fog in the distant trees with this kind of lighting may have been pretty cool if I had a lens with more reach.
Today’s photo is of about 250-300 degrees worth of landscape. This picture is a photomerge from this past Saturday at our school (SOU), year-end party. I took about 11 photos to make up this panorama. Unfortunately, I took them horizontally (and I should have taken them vertically to get in more sky/ground) which meant that in order to crop them into a proper, rectangular pic I’d have to crop out the sun. Instead I just left the photomerged version as is without a crop.
As this photo was taken from the south side of Ashland, you can’t see Mt. Ashland (the Siskiyous are in the way) or many of the other items you normally see in my panoramas taken from the east side of Ashland like the Ashland Springs Hotel, etc. You can see Pilot Rock to the left if you click on the photo for a much higher resolution version.
Hyatt Lake - Southern Oregon
Today’s photo is from the side of Hyatt Lake opposite the resort side. Hence, you can frequently find yourself alone, as I did, in this location. Very tranquil and lovely… Something swam by me in the water soon after I took this pic. I followed to see what it was, but after a few dozen yards things got swampy and I could go no farther. I think it was an otter.
Southern Oregon pears
Today’s photo of pear blossoms was taken much earlier in the month. Now the pear trees are all green and the blossoms are long gone. In a few months they will be loaded with pears. I’ll have to take another visit to this same spot then for a photo of the pears on the trees.
Ashland, Oregon panorama
Before last Sunday’s eclipse, I scouted out various locations for photo taking. I like this particular place for landscapes, but the view wouldn’t have looked much different during a solar eclipse so I took this photo* and moved on to ScienceWorks for the eclipse party instead.
You will see a lot more detail if you have a widescreen computer monitor, maximize your window, and then click on the image. To capture as much detail as possible (and not miss out on the amazing clouds) *I shot about 8 or 10 images vertically at 24mm (36mm equivalent as I have a crop sensor) and then photomerged them together for this very horizontal panorama.
From left to right, you can see Pilot Rock, Mt. Ashland, and Wagner Butte. This panorama covers nearly 180 degrees and pretty much all of the Siskiyou Mountain Range viewable from Ashland.
Osprey at Hyatt Lake in Southern Oregon
As mentioned previously, I headed into the Cascades earlier this month to try and find a nest of bald eagles on the edge of Hyatt Lake. I found the nest, but ma and pa were nowhere to be found. There was one juvenile in the nest staring at me stare at him/her. After about an hour of this I was about ready to call it a day as it seemed I would have to wait forever for the white-headed parents to return. Suddenly, the juvenile stirred for the first time and made a little fly around. I captured today’s photo at the beginning of that moment.
May 20, 2012 solar eclipse as viewed from ScienceWorks in Ashland, Oregon
I had planned to head down to Weed, California to photograph yesterday’s eclipse (as that is where the eclipse was supposed to be closest to 100% in the area), but a number of factors caused me to stay in Ashland instead. Even though the sun was behind clouds, that didn’t seem to change the view of the eclipse. It looked great through proper instruments including my Nikon D7000. I didn’t look through the viewfinder. Instead I used sunglasses and live view.
For best results in photographing an eclipse, reduce your ISO to 100, increase your shutter speed to maximum (1/8000 for the above photo), and use your smallest aperture possible (f/40 for the above photo).
The above photo is as total as the eclipse got in Southern Oregon, better than expected with sun coming around all parts of the moon (annulus) even if the moon wasn’t perfectly centered.
Eclipse viewers at Ashland's ScienceWorks
A surprise appeared on the wall behind me as the tree’s shadow showed signs of the eclipse as the eclipse progressed. The crescent moon shadow pieces in the tree’s shadow were only there as the eclipse approached its annulus stage.
