Last night Ellie played in the first regular season softball game in Phoenix. It rained pretty good just prior to the game (and then again after), but the softball gods parted the clouds somewhat during the game.

Posted on June 6th, 2012 under people. Tags: clouds, Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8G VR II, nikon d7000, softball, sports. Comments Off on Softball under stormy clouds

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.

Posted on May 26th, 2012 under nature, only in ashland. Tags: clouds, mt. ashland, Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8G ED AF-S Nikkor Lens, nikon d7000, panorama, pilot rock, siskiyous, wagner butte. Comments: 1

On Wednesday I had a bit of free time in the afternoon, and the clouds began to break up, so I headed up Highway 66 into the Green Springs. I was going to look for a bald eagle I heard had nested near Hyatt Lake. More on the eagle later….

On my way home I came down Dead Indian Memorial Road into Ashland and took several photos which I photomerged together to arrive at the above panorama picture.

Posted on May 11th, 2012 under nature, only in ashland, outside of ashland, places. Tags: clouds, nikon d7000, panorama, skywatch, Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8 AT-X 116 Pro DX Autofocus Lens for Nikon. Comments Off on Dead Indian Memorial Road Panorama

I love waking up in the morning to look out the window and see what kind of magic is happening. Every day the scene is different. Some aren’t spectacular, but a surprisingly large number of days are. Today’s photo is from yesterday morning. I took this after the sunrise, which wasn’t as amazing as it sometimes is, but the clouds, sun rays, and brand new leaves on the trees made this one special.

Posted on May 4th, 2012 under nature, only in ashland. Tags: clouds, home, Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8G ED AF-S Nikkor Lens, nikon d7000, spring, sunrise. Comments: 1

I went back to the same location as this prior image to give this panorama shot another try without so much sun. This time I photomerged images taken at 24mm (on a crop sensor) instead of 11mm.

There is a bird flying through this photo just right of center. I think that is Pompadour Bluff in the center.

Posted on April 30th, 2012 under nature, only in ashland, places. Tags: clouds, grizzly peak, Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8G ED AF-S Nikkor Lens, nikon d7000, panorama, photoshop photomerge. Comments Off on Cloudy Ashland Panorama

I drove from Ashland to Los Angeles in a single day on my own. I made three or four pit stops along the way and this was the view from one of them. I was somewhere on I-5 heading south between The Bathrooms and The Angels (Los Banos and Los Angeles) when I took this photo.

I left Ashland before 4 a.m., traveling through quite a bit of snow and rain along the way. The sunrise was a dazzling contest between the sun and storm clouds for several hours between Redding and Sacramento. Unfortunately, I didn’t make any photo stops until this one.

I’m not sure what kind of trees these were, but they seemed to go on forever, like many of the orchards and farms along I-5.

Posted on April 15th, 2012 under nature, outside of ashland, places. Tags: california, clouds, nikon d7000, Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8 AT-X 116 Pro DX Autofocus Lens for Nikon, trees. Comments Off on California’s Central Valley

Yesterday was a really beautiful day in Ashland. Unfortunately, I had to work most of the day. However, I did get this shot off on my way to work. Actually, this is five shots merged into one in CS5 and probably covers about 150 degrees. That’s why Grizzly Peak, on the left, looks so small even though I wasn’t that far from it.

Other than the sun being too much, I really like how this photo turned out. I’ll have to try it again someday when the sun is behind a cloud.

Posted on April 7th, 2012 under nature, only in ashland. Tags: clouds, grizzly peak, landscape, nikon d7000, panorama, photography, snow, spring, Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8 AT-X 116 Pro DX Autofocus Lens for Nikon. Comments Off on Ashland panorama

I previously mentioned how I was getting better results working with RAW files in concert lighting situations. When going through my jpg image results I almost deleted the above image because the amazing clouds my eyes saw were totally ruined in the jpg file. Before hitting delete, however, I decided to see what I could do with the RAW file. Here is the result:

Posted on March 28th, 2012 under nature, only in ashland. Tags: clouds, grizzly peak, nikon d7000, photography, raw vs. jpg jpeg, Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8 AT-X 116 Pro DX Autofocus Lens for Nikon. Comments Off on RAW vs. JPG (RAW isn’t just for weird, indoor lighting)

When the daytime temperature hits 60 degrees and the forecast is for snow in the evening, you know the sunset is likely to be spectacular. Luckily I was out, waiting for Ellie to finish her flute lesson, when the pre-sunset show began to take place.

Posted on March 5th, 2012 under nature, only in ashland. Tags: clouds, mt. ashland, Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8G VR II, nikon d7000, sunset. Comments: 7