Japanese Maple leaf lands atop the metal roof of the birdhouse
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The last image I posted was of the Birdhouse hanging from a branch of the Japanese Maple tree in front of our house. I loved the way this leaf, with its beautiful yellow and orange colors, was framed by the rusted metal roof of the birdhouse.
The photo was taken with a Canon EOS 40D, EF17-40mm f/4L lens, 1/90 sec at f/4, ISO 100.
The birdhouse hangs from a branch of this Japanese Maple Tree.
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As promised, here’s another photo taken in front of our house. Our Japanese Maple tree’s leaves are turning beautiful colors and falling from the tree. Some of them are caught by the birdhouse with its rusting metal roof that is hanging from a branch of the tree. The leaves on the birdhouse were as I found them, having fallen on the roof and onto the twigs that serve as a perch for the small Finches that nest in this area.
The photo was taken with a Canon EOS 40D, EF17-40mm f/4L lens, 1/30 sec at f/4, ISO 100, camera mounted on a Vanguard tripod with a Manfrotto head.
The trunk of this Japanese Maple tree welcomes the leaves of Fall after a rain
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Each year, as Fall arrives, the Japanese Maple tree in front of our home goes through the most wonderful color changes. This year we were also lucky to have some rain and it brightened the colors of the leaves and the moss on the trunk of the tree. There were many good shots to take by this tree. This is the first of several I’ll be posting over the next few weeks. Be sure to click on the image to enlarge it.
Note: All leaves in this series of images fell naturally and were not moved or placed where I photographed them.
The photo was taken with a Canon EOS 40D, EF17-40mm f/4L lens, 1/6 sec at f/4, ISO 100, shooting on a tripod.
The Lines of Aging
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In so many things in life, lines appear as things age. Ah, so it goes with leaves, streets and people.
This photo was taken with an iPhone 5 on my street as fall approaches.
Centuries of water passed over these rocks.
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This photograph was taken in the Lower Slot Canyon in Antelope Canyon near Page, Arizona. It’s amazing to think how the force of centuries of water running in a creek through these rocks as well as flash floods from the Southwest’s monsoon rains have carved such beautiful structures. Most slot canyons are formed in sandstone or limestone. The slot canyons can measure as little as 3 feet across at the top and 100 feet down, not always widening very much at the bottom. Antelope Canyon is the most-visited and most-photographed of the slot canyons in the American Southwest. It’s located on Navajo land near Page, Arizona and is formed of Navajo Sandstone.
From a photography perspective, the slot canyons are very interesting because, for most of your shots, you are shooting in the dark. The camera is on a tripod and the exposures are very long ranging from 1/15th of a second to 30 seconds. With exposures that long, the minimal existing light has enough time to create a viewable image from the camera’s sensor. It takes experimentation in the dark until you get the right exposure. It’s a little easier in those areas of the canyons where some sunlight is streaming down from above, but then the exposures get very tricky because great contrast exists between the very bright and very dark areas of what you’re shooting (a good reason to use multiple exposure HDR – although I didn’t use it on this photo). This, plus the hikes down into the canyons, make it lots of fun to shoot there and then work on your images afterwards.