A Little Closer To Heaven

I gotta be honest with all of you. I’m really hurting for some quality posts this week. Packing for Virginia, obeying my dog’s every command, entertaining a visiting mother in law, and barely finding time to spend with my wife, all the while working my butt off on my last week of my current job has left me very little time for the outdoors.

I did, however, manage some time to go on a walk in our beautiful city park and my wife was even patient enough to let me snap a few pictures along the way. Enjoy:

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It’s raining, it’s pouring.

But I wasn’t snoring.

I was wide awake with my camera out.

We’ve been getting hammered with rain lately and I’m actually loving it! All this rain has brought several beautiful double rainbows to the area and I was lucky enough to snap these great photos of the one across the street from my house:

I also stayed outside for hours trying to get some lightning pictures to no avail. Oh well, there’s a lot more storms coming later this week and I’m sure I’ll get a chance to try again.

Stay tuned tomorrow for my weekend trip report (for real)!

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I finally gave in and decided to make one of my Picasa web albums public for all of my faithful readers. In it, I’ve uploaded every picture I’ve ever posted on my blog and a few more. I’ll continue to update it everytime I blog and everytime I feel like putting new pictures on it. The link can be found under the “About Me” heading on the left side of my blog. Or, you can check it out at http://picasaweb.google.com/dbarnett415

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Sara and I took a dayhike that we’ve taken many times in the past over the weekend. It’s a very rugged 5 mile round trip hike to one of the tallest waterfalls in the United States, Hemmed-In Hollow. Now, 5 miles does not sound very difficult, but I assure you…with about a thousand feet of elevation gain in 2.5 miles on the return, it can cramp even the most athletic of hiker’s style. The path is narrow and steep. Plus, it’s very uneven and full of rocks to stub your toes on or twist an ankle.

The weather forecast said there was a 20% chance of rain. No big deal..except it should have been 100% because it rained the entire time we hiked. This made it a little more difficult because the rocks were very slippery. It was a normal hike on the way down. No problems, no slips, not too difficult. It started pouring on us when we got to the falls, so we crawled into the small cave beneath the falls and sat down for some lunch. I scarfed down a Snicker’s marathon bar and Sara had an apple. I took a few pictures (from inside the cave because I wasn’t about to ruin my camera), and we left.

The rain paused for a little while on the way back and though I wasn’t able to snap any pictures of the falls at Hemmed-In, I did get to practice my technique on a smaller falls along the trail. What do ya think?

The hike back was very difficult and slippery. I was winded from all of the junk food that I still haven’t worked off since the holidays and it just wasn’t pretty. The trail let me know just how out of shape I really am. I did get to test some rain gear out that worked very well and I’ll be able to report on some of those things pretty soon, too.

Stay tuned tomorrow for another top ten list.

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I don’t know about you…but I love taking pictures and am always looking for new tips on how to make my photography better. I just learned a few new tips and wanted to share them with all of my readers.

Photographing Waterfalls:

1. Unlike many assume, sunlight is not your friend. Waterfall pictures turn out much better when it is cloudy outside.

2. To get a better effect from your pictures, slow the shutter speed down to 1/4 second or slower. This will create a flowing effect, instead of a rough looking picture.

3. In order for these pictures to turn out okay…one needs to adjust the exposure to make the picture darker. If the exposure is normal…then you will be left with a very pale picture because the slower the shutter speed, the more light in the picture. Many of my pictures don’t even turn out if I don’t adjust the exposure.

4. Take lots of pictures…the more you take…the more of a chance that you’ll get some keepers.

5. Finally, make sure you either have a tripod or something to sit the camera on. The slightest movement on your part…and the picture is ruined.

Okay…so those tips revolutionized how I take waterfall pictures. Let’s move on to sunrise and sunset pictures:

1. Place something in the foreground of the picture to create a shadow. This will look much better than just a picture of the sun going down.

2. Remember to adjust the exposure to less or more light in order to get better pictures.

3. A tripod will help, but is not necessary.

4. Once again, take lots of pictures because a sunset is constantly changing.

5. Slowing down the shutter speed may also help in some pictures…though you may have to make other manual adjustments to get the desired effect.

Well, all of these tips have been helpful to me, and hopefully they’ll be helpful to you. Good luck trying to capture the beauty of nature and the outdoors on your camera. It can be really tricky sometimes to relate what you saw with what the picture shows.

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