HDR Photography
Too early in the evening and too high in the sky to be a standard sunset: this must be some serious sci-fi gridfire weaponry. The patterns in the Crepuscular rays puts me in mind of MIRV tests, and the scale of the clouds so thoroughly dwarfs the buildings beneath it on the banks of the Hudson River. Connecting spectacular aerial views with apocalyptic power is nothing new, but the twentieth century swapped the power source from divine to human.
This highway in the hillside makes the mountain look rather smug, I think. This is the Han Solo of rocky formations.
Bannerman’s Castle on Pollepel Island in the Hudson River was once an arsenal, and then a tourist destination, before it burned down in 1969 and the island was closed to the public. Now the fortified silhouette of the ruins apparently inspires an incredible amount of use as a hideout for the supernatural in fantasy fiction. Though I didn’t know it at the time I took this picture, this island is one of the major inspirations for Lev Grossman’s Brakebills College. A sunset train ride down the Hudson River is the perfect occasion to stumble on a structure like this.
This winter that won’t begin has brought strange landscapes to New England. Along Little River through Stowe, VT, the environment is in a strange flux/limbo. Add the snow with imagination?
Continuing my exploration of the capabilities of Aurora HDR from Wednesday, I processed this image from high above central Pennsylvania after sunset using that software and the Noiseless CK package to unbelievable results—that is, I literally could not have achieved this image with an acceptable level of noise using my earlier workflow. Though it’s still not perfect, I can’t stop examining the path of that river, lit by the last few photons of the day.
There’s a tiny (abandoned?) cabin in the woods of this scruffy, autumn-inflected island. This fall has been warm and dry, the Sun bakes the glacier-cut stones, and the water is already cold. In this environment, I can’t help but imagine escaping to a little cabin of my own.
I love the way water crashes through rocks.
When the water is too high the trail (pictured!) is impassible and it is necessary to take the high water trail. The trail is not impassible in this shot.
Early morning on the Laurel Fork. Before the morning mist burns off, walking along the river is like walking through a fantasy novel.
Water levels in the Raquette River through Stone Valley (site of some excellent rocks) were quite high, leading to normally dry areas (like this one) overflowing with impromptu waterfalls. Surfaces and water levels in various areas didn’t want to match up, and made for a feeling like the whole river had been “assembled” out of order.
As a scientist and educator in the 21st century, it’s difficult to overstate the role that Carl Sagan played in shaping my worldview. When I traveled to Ithaca, NY for the first time this week (for a chemistry conference, naturally), I wasn’t planning on any kind of specific pilgrimage. Nonetheless, I found myself standing on a tall bridge above a gorge, watching the lights of Ithaca and the flashes of lightning in the distant clouds.
I didn’t have my normal Nikon with me. I didn’t have my tripod with me. I made do. How often do you get to photograph lightning over Carl Sagan’s house?
(It’s the house on the right, by the way.)
Friday marked the end of exams, and students and faculty alike celebrated by checking canoes and kayaks out of this little boat house on St. Lawrence’s campus. (If it’s true that our school resembles a ski resort in the winter, it also resembles a summer camp during the warmer months of the year.) Nothing really says the year is done (and grading with it) like floating along in complete relaxation.
The smokies in the spring really are quite spectacular.
Spring is in the air in the Smokies and the rivers are flowing.
There are few natural features that look colder than a rushing blackwater river when the air temperature is below 0ºF. The convergence of this little reservoir to the far-off (and equally miniature) hydroelectric station neatly contrasts the frigid setting with the optimism of twentieth-century technocrats. (The Adirondacks are dotted with an improbable number of tiny hydroelectric stations.)
