Fall at the falls – I
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Of course I can’t stop going to the Onaping Falls when the trees are putting on a display. For some reason, the colors up there didn’t seem as vibrant and up front and center this year. I was probably too late. I decided to explore a bit upstream from the main trail, and the next few posts are from around the same area, but looking in different directions.
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Fall shots – I
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Fall in Northern Ontario lasts approximately 3-4 weeks by my understanding – if we are lucky. This year it started a wee bit early too, probably due to lack of moisture, so the trees started to turn even before the summer was over. Yes, fall time is nice, but as soon as the colors are gone from the trees, it only becomes a reminder whats coming. -Yes, the white stuff….uggggg. The ‘S’ word is a bad word in this house. 
Anyway, fall time – time to get out and get some colors at my regular locations. So here we go. First shot is from the Hwy17 bypass. I drive on this highway quite frequently, and I have been witness to the amazing color change during a period of a couple of weeks, so it was a must have shot. Shot on a chilly and cloudy morning around 8 am.
Glen Haven, MI
Nikon D300, Nikkor 16-35mm f/4, 16mm, f/16, 1/125sec, ISO200
I’ll kick this week of with a shot from the Scott Kelby’s 2011 World Wide Photo Walk. I sure hope you got to do a walk near your location, if not, try to make time for next year. I had to pleasure to do two walks that October weekend, the unofficial one in Glen Haven, MI and the official one in Traverse City, MI. I have already posted one shot from the Glen Haven walk on this blog (click here), and here is another one. It’s the path from the old Coast Guard Station, (now a museum) down to the beach.
It’s definitively a place I would like to go back to sometime next year. Beautiful place.
Photowalk 2011 – Glen Haven, MI
Nikon D300, Nikkor 16-35mm f4, f/8.0, 1/350 sec, ISO200, 23 mm, 8 frame pano
It has been a tradition of mine to go outside the country to take part in the World Wide Photo Walk events. I have done that in 2009 and 2010, (both Denmark) so why should 2011 be any different. This year I went to Traverse City, MI. Traverse City and area is an absolutely gorgeous place this time of year. The fall colors are just about peaking, and the landscape is very inviting with lots of hills, beaches, dunes, wineries and orchards. Traverse City claims to be Cherry capital of the world – and that’s probably very true. I urge anyone within driving distance to check it out. Beautiful place.
I had the opportunity to attend two walks. Yes, I know you can only register for one, but that does not prohibit any one for tacking along another group, as long as you notify and get the OK from the leader of the walk. You can of course not submit photos for the competition. Well, I had no problem getting the OK from Ken Snyder, who was the leader of the walk in Glen Haven, MI – Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore.
This place is just gorgeous. Incredible beach and the dunes are just spectacular. I wish we had more time to explore the area and check out the Coast Guard museum, but that will have to be next time.
Above is a 8 frame pano from the Dunes overlooking the lake. Very strong winds that day, but thankfully no rain.
More skies…
Nikon D300, Nikkor 16-35mm f4, 16mm, f/8, 1/2000sec, ISO200
I was out doing a bit of Geocaching just outside of town, around mid May this year, there where still no leaves on the trees. One cache took me to the top of one of the peaks – about 985 ft ~ 300 meters above sea level. Great look from there over one of the lakes. While I was logging the cache, the skies just got really dark to the right on the image, which is roughly over the down town area and you could see the rain coming down – probably pretty hard. At the same time, the sun was shining through a thin layer of clouds to the left of the image. I had to shoot it because it started to look really cool and dramatic. I was kind of hoping that the B/W conversion would convey that.
Skies up here…
Nikon D300, Nikkor 50mm 1.8, f/22, 1/180sec, ISO200
The skies here in Northern Ontario are usually one of two things. Grey skies, or no skies at all. Occasionally we get lucky and get some pretty spectacular stuff but that is rare. I wish we would get something like this or this - both shot by Scott Ackerman. Another great cloud shot is this one by Mike Olbinski – amazing stuff. Well, I got to work with what we get up here, so the next couple of posts will be feature skies and clouds from my neck of the woods.
We took a walk friday night after a small rain storm had passed. As the dark clouds were moving on leaving just blue sky behind, the sun all of a sudden peeped out beneath the cloud cover. A quick shot at f/22 to get the star burst effect. In LR a gradient adjustment to lighten the sky at the top of the image. My vantage point was not the best but I’m glad I at least had my camera with me.
