While at a roadside pullout along the Avenue of the Giants (California 254) with a view looking up and to the southeast at nearby coastal redwoods in Humboldt Redwoods State Park. My thinking in composing this image was to capture the view looking to the upper portions and tree crowns of some nearby redwoods. Kind of like an image with the entire height of the redwoods. Metering the image was a little more involved in trying not to blow any of the highlights while still being able to pull the shadow areas later on in post production.

While at a roadside pullout along the Blue Ridge Parkway with a view looking to the southeast to ridges and peaks of the Great Balsam Mountains with Looking Glass Rock as the prominent peak in the image center (based on Peak Visor app on my iPhone). My thought had been in composing this image to center the peak, while including some of the nearby forest and shrubbery vegetation as a foreground interest. I liked that look of beyond the nearby trees. The other thing was to meter the image properly so as to not blow any of the details and highlights present in the overcast skies and low cloud cover that morning.

I did some initial post-processing work making adjustments to contrast, brightness and saturation in DxO PhotoLab 7. I then exported a TIFF image to Nik Color Efex Pro 7 where I added a Polarization, Foliage, and Pro Contrast filter for that last effect on the image captured.

- Ralph Waldo Emerson.

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Another image from our brief but memorable venture into Petrified Forest National Park. While we only planned on a quick drive through the park road, it soon turned out into a bit of an exploratory trip. We stopped at almost all the pullouts, and I took pictures mainly using my iPhone. But when the view was compelling enough, I broke out the big guns. This was one such location. The view of the sprawling desert reminded me a lot of Canyonlands NP, and due to our slow progress, we were well into the evening by the time I took this picture. Evening in late fall means side lighting and long shadows. Unfortunately, the clouds that filled the sky in the northern part of the park had disappeared, but the light more than made up for it.

I was driving around checking the lakes for loons and spotted this cow & calf feeding not far off the side of the road. I parked in a pullout and followed them. It paid off with me getting this shot. Lots of moose calves this year.

Love that she is washing the calfs ears.

Camera Settings: f/4 - 1/320 - 175mm - ISO 320

A grizzly cub of the year takes the time to practice scent marking. Its mother, the sow locals refer to as Raspberry, ambles on to find a spot to scent mark of her own.

Taken at the Nine Mile Pullout, near Yellowstone Lake, Yellowstone National Park.

While at a roadside pullout along the Icefields Parkway with a view looking to the north to Mount Wilson. This is in Banff National Park. My thought on composing this image was to zoom in with the focal length to have the mountainside fill most of the image while still including some nearby evergreen trees and a backdrop of blue skies to complete this setting in the Canadian Rockies.

A detailed view of the rocks found in the foreground of the previous posting.

Late in the week we had a sunset outing part way up the Going To The Sun Road along Lake McDonald. The pullout had a parking area with a pebble beach with room for us to spread out. I found this small grouping of rocks a short walk from the parking area.

Morans Falls

Lamington National Park

[Freebies!]

[The everlook action and other tutorials]

Image taken from above Moran's Falls which is a beautiful 30 minute walk from a pullout before O'reilly's rainforest retreat. It's a bit of a hairy drive in the dark for a first timer but so worth it :)

The tile refers to two things I think about in terms of who we have become in photography.

A.A is the 'accidental artist' which is the best way I can describe our work if catering to an audience where concepts and background motivations are important. I've never really considered myself an 'arty' kind of person and so , when I go into the field, I'm simply aiming to capture a compelling rendition of my experience. A kind of visual diary of my experience as a whole. If the by product of that is a form of art that others appreciate, then I am appreciative :) I feel that I work best when I'm not overthinking a scene as to what kind of message I'm trying to portray or what kind of deep soulful thoughts I had. I just don't usually have them ! For me, the KISS principle works best (Keep It Simple Stupid) but I do realise that others approach photography from a completely different direction. I just hope that there's a role for KISS photographers in the fine art world :)

AC stands for the 'accidental celebrity'. With over 100k followers on several social media sites, Marianne and I have to accept that we're actually known! The AC could be driven into doing things which stray from the principles of being an AA but we'll resist that. It is interesting to see what happens to images on different platforms though. This image has also been posted on our flickr and instagram . Go ! The race for exposure is on for Moran's lol - I'm betting on an instagram win :)

(No I didn't place that stray leaf there lol!)

On our way back from the Trail of the Cedars we stopped at a pullout along the road to capture some images of McDonald Creek.

(Geo location is approximate.)

Another one fo those roadside pullouts along the Wildlife Loop Road in Custer State Park with a view looking to the South. What I liked about this view was how I could look down and across the rolling hillsides to take in the view that seemed to stretch on and on. By angling my Nikon SLR camera slightly downward, I felt I was better able to capture that view across this varied landscape, as well as minimizing the overcast skies above. After some initial work with color, contrast and saturation, I added a Pro Contrast CEP filter in Capture NX2 which helped to work with the more muted colors from the overcast skies that afternoon.

A view looking to the east-northeast at a roadside pullout along the Blakely Dam Road in the Ouachita National Forest. Given the off time in the middle of the week with my travels, I seemed to have had good luck with traffic and was able to stand in the middle of the road while composing this image. I used the road ahead as a leading line and angled my Nikon SLR camera slightly downward to capture a more sweeping view with that road as it cut through this forest. I felt that I didn't have to include much of the overcast skies above and think about blowing any highlights with this captured image. I could compose and meter the image by focusing on the trees nearby, ensuring I was able to bring out the many colors present.

A setting looking to the south while taking in views across a dried up Bristol Lake in the Mojave Desert. The setting is at a roadside pullout along US 66 or the National Old Trails Road with distant views of the Mojave Desert Ranges. I later performed a conversion to black & white using Silver Efex Pro 3 where I made some adjustments to color filters to bring out a much richer tonal contrast for the final image.

Capitol Reef NP

Dinner spot night one. Camp stove cooking at a roadside pullout with a decent view. No complaints.

In Gunnison National Forest at a roadside pullout where I had a view across a mountainside of aspens. As I walked along the road, I decided to use a layered approach to the trees, with the nearby trees being the first layer and then going up the mountainside. The blue skies with clouds above would be that color complement for this setting in the mountains of Colorado. I later worked with control points in DxO PhotoLab 4 and then made some adjustments to bring out the contrast, saturation and brightness I wanted for the final image.

While at a roadside pullout along the Going-to-the-Sun Road with a view looking to the southwest across a grassy meadow and then to the calm waters of Saint Mary Lake. This is in Glacier National Park. My thought on composing this image was to bring out the layers that I saw to my front. First would be the grassy Meadows with the colorful wildflowers. Then would be Saint Mary Lake with the reflections on the still waters. Finally, there would be the backdrop of the ridges and peaks of the Central Lewis Range, Hudson River Divide with blue skies above. I later worked with control points in DxO PhotoLab 6 and then made some adjustments to bring out the contrast, saturation and brightness I wanted for the final image.

near Colabank Pass. The one that everyone seems to stop at because it's so orange (and has a good pullout).

While we were driving through the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve today, we came across a pullout that was a butterfly observation location. There were a lot of orange and pink flowers that the butterflies were attracted to. We saw at least six different types of butterflies here. We didn't have time to really set up and shoot them properly so I think another trip is in order. Can't wait to go back again this week.

The Tallgrass Prairie Preserve is run by the Nature Conservancy and they are trying to preserve the ecosystem in the tallgrass prairie. It was mostly turned into farm land and the grasslands disappeared. This group has done a lot to change this and has made this location a great place to view nature in its natural setting.

While at a roadside pullout along U.S. Route 163 at the Utah and Arizona state line. The setting is looking to the northeast into Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park. My thought on composing this image was to center the sandstone formations and buttes off in the distance while including some of the nearby foreground leading up to them, adding to this setting. The blue skies would then be that color contrast to complement the image with earth-tones present in the lower portion.

A setting looking to the north across the Pacific coastline at Bruhel Point while taking in view from a parking area pullout along California State Route 1. With this image, I decided to zoom in with the focal length to include only a portion of the hillsides and coastline. While a wide angle view is amazing to soak in, this more focused view allowed what I felt brought more attention to the coastline and waves rushing in.

It's not to often one sees this much snow here at Silver Falls State Park.

This long view is from a roadside pullout. Snow was falling creating a haze effect in the distance.

A setting looking to the southeast from a roadside pullout along the main Scenic Drive while taking in views across the high desert landscape leading up to the monocline cliff walls of the Waterpocket Fold off in the distance. This is in Capitol Reef National Park.

From a roadside pullout on the main park road with a view looking to the southeast across the desert landscape in this part of Big Bend National Park. The distant ridges are looking into Mexico.

Following a quick crew change at the tunnel at 44th Avenue, this Z heads for the Midway Sub to do some work at the St Paul Intermodal Facility. A pullout job pulls a cut of humped cars out of the bowl as it builds a train in the departure yard.

grasslands national park is broken up into two major areas, west block and the lesser known east block

this was my last morning in the west and on my way to an hours-long hike into the prairie when i spy this on the roadway!

it's a perfect bright morning as i slowly back up my van and slink out, trying not to arouse this sunning beauty...tripod shooting at 250mm from a bunch of angles, marveling at how calm snake is

the small screen on the camera is hard to view when your eyes are old and they are stopped down from the bright light, at least that's my story...

an inbound half ton stops and two hikers dismount, as we talk snake it becomes clear this is no ordinary beast, in fact, it is an imposter that is very believable from a short distance away

snake still has not reacted at all, which should have been my first hint but i was fully into photography mode

a few hundred metres at a pullout was my hiking location and where a parks canada joker was set up...she did direct me to a snake hibernaculum, where i did see an actual, live rattlesnake

While at a roadside pullout to the Prada Marfa location in west Texas. My thinking in composing this image was to focus on one section of the fence with locks present. The one bike type cable lock with the pattern of the heart would be the image center, more or less with the other locks present to add to the story told.

From an overlook pullout parking area along the Redwood Highway with a view looking to the west across a nearby wooded area in Del Norte Coast Redwoods State Park and then to the Pacific Ocean with a sun setting off in the distance. My thinking in composing this image was to have a leveled-on, balanced view between the foreground leading up to the ocean with that of the blue skies and sun above. The next thing I had to keep in mind was metering and not blowing any of the highlights present with the sunlight. I was able to find an exposure setting to allowed me to pull out the more shadowed areas in the nearby wooded area.

Mountains Rise Above Me on All Sides

As if mighty Titans lying down to rest from an age long ago

These peaks are part of a greater mountain of stone

They have been changed and shaped over the many eons

A river flows by as if passing the markers of time

The Sun shines and the Sun sets

So while I've captured this image for an instant

My words written might tell a tale of these mighty Titans of stone.

Another work of short poetry or prose to complement the image captured one afternoon at a roadside pullout a few miles down river from the main entrance to Denali National Park & Preserve. On the image right is a mountainside within the national park; on the image left, ridgelines and peaks within the Hayes Range.

When I captured this image, I was drawn into the setting with the river valley flowing with the ridgelines and mountainsides on both sides of me. It was only later when I started to write about this image, that I...well, it dawned on me how it reminded me of other settings locations that I've been before like with the Icefields Parkway in Alberta with Banff and Jasper National Parks. And that I’d also experience later while taking the park road bus ride into Denali National Park & Preserve.

My initial post-processing work was making adjustments to contrast, brightness and saturation while playing around as I learned how to work with DxO PhotoLabs 3 that I’d recently purchased after moving away from Capture NX2. I then exported a TIFF image to Nik Color Efex Pro 4 where I added a Polarization and Pro Contrast filter for that last effect on the image captured.

In Joshua Tree National Park at a roadside pullout with a view across an open plain with Joshua Trees and other plant-life. I liked how the snow helped to minimize colors, almost creating a green with black-and-white setting and also added textures and details with the plant-life and trees. While I felt there was negative space with the overcast and snowing skies, I was able to later pull out some details and shades present using the ClearView Plus tool in DxO PhotoLab 6.

A setting looking to the west while taking in views at a forest landscape in this part of Great Smoky Mountains National Park. This is at a roadside pullout and parking area along main park road (Newfound Gap and US Hwy 441).

Upon the top of that same craggy ridge

The caption used is from a poem by William Wordsworth, from The Prelude.

While at a roadside pullout along the main park road on the Tennessee side of Great Smoky Mountains National Park. The view is looking to the north-northwest to ridges and peaks of the Eastern Great Smoky Mountains with Anakeesta Ridge. Given the low clouds that were along the mountain peaks, I chose to minimize those overcast skies and focus the image on the spurs and ridges coming off the main peaks. I liked the layers that they brought out with the tree lines and the way the spurs and ridges seemingly came after the other. The rest was metering the image to so that I could capture some of the details present in the overcast skies while still being able to pull the more shadowed areas along the mountainside later in post production.

At a roadside pullout along Artists Drive with a view looking down the asphalt road as it goes down and then up before making a turn. My thought on composing this image was to capture that look of the road ahead before a turn followed along more of the nearby mountainside. The last part after doing some post-production work in DxO PhotoLab 6 was to crop a portion of the foreground and bring out more of a wider angle, panoramic look to the setting.

Iceland is indeed the land of waterfalls. As you drive the countryside small waterfalls are common. On our way to Vik on Highway 1, we passed this farm with a beautiful waterfall behind it. The farm, Ásólfsskáli, lies the foothills of Eyjafjöll (The Island Mountains). According to The Book of Settlements, an Irish Christian, Asolfur alskik arrived in Iceland and built his lodgings here. Thorgeir Bardarson, the ruler of the area, eventually drove him from the area but the stream that cascades down the mountain has has been called Írá after his stay in the area. The waterfall is known as Íráfoss. There are no signs or pullouts, tourist trails or gift shops but it still is a spectacular sight as it cascades down the cliff that were, on this day, cloaked in summer green.

In the foreground a few bales of hay are wrapped in plastic. This is a common practice troughout Iceland. To my family and I they looked like fields of marshmellows. The wrapping helps turn dry hay into a silage product (haylage) for feeding livestock. For haylage production, if there are no silos available, wrapping bales is a less expensive alternative for making a 15 to 20 percent protein forage feed. The wrapping of dry hay mproves the forage’s digestibility. This process is becoming more common in parts of the US and Europe but is already the norm in Iceland.

CN Q119 trundles west across the westernmost of the two large CN bridges at Lytton, BC. This marine intermodal was part of a seven train fleet that departed Kamloops in the early to mid morning, and held/staged near Ashcroft for the scheduled afternoon release of the mainline by a rail gang working west in the directional running zone.

The easternmost of the two Lytton bridges is much more commonly photographed, as it can be shot from the edge of a parallel highway bridge. This angle was cleared up by the tragic wildfire that burned Lytton to the ground in 2021, but blocked as the highway pullout this angle is shot from was used for staging emergency relief forces, and then material and equipment for the rebuild of the town subsequently. I returned the following day to shoot this again in clear sunlight, but way stymied by a lack of trains during prime lighting due to continued maintenance to the east.

I shot a tighter vertical, followed by a wider horizontal. Lighting aside, which composition do you prefer?

This was an awesome day. We left Egilsstadir early for the drive to Myvatn. We passed a number of waterfalls (with no pullouts or names) until we came to Rjukandafoss - a beautiful waterfall with several sections. When hiked as the trail and had some great views. Nice start to the day. Back on the road to cover what is known as the Big Sky Country of Iceland - pretty much a lot of nothing. We were headed for Dettifoss - a major waterfall on my Bucket List. It exceeded expectations. Absolutely stunning visually and auditory - it is massive. I tried some long exposure with a tripod but it felt like the ground was shaking. Heather let me check out another waterfall about a mile away - Selfoss. If Dettifoss wasn't around, this would be a major destination by itself. Very different than Dettifoss but awesome on its own. I stayed for a bit and just ogled everything. Simply wow. I returned to the car and Heather dragged me off to another trail with very cool canyon views. We heard there was a third waterfall very close by so naturally we went. It was amazing. There were about 2-3 other people at Hafragilsfoss. Good God Almighty - this waterfall was spectacular - and the guidebook said this was difficult to reach with a 4x4 and best skipped. I'm glad we ignored this (the road was actually a piece of cake). Side note - the area around here looked like Martian landscape. We were in Heaven! We reluctantly headed to Myvatn - the Icelandic equivalent of Yellowstone. It was nice but we must be jaded since we live so close to Yellowstone. All in all, a very nice day, and I definitely want to go back to Dettifoss and the other falls.

I took these photos in mid-September 2021.

At a roadside pullout location along main loop road in the Cades Cove area at the Wet Bottom Trailhead with a view looking to the southeast taking in the setting of a grassy meadow with ridges and peaks in this part of the Western Great Smoky Mountains. This is in Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

A setting looking to the south while taking in views across the waters of Price Lake at a roadside pullout along the Blue Ridge Parkway. My thought in composing this image was to capture a leveled-on view with the horizon, using the distant shoreline with the forest of trees as a dividing line and balanced between the lake waters and the skies above. The rest was aligning myself to bring out shapes along the distant shoreline that helped to break up the horizon and add to the image captured.

Wikipedia: Ramasun Station, formerly Chang ('elephant') Station, officially the 7th Radio Research Field Station (RRFS), in Non Sung Subdistrict, was constructed by the US in 1964, just as the Vietnam War was gaining momentum. The site was run by the Army Security Agency (ASA) the Army's signals intelligence branch closely allied with the National Security Agency. Its purpose was radio communications intercept and triangulation of enemy installations. The site was dominated by a large, circular Wullenweber array. In its heyday, the station housed 1,200–1,500 US personnel, complete with sleeping quarters, a cinema, a post exchange (PX), gym, swimming pool, tennis court, arms depot, and a 300 m long tunnel that the Thai army today claims was used for electronic cable storage. It employed more than 1,400 Thais at generous wages. With the US pullout of Southeast Asia in 1975, the station was handed over to the Thai 3rd Infantry Division. In 1983, it became the base of the 1st Battalion, 13th Infantry Regiment. In August 1997, it was renamed "Sunthondhammathada Camp".

Another beautiful morning along the shores of Lake McDonald in Glacier National Park. I climb down an embankment at one of the pullouts on the Going-to-the-Sun road to take a series of vertical images that I combined in Lightroom to form this panoramic.

I've been in Zion for about a week, exploring the canyons and riverbeds. I started out slow, but got some great shots in retrospect. This shot was an unexpected find as most of my shots are. I had popped out of a canyon hike and was on to another area. I stopped in a roadside pullout and noticed these trees that were about to emerge from the shadow of the mountain.

This guy wasn't at all camera shy. In fact he and his herd-mates slowly made their way so close to the small group of photographers standing respectfully at a pullout along the road that we all had to fold up our tripods and move back several times so as to be able to get shots like these with our long lenses. And so as to be sure we weren't inadvertently disturbing the unperturbed rams.

Taken at the confluence of Soda Butte Creek and the Lamar River, Yellowstone National Park

A setting looking to the west while taking in views across the mountain desert landscape present in this part of Joshua Tree National Park. This is at a roadside pullout along the Keys View Rd. What drew me into this setting was not only the still snow-covered landscape from the snow storm the day prior, but also the way the Joshua Trees to my front seemed to group together with the mountain and blue skies as a backdrop to highlight them.

An image I made on my first day on the Faroe Islands. I had landed on Vágar Island, gotten my rental car and done that first drive from Vágar to the island of Streymoy (going through my first subsea tunnel) where Tórshavn is located. Had a confusing little time finding my first Airbnb, dropped my stuff off, got some groceries for lunch and then hopped back in the car for an afternoon drive to the village of Saksun. At a certain point you turn off the highway and onto one of those one lane roads that the Faroe Islands is famous for. Lucky for me I found an especially large pullout to get out of the car at the spot as the light and the landscape were getting along quite nicely. I believe I only made two photos at this spot: one with my Pentax 67 and this with my Zero Image pinhole. After that I just stood here a while and continued to marvel (I hadn't really stopped since my plane had first come into sight of the islands and wouldn't really stop until I flew out ten days later).

Zero Image 2000

Kodak Ektar 100

A view looking to the southwest at a roadside pullout along Utah Scenic Byway 12. This is located in Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument and takes in view of the Aquarius Plateau with the high desert landscape setting that includes eroded gullies and colorful slickrock stretching off to a distant horizon. My thinking in composing this image was to take advantage of the nearby tree or shrubbery and desert plant-life and have a captured view of a log beyond. I closed down on the aperture so that more of the entire setting would be in focus, even though the focal point was with the nearby tree or shrubbery. I later worked with control points in DxO PhotoLab 5 and then made some adjustments to bring out the contrast, saturation and brightness I wanted for the final image.

Such a rare clear day!

At a roadside pullout along the main park road with a view looking to the southeast across a recently snowed landscape. My thought on composing this image was to angle my Nikon SLR camera slightly downward and create a sweeping view across this national park landscape, leading up to the more distant hillsides with its rock formations. I wanted, though, to include some of the skies above, as I felt the snow storm coming in had some details that added to the complete setting.

I really cannot adequately describe how much I enjoyed driving in the Faroe Islands. While there I did both a ton of hiking and a ton of driving and enjoyed both almost equally.

There are many factors that make driving around these islands so enjoyable. The most obvious is the landscape. It seems like every bend in the road brings some heart-stopping vista. I was glad the traffic was so light because I barely wanted to go the speed limit, preferring to take my time and marvel at the scenery around each corner. The land itself is amazing but thanks to the geography of these islands you constantly find yourself in different light or weather. The islands are shaped like giant fins coming out of the Atlantic, with the roads mostly circumnavigating these islands. But quite frequently you have tunnels that bore straight from one side of an island to the other. In a couple of kilometers you can go from heavy cloud cover to bright sun, or from drizzly rain to sunset skies.

Of course those aforementioned tunnels are an experience themselves. Many of the tunnels are one lane, dark, thoroughfares that cut right through the mountains. But the Faroe Islands are home to three subsea (soon to be four) tunnels that connect various islands. These tunnels are multiple lanes, bright, and dive deep down under the surface of the sea with their lowest points usually lit up by colored lights painting the tunnel walls red or blue or green while you whisk along at 80kmh under the surface of the sea. And they are long, at least the newest one is which takes over six minutes to drive through (I timed it) and has a roundabout two-thirds of the way along it. But then other tunnels are rocky and narrow with the frequent pullout for oncoming traffic that has you anxiously peering to the tunnel's end for oncoming headlights while minding the narrow clearance to either side of your rental car. In short, the tunnels themselves are one of the more memorable aspects of the drive here.

Then there is the open, empty nature of many of the roads. Other cars are not uncommon, but driving for kilometers without seeing another vehicle is also not uncommon, at least during the time of year I was there. I could pull over, get out, and it would be quiet - at least of traffic. I felt nicely alone, even standing alongside a major road like in this image.

I guess last, and I have mentioned this in a previous post, is the proximity of everywhere. No drive was over two hours, and most were well under an hour. It was fast to get everywhere, even if you were going slow. Or at least the drives themselves were so beautiful they never felt long.

I have kept a mental list of some of the most beautiful drives I have done in the US. The Going To The Sun Road, or the Road to Hana, or the Beartooth Hwy, or even the stretch of US 395 that runs from Burns to Lakeview here in my home state of Oregon. These have all stood out to me as exceptional. They stood out. None of the drives in the Faroes really stood out because they are all pretty exceptional. I suppose if I had to choose though I would point to the Oyggjarvegur scenic route that runs through the mountains above Tórshavn and the scenic route that also winds through the mountains between Eiði and Funningur (that as far as I can tell doesn't even have a name).

Anyway, those are my recollections and impressions from driving the Faroes. Some of them, at least.

Pentax 67

Cinestill 400D

Northern New Mexico off of highway 68 in between Taos and Santa Fe. [The Rio Grande is the third longest river in North America.]

While at a roadside pullout along the Icefields Parkway with a view looking to the southeast to ridges and peaks around the Columbia Icefield area. This is in Jasper National Park.

Schooner Creek pullout, Lincoln County, OR. 12-3-16.

ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S32858882

While at a roadside pullout along the Wheeler Peak Scenic Drive with a view looking to the northeast down and then across the Nevada desert present. This location is in Great Basin National Park with Mount Moriah on the image middle left. By angling my Nikon SLR camera slightly downward, I felt I could create more of a sweeping view across this national park landscape. The horizon would also be brought higher into the image and hopefully create more of a sense of grandeur with the more distant mountain peaks and ridges. I did some initial post-processing work making adjustments to contrast, brightness and saturation in DxO PhotoLab 5. I then exported a TIFF image to Nik Color Efex Pro 5 where I added a Polarization and Pro Contrast filter for that last effect on the image captured.