Fine Art Photography Blog

In Mount Baker Snoqualmie National Forest, the Boulder River Wilderness Area is remote and obscure. At 75 miles from Seattle, and without skiing, many locals can’t easily point to it on the map. Along with the natural splendor, this makes for hiking heaven. There are more campgrounds between Silverton and the end of the paved road than Starbucks downtown; all are closed for the season.

The area is home to centuries old virgin western hemlock and red cedar, 60 million year old fossilized plant leaves, Big Four Mountain which will hopefully be the subject of a future post, and the famed Ice Caves. This is an easy and well maintained single mile hike, starting at a picnic area build on the site of the old Big Four Mountain Hotel. A boardwalk guides visitors across the bog and to the base of the mountain, towering more than a mile above. The caves themselves are more like tunnels into a permanent ice field; the roof is unstable, and hikers have been seriously injured, even killed, here. Read the rest of this entry »

I thought I had lost the first image in this series many years ago. This was shot in December of 2000; I had spent the month living in Denver and left at sun up most days to explore the high country. Heading into Colorado’s “interior” along US Route 285 toward Buena Vista, this expansive landscape can’t help but catch the eye.

Without meaning to, I’ve pulled over to enjoy the scenery every time I’ve driven by this particular curve in the road. That hasn’t been very often; three years passed between the road trips that produced the two photos below.

Read the rest of this entry »

Diagonal lines are a powerful tool to draw on when composing a frame. This is true in portraiture, landscape or cityscape photography, and it’s true, sometimes even the saving grace, in abstract photography.

Here, in the heart of San Francisco’s financial district, a fountain decorating the foot of a skyscraper is hardly rare. This one is outside what used to be The Sharper Image, then Charles Schwab, always a favorite meeting place for the bike messengers. A jet shoots water upward, causing ripples and even waves. Below the water is a tile bed, obscured by the movement and sun reflecting on the surface; above is a leaf, fallen from one of the nearby trees.

Read the rest of this entry »

Just east of Snoqualmie Pass, the climate begins to change drastically. A desert opens up after the Cascade Mountains drop off; this isn’t the type of weather we typically associate with the Pacific Northwest. Across the “Mountains to Sound Greenway” from Keechelus Lake ( the source of the Yakima River ), is a small pond in the Aline Lakes Wilderness Area.

Ironically, Gold Creek is an artificial alpine lake. When the DOT was building I-90 in the late 1960s, the area was a gravel pit and storage yard for the construction vehicles. From humble beginnings comes a tranquil hike and a home for abundant wildlife.

A crop showing the distant snow-capped peak reflecting in the water, and the shore above … notice the deeply red tree, which is smaller and less distinct than the lone yellows:

Read the rest of this entry »

Every photographer goes through a period of looking for clever ways to make use of stair cases. Mine was extremely brief, just long enough to set up the tripod for this:

Read the rest of this entry »

Ducks aren’t typically thought of as fine art, and generally for good reason. Still, it can be good practice trying to make something so plain look attractive. All of the same tools - lighting, color, depth of field, geometry - can be used on humble fowl:

Read the rest of this entry »

From Yellowstone’s Geyser Basin, this is a good example of the power of panoramic format landscape photography. We tend to scan the horizon - glance side to side - to keep our wits about us and avoid surprises. Whether this is hard wired from evolutionary times or because of the generally broad plane from one edge of our vision to the other, we see the world this was: as wide as the sky.

Photography is an art, meaning that your goal shouldn’t be to reproduce the world as a bystander would see it. On the other hand, tapping into the familiar can help convey abstract notions.

Read the rest of this entry »

In another homage to MC Escher, this time more subtle, here is a photo of two ducks in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park. The ducks are just entering the frame, disturbing a dogwood reflection in their small pond near the Japanese Tea Garden. The floating leaves, in particular, make this image Escheresque.

Read the rest of this entry »