The first time I took I-90 up to Snoqualmie Pass, I was floored, and I assume most people would say the same.  Luscious green mountains line the freeway, tall and steep, with hanging valleys and individual peaks blocking deeper canyons;  the whole scene reminded me of Montana’s Glacier National Park. Of course, this impression wears off with time, and the area begins to feel “old hat.”

Granite Mountain offers an escape from the routine, to rekindle the feeling that Seattle’s immediate surroundings are in fact montane wonderland.

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I’ve been convinced of the value of geo-tagging my images for a long time now, as you can see from my fondness for maps. Over the holidays I picked up a GPS unit, in part to help with this in the future, but sadly most cameras - including my 5D - won’t talk to GPS hardware.

The map above gives the latitude and longitude for any point on the globe; every click shows the location in the center of the map. It works, but, as Google would say, it’s not a very ’scalable’ solution. I’m working on a software approach, to match up time stamps in the photos against time stamps in the GPX files with some fuzzy matching. Clearly, though, it won’t work for older shots that still warm the heart, and the interactive map is still useful for that.

Of course, that’s a Film Age trick, and needs to be handled differently with digital.  Photoshop can come to the rescue, as always.  A long-exposure is a more natural way to accomplish the same thing, and demands low light … ghostly ambiance.  Shoot a scene in bulb mode, and put the lens cap on when your image is almost properly exposed.  Position your subject, then take the cap off and finish the exposure.  Most of the background will have already sunk into the photo;  only a hint of your subject will show up, like an apparition.  A similar trick can be done with a flash.

Sometimes, though, the camera plays its own tricks.  Try as I might, I can’t figure this one out:  Gandolph the Gray, from Lord of the Rings, or at least his ghost, seems to have shown up in a waterfall shot this spring, near Talapus Lake.

Have a look at the original;  he’s highlighted below:

Here’s a close-up: (more…)

Exploring Washington state more intimately has opened a new world.  Driving cross-continent has given way to kayaking with the sea monsters in Lake Union.  Across brackish Puget Sound the Olympics continuing to rise up, becoming the Himalaya of tomorrow.

Unfortunately, moving cuts into time on the trails, leaving me with nothing photographic to share for a couple of months now, but can be worth it nonetheless.

In the last photo, above, an Argosy cruise ship leaves faint streaks above the lake while the stars leave their trails above.  Queen Anne hill is lit up like a million candles with the Aurora Bridge leading north. Trees can be seen growing out of Gas Works Park;  on a clear day, the Olympic Mountains stand above the bridge;  tonight they’re hiding in the darkness.

This is one of my favorites of the night; the colorful embers spilling down from the two main explosions, and the streaming plumes of fire shooting upward make up for the darkening sky:

The lake was filled with more boats than water.  As the show went on, a thick blanket of smoke condensed on the lake, obscuring the surface level view in the lake.  The Aurora Bridge is barely visible in the bottom-right corner of the frame:

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Snow changes everything, and, this year, the highlands have no shortage of snow. The only hints of winter are above, on the surrounding peaks. It isn’t until halfway up the mountainside that patches of snow start to appear, at first isolated from one another, then more and more often, until the ground is covered in white. At first it’s shallow enough, but soon it becomes impossible to tell; with nothing exposed to provide a frame of reference, the snow could be inches, feet, or miles deep.

About the point where the trail begins to climb switchbacks up the mountain side, a blanket of snow hides the path completely. This is where most hikers turn back. It’s a difficult climb when the ground is slick and the trail is lost completely. Still, it isn’t long before the hill levels off, forming a plateau which leads to the stream forming waterfalls.

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The tonal quality of the light can play more role in the final image than, perhaps, any other single factor.  We can see this in the work of Ansel Adams ( the crosses of Moonrise, Hernandez, New Mexico;  the clouds in Clearing Winter Storm ) or Sebastiao Salgado ( Sudanese Refugee Camp, Boys in Mexico City ).  Both men produced gorgeous zone-system exposures, but, two of these show light filtering through the atmosphere. Black and white zone system photography highlights the effect, but it can work well in color, too.

Dust particles in the air can be one of the easier ways to capture the filtering light effect.  Storms are harder.  Water droplets suspended in the air can reflect the light perfectly, as Old Ansel  showed us.  Unfortunately, low hanging fog tends to block the sunlight;  finding the right conditions can be difficult.  Edges of storms are most likely to catch the light - and let enough of it through to make a good exposure. (more…)

Enveloped in the middle of Seattle, Lake Union looks like a bladder being fed by over thin channels. With a clear view of the Space Needle and downtown from most points on the lake, the Center for Wooden Boats along the south shore, pedestrian foot bridges and green belt, and Gas Works Park to the north, it fits in nicely with its surroundings in the Emerald City.

To the west is Ballard, the locks, even a boat elevator; this leads to Puget Sound and the Pacific Ocean. To the East is Lake Washington, via the choppy Montlake Cut. Both ways out of Lake Union are to the north, like ventricles feeding into a heart … see the map below. Both of these channels sit under working draw bridges, opening throughout the day to let travelers through the waterways below. Most of the larger industrial ships don’t make it this far, though; these head to the famous unsecured Port of Seattle, between Elliot Bay and the West Seattle Bridge.

The entire lake has an unusual character; a mix between a park and an industrial zone. Lining the shore to the north are tug boat operations, small repair companies, and fleets of moored fishing ships, as seen in these photos. Lake Union is Seattle’s favorite air strip for sea planes … every time I’ve been kayaking, one lands or takes off within a hundred yards. (more…)

The Cascade Range divides eastern and western Washington / Oregon, and the northern edge of California. To the west is a lush valley, while a vast desert lies to the east. Dividing these eco-systems, the spine of the mountains cuts upward, breaking up the path of the clouds overhead, getting many of them to spill their water earthward.

This divide creates an unpredictable series of micro-climates. A storm can be profoundly violent in one area and open up like an eye in others. Above, wide swatches of blue shine through, while below we see thick fog hugging the mountainside while sleet falls on the trees.

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“It’s god-awful country,” the officer said, recommending that I avoid US 287 across Wyoming from Rawlins to Moran Junction. He was right. I had flown to Connecticut, where I grew up, bought a used car, and was driving it home to California; a member of the local highway patrol wanted to make sure my [paper] temporary plate was legitimate. After our ad hoc meeting, I confirmed that the road to Grand Teton is indeed long, sun parched and wind swept high desert.

Yellowstone itself is an oasis, rising up on the back of the Rocky Mountains to pull moisture out of the air, and teeming with life because of it. Sitting on a now-protected crest of the continental divide, the park is known the world over for its wildlife, although the photo doesn’t show any endangered species. In the surrounding hills and meadows live bison, elk, bighorn sheep, black and grizzly bears, eagles, and more.

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