southern utah

in october of 2011 i took a trip back home to utah to visit the southeastern corner of my home state.  my dad and i drove down with plans to visit some of the anasazi indian ruins in the area and also to see some of the landscape in that part of the state.

our first stop was the "valley of the gods" - it's kind of a smaller version of monument valley however, smaller is a relative term here...  the tops of the buttes are about 1000 feet above the valley floor.

there's a dirt road that takes you through the monuments of the valley, this was our first stop as we got closer to the formations.

as we got worked our way around the valley we noticed a storm coming in over the valley and quickly jumped out to get the shot.  mine didn't turn out but my dad was able to get a great shot of the rain coming down over the west end of the valley.

after visiting the valley of the gods we headed up to cedar mesa to see a some anasazi cliff dwelling ruins.  the first is called fallen roof ruin.  

over the years the layers of sandstone have fallen away revealing the mineral-encrusted layers beneath.

this ruin is appropriately called house on fire.  the wide angle lens accentuates the layers of stone radiating out from the ruin.

the trick to catching these ruins at the right time is to be there in the late morning.  the sun shines on the opposite side of the wash and reflects the warm light up onto the ruins.

after cedar mesa we drove up to canyonlands national park.  we intended to catch the sunset looking west off of the green river overlook.  the sun never showed up but i'm glad i took a shot anyways - i like how it turned out.

early the next morning we got up early to catch the sunrise at mesa arch but we couldn't squeeze ourselves into the line of tripods that were already there so we hightailed it to our plan b - dead horse point.  we got there just as the sun was peeking over the la sal mountains.

i think it's just about time to start planning the next excursion... just not sure where.  any suggestions?

corn

when we moved to indiana there were two things that immediately stuck out to me: first, the flatness of the land - i had no idea that such incredibly flat land could exist - and second, the corn.

one of the first little excursions i took was out into the farmland.  i drove out from the city, not really paying attention to where i was going or how i would get back home (i had my gps).  i just drove admiring the golden fields of dried corn stalks (apparently they harvest it after it's all dried up).

overlooking the fact that it's all going to end up as either cattle feed or high fructose corn syrup, i've loved seeing corn throughout the year.

corn in the fall

corn in the winter

going low budget - branching out

for a long time i could only use slide film (usually fuji velvia or provia) or professional black and white film.  i did this in order to have what i thought would be highest quality pictures possible.  i felt that only the best would do.

as part of my therapy to break me of this mindset i bought some fuji superia 400 speed film - your standard print film - from walmart, took some snapshots, then had it processed at walgreens (just the film) then scanned it myself.

this is a big step for me.  in the end, i have to say i'm very happy with what i got.  the scans are somewhat unsaturated and grainy but i think it actually adds to the feel of the pictures.

at the detroit science center...

out garage sale-ing...

and the rest from a recent in-town vacation...

thanks for looking.

sacred grove

last summer we drove to boston for my brother-in-law's graduation and on the way home stopped in palmyra, ny to see the historical sites.

we spent some time walking through the sacred grove (click here if you don't know what happened there) and i got the following shot.






(here i am setting up the shot)

i was pleasantly surprised with how this one turned out.  it was a beautiful, cool day.  the sun was sprinkling in through the trees.  it was very peaceful.

i'm happy about the way the sky appropriately glows a brilliant white at the top of the picture.  i'm happy about the way the subtle shading from black to white just fell into the right places without any help from photoshop.

it's one of my new favorites.

the celebration

to celebrate the arrival of the scanner, i tried out some of my fuji provia slide film.

remember this post? remember how at the end i said i'd get the pictures up as soon as i had them? well now i have them. it only took me a year and a half.


see that white speck on the horizon at the end of the little path?

here's that section blown up:



yeah, that's a boat.

thank you epson.