Here's a couple more from out little adventure this past weekend...

This first one is of Slippery Rock Creek from the Eckert Bridge. With much of the areas south of us getting slammed with snow, I anticipated that we would get at least a little snow. As it turns out, we got absolutely none! Not a single flake! Unfortunately, I was really hoping for a couple inches of fresh snow to cover the scene and really give it that bit of pop that only comes from fresh snow... So what do you do when the snow doesn't arrive? Well, in this case, I managed to process the shot in black and white in such a way that makes it kind of look like there is more snow than there was.

Mouseover the photo for the original color version to see the difference...

Technical Data: Canon EOS 7D Mark II, Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS STM at 47mm, 1/160th second at f/11. ISO 100. RAW processing in Adobe Camera Raw, B&W conversion in Adobe Photoshop CS5 with Nik Silver Efex Pro.

Here's also a B&W conversion of the semi-frozen Kildoo Falls. The transformation here isn't as dramatic, but it still brings out more detail in the photo. I'm a little torn as to which version of this one I like better...

Technical Data: Canon EOS 7D Mark II, Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS STM at 18mm, 1/4th second at f/16. ISO 100. RAW processing in Adobe Camera Raw, B&W conversion in Adobe Photoshop CS5 with Nik Silver Efex Pro.

As I type this and look at these cool (pun intended) winter photos, I am also excitedly looking forward to this summer when we will be taking a trip north to Maine to see puffins! I just made our reservations with the boat today, so now I can start planning the other pieces of our trip soon!

I've also been thinking a bit more about the other styles of photography that I've been neglecting in my pursuit of wildlife photography recently, and I have a couple ideas forming in my head for a couple interesting shots. We'll see if they come to fruition.

- Bill

So after a couple requests for more landscape photography, I made a point to get out and see what I could find. We stopped at McConnells Mill State Park, and made our way to Kildoo Falls which was mostly frozen, but the water still flowed within a column of ice which really made for an interesting experience. We had visited last year, and you could hear the water rushing inside the column of ice, but I especially liked the little window that was open this time.

Technical Data: Canon EOS 7D Mark II, Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS STM at 18mm, 1/320th second at f/5.6. ISO 800. RAW processing in Adobe Camera Raw.

You can sort of see the water splashing through the mostly frozen waterfall, but the video below really helps to illustrate what a cool effect it was...

Technical Data: Canon EOS 7D Mark II, Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS STM.

I've got a couple more to share from this little trip, so stay tuned.

- Bill

Ok - so admittedly, I intentionally have not posted in a while, but that was so that I could post my 600th post on the six year anniversary of starting my blog. A lot has happened over six years, and I've taken a ton of photographs (I honestly don't even know how many!). I have done some bigger posts for other anniversaries, so I wanted to do something similar again... but how to do it.

Then it hit me, why not take a look back at my top six favorite styles of photography. Some have been a strong interest since the start (like macro photography of spiders and bugs), while some are pretty new (videography - ok, I know it isn't technically photography, but it still requires a camera!), and some I only enjoy sometimes (landscape), though others I'd do every day if I could (underwater), and some I work hard to get (wildlife), and others that I don't work for but allow it to come to me as the subject warrants (black & white). Of course sometime I am doing multiple styles of photography all at once. But let's take a quick stroll through some examples of each style with some photos that may have gotten over-shadowed or missed for whatever reason throughout the years...

MACRO Definitely my favorite form of photography, macro gives me the chance to show things that most people overlook or never even see. Of course, a lot of the time, those things are the "creepy crawlies" and spiders that most people don't want to see anyway... but I find those things fascinating. Particularly jumping spiders - my absolute favorite macro subject. But macro can be very versatile - spiders, bugs, flowers, abstracts, underwater, fungi, just about anything. And when other forms of photography just aren't feasible because of bad light conditions or such, there are always macro subjects to be found.

BLACK & WHITE This is a style of photography that I have to admit I don't work at at all. I let this one come to me. If the scene or subject screams to me to be shot in black & white, I might see it while I'm taking the photo or sometimes not until I'm home and processing the photos on the computer and sometimes still not until months or years later looking back at the photo. The great thing about B&W photography is it can be merged with any type of photography, and as you'll see, I've tried it on just about every style of photography I do. Actually, that makes me realize that I have yet to ever convert a macro spider photo to black & white... I guess that will be an upcoming project! While I was tempted to process some new photos for this little set, I decided to just dig through the archives to find ones I'd processed previously and get them some due screen time...

WILDLIFE Wildlife photography spans a number of areas for me... birds, reptiles and amphibians, mammals, truly wild, and zoo kept animals. All of it is a huge draw to me. Luckily, Anya and I have moved to a place where we get exposed to so much more wildlife than we did before. As such, I was able to pick this entire assortment from photos I've taken right here on our property or close by (technically the owl and the snake were from the local park where we go to walk the dogs). This is definitely what I probably consider one of my most difficult forms of photography. The amount of patience and luck required are simply staggering at times, and the time investment is one I wish I could devote more effort to. But as I said, luckily all of this is right outside our door, so the convenience factor certainly is helping me to improve and get better shots all the time!

UNDERWATER Well - what can I say about underwater photography other than I wish I could get to do it more often! It is a very challenging form of photography, and quite often by the time I'm getting into a groove and starting to feel like I'm able to get more creative with my shots, that's exactly when the trip is over and it will be another year before I get to try again. Honestly, if I could go diving every day, or even every weekend to hone my underwater photography skills, I would. For now though, I'll just have to be happy with the once a year that I do get to go experience and record such amazing things!

So there you have it... six styles of photography, six years worth of trips, experiences, passion, sights... all recorded and shared here in 600 posts. Amusingly enough, at three years, I made the claim that I looked forward to three more years but figured a site redesign was in order before then and I'm still using the exact same site. I do think that needs to change, but part of my reluctance is the fantastic compendium that this site has become for me. I quite often refer back to old posts to share things again or even just a reference for myself. So hopefully I can figure out the challenge of upgrading this site while maintaining the integrity of all of the history that I've built here. For now though, I'll focus on continuing to capture and share photos like these!

Thanks for stopping by!

- Bill

PS: If you are interested in exploring further into some of these examples, the section headers and the "button" below are links to the history of posts that have been tagged with that label, so if you want to see more of any specific style of photography, just click and explorer!

Anya and I made another trip out to Cuyahoga Valley National Park last week in hopes of getting some good fall foliage photographs, but sadly the trees out there were still green for the most part. I did take a number of shots at the Blue Hen Falls and put together a couple HDR images. In general, I've never been a huge fan of HDR because they usually have a very clear processed look to them, but I still give it a shot from time to time.

Take a look at this attempt (mouseover the images to display the larger version) and place your vote for which version you like best.

Single Shot
HDR with PS:CS5
HDR with PS:CS5 + HDR Efex

Technical Data: Canon EOS 7D, Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS STM at 18mm, Various exposures at f/16. ISO 100. RAW processing in Adobe Camera Raw, HDR processing in Adobe Photoshop CS5 and Nik HDR Efex Pro.

- Bill

Just a single shot today... this is Brandywine Falls - the second tallest waterfall in Ohio and one of the more popular attractions in the Cuyahoga Valley National Park.

Technical Data: Canon EOS 7D, Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS STM at 18mm, 1/200th second at f/8. ISO 400. RAW processing and cropped in Adobe Camera Raw.

Thanks for stopping by.

- Bill

Well, the Horseshoe Falls never really freeze (well, neither set of falls at Niagara Falls freeze completely, but there is much less ice build-up on the larger Horseshow Falls.

That doesn't mean it is any less impressive...

This first view I liked because of the ominous feel to it. The heavy mist, the hint of that huge boulder of ice at the bottom peaking through...

Technical Data: Canon EOS 7D, Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 II at 27mm, 1/250th second at f/11.0. ISO 100. RAW processing and cropped in Adobe Camera Raw.

And this one shows off a nice contrast of the fast rushing water and the ice coated cliff-side next to it.

Technical Data: Canon EOS 7D, Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 II at 42mm, 1/500th second at f/11.0. ISO 100. RAW processing and cropped in Adobe Camera Raw.

These next two show off some weird igloo shaped mount of snow and ice sitting off to the one side of the main pool under the Horseshoe Falls. I have no clue how or why it formed like that, or if it is a typical formation. I was extra curious about the "tunnel" that seemed to be burrowed into it, and the enormous cracks running down its sides. Of course, there's no point of reference for size here, but it was massive. You can also see the churning ice down in the water... most of those pieces looked to be about the size of cars.

Technical Data: Canon EOS 7D, Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 II at 21mm, 1/250th second at f/11.0. ISO 100. RAW processing in Adobe Camera Raw.

Technical Data: Canon EOS 7D, Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 II at 37mm, 1/250th second at f/11.0. ISO 100. RAW processing in Adobe Camera Raw.

And lastly, another overall shot just showing that absolutely impressive waterfall...

Technical Data: Canon EOS 7D, Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 II at 18mm, 1/500th second at f/11.0. ISO 100. RAW processing in Adobe Camera Raw.

- Bill

Ok, I usually don't go in for panoramic photographs, but Niagara Falls was really a subject that begged for the treatment. I was amazed with how simple Photoshop CS5 made stitching the images together. I'd tried panoramic images in the past and the results were always less than stellar, but these turned out nice... and literally all I had to do was point PS:CS5 at the set of images and it did the rest. All I had to do was decide how I wanted to crop the image after it was stitched together. I then had the challenge of getting my gallery website software to accept some pretty large photos (the biggest of which is over 70MP!).

I also don't know what the best way to display these is, but here goes...

Technical Data: Canon EOS 7D, Sigma 10-20mm f/4-5.6 EX DC HSM AF at 10mm, 1/200th sec at f/16. ISO 100. Raw conversion Adobe Camera Raw, Composite image built in Photoshop CS5.

Technical Data: Canon EOS 7D, Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 II at 53mm, 1/250th second at f/11.0. ISO 100. RAW processing Adobe Camera Raw, Composite image built in Photoshop CS5.

I'll see if I can come up with a better way to display these as they really are much more impressive if you can see them larger where the panoramic effects are really illustrated.

- Bill

Well, as I sit here I look out the window and I am quite literally in a cloud. The weather is warming up and everything is starting to melt, but the combination of warmer air and the foot of melting snow everywhere is combining to make everything a thick soup of fog. I can barely see the stand of trees across the way, but I can definitely see spring coming.

However, the other day, Anya and I played hookey from work to take a day trip up to Niagara Falls to see it while it was still frozen. Reports say they expect the ice to last into May, but we figured we didn't want to risk waiting that long, so with decent weather (no snow, and warmer temperatures) we took the drive up. We were rewarded with 35F temperatures and a blazing bright sun that made it feel even warmer. The sun did end up producing a challenge with the exposure (very harsh whites and drastic shadows), but I still enjoyed the day.

Technical Data: Canon EOS 7D, Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 II at 30mm, 1/250th second at f/11.0. ISO 100. RAW processing Adobe Camera Raw.

I've still got a ton more photos to process, so definitely stay tuned and I'll try getting more up as soon as possible!

- Bill

Anya and I took the day off work on Friday and decided to go on a little hike for Valentine's Day. I figured that if I have to continue to suffer through this winter weather, I might as well make use of it and see if I could get some good photos from it. We headed to McConnell's Mills to find some frozen waterfalls and see how Slippery Rock Creek looked. Then we stumbled upon this beautiful waterfall.

Technical Data: Canon EOS 7D, Sigma 10-20mm f/4-5.6 EX DC HSM AF at 12mm, 10mm, and 10mm, 1/8th, 1/8th, and 1/4th sec at f/11. ISO 100. Raw conversion Adobe Camera Raw.

Exposure on these shots was pretty difficult with the extremely bright white snow outside and the dark insides of the cavern. I tried using some flash, but really wasn't able to get things just right. Additionally, and probably most impressive was that you could see and hear water still flowing inside that pillar of ice; unfortunately, there simply was no way to capture that with a photo.

I've got as couple more from this trip that I'll share soon.

- Bill

Well, I finally made it through the rest of the photos from Hocking Hills. Honestly, this last set is where all the gems are, so I'll get right to the one that I think turned out the best. I liked this one as a color image, but then decided to try it in B&W - I ran it through the Antique Plate preset in Nik Software's Silver FX, and the result is just stellar I think...

Technical Data: Canon EOS 7D, Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 II at 49mm, 1/30 sec at f/5.6. ISO 100. RAW processing Adobe Camera Raw, B&W conversion in Silver FX (mouseover for color version).

There is still more to come, so stay tuned.

- Bill