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Fall on Conrad Road

I made this picture on the Island Trails in the Ludington State Park. The bright blue areas of the photograph are Hamlin Lake. My father-in-law, Don Verduin, and I spent a great deal of time trying to find the perfect wild iris to photograph. Don actually found this flower first and was kind enough to let me in on his treasure.

Lady Slipper

Wagner Awash

I have always enjoyed walking along this road, lined with giant pines. Today, I lay on my back, looking up at them like I would when I was a kid. I captured this so that it lives not only in my memories, but out in the world as well.

When bright sunlight hits water, it creates a wonderful array of sparkles. When those sparkles are photographed, the aperture ring inside the lens makes them appear as perfect geometric shapes. I feel that the sparkles make this photograph a stronger image.

What a View

Dune grass, that a week earlier blended in with a sand dune, stood out against the snow that painted the dune along the Lake Michigan shoreline near the Ludington State Park Beach House.

I have a teaching degree and several credits towards a master's degree in social work, but as I went down those roads in life I found they weren't for me. I took the road less traveled, followed my heart, and went into photography full time. As in the Robert Frost poem, that has made all the difference.

A Sunday ride on an autumn afternoon is one of the best things about Michigan. We all have favorite spots we visit year after year to check out the fall color. This is my favorite tunnel of trees and the best image I have ever made there. I had been driving Conrad Road between Ludington and Scottville east and west for days to check the progress of the leaf color change on the massive old maple trees lining each side of the Polcin Farm. On this day, October 10, 2010, the trees and the light looked picture perfect. I set up my tripod in the middle of the road and carefully designed the image in my viewfinder. My camera had live-view capability, but I have studied images in a viewfinder for so long, I prefer, if the situation permits, to be able to still see the world through that little eye hole. I made certain to include everything inside the borders of my viewfinder that I wanted and to include nothing I did not want. Unless we are photographing fast-moving objects where it is impossible to see and evaluate everything visible through the finder instantaneously, Brad and I each painstakingly try to finish in-camera the composition of every image we make. Most of our artwork is therefore created in a 2X by 3X proportion because that is the proportion of traditional 35-millimeter film and now traditionally-proportioned digital sensors. I loved everything I saw in the viewfinder when I triggered my cable shutter release at this moment. Moments later, two people on bicycles pedaled over the hill at the back of the scene. I fired off a few quick shots to capture a peak moment of this added ingredient to the scene. Brad and I like to teach our workshop students that if an element doesn’t add to a scene, it probably detracts. The bicycle riders definitely added a human and storytelling element and, dwarfed by the giant trees, a “little person in the big world” sense of scale. As fine art, I prefer the naturalness of the image I made without the bicyclists, and that is why I selected that one for this book. But the storytelling image with the bicyclists is the one that the national-award-winning Pure Michigan tourism promotion campaign selected for billboards. They wanted the people looking at those billboards to imagine themselves pedaling their bikes in such a spectacular Michigan place. Brad and I pride ourselves on being visual storytellers; I love telling Michigan’s beautiful stories with my cameras.

While several of our photography workshop students were working to create strong, unique images at a sunflower field along M-22 near Onekama, a surprise visitor completed my composition.

Some trees look almost human as they strike individual poses against the landscape. I was photo hunting in Victory Township, northeast of Ludington, when this tree and the atmosphere surrounding it caught my eye.

Our workshop students were up to their waists in dewy grasses before sunrise and many of them were on their knees getting their cameras immediate to the wildflowers, grasses and weeds in a field near our Pere Marquette River property. I got down low beside them to immerse myself in the tapestry of spring growth. Six a.m. never looked better to me.

Wednesday December

Emerging from the White Birch Forest in Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore after searching for images of the birch trees and maple leaves in autumn color, I was about to put my camera equipment back in my trusty Suburban when I took in this view less than 50 yards away. It looked and felt like a melody of color, pattern, and texture.

Dandelions and Fruit Trees

Sometimes it seems like we wait forever for the leaves to turn along the shores of the inland lakes tied to Lake Michigan. Then, seemingly overnight, a glorious change greets us on a morning like this one on Hamlin Lake. My son Brad and I encountered this fleeting scene at Victory Park on Upper Hamlin Lake in mid-October. Brad was still running with tripod and camera for a different vantage point while I made this picture along the park waterfront. Fortunately, I got off one shot before a cloud dropped the curtain on the fall color light show.

I am at first overwhelmed by all the color and patterns bombarding my senses amidst the birch trees and maple leaves in the famous White Birch Forest. I know not to hurry. Finally, I find my prize. The patterns of these maple leaves and birch bark are music to my eyes. I have probably spent an hour looking for strong compositions in this magical forest in the Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore. Every minute has been a joy. F11 at 1/250, ISO 800, 300mm lens at 300mm

Oh, to experience another winter morning as stunning as this. I love below-zero mornings; the sky is usually crystal-clear and the morning light brilliant. But I never imagined the beauty that would await me at the Sable River Outlet this February morning. Steam coming off the water at sunrise had turned the grass to shimmering white shafts on the dune south of the outlet.

Give me a windy day at the beach anytime, especially an autumn day when the light is sharp. On this afternoon, I wanted to capture the feeling of a windy day along the Lake Michigan shoreline. I set up the tripod and used a slow shutter speed to record the movement of the dune.