Todd and Brad Reed’s Michigan: Wednesdays in the Mitten

In order to help protect this beautiful piebald deer, my dad and I have sworn not to tell people where we found it. We had received a tip from a family friend, and after almost two hours of searching for this elusive animal, we were getting ready to give up. Suddenly, I spotted it about 75 yards away in the woods. It wasn't until I downloaded this image and saw it on my 30-inch monitor that I noticed the other two deer in the scene. Our perseverance and teamwork paid off.

I don't know who was more determined, the fish trying to jump up the dam on the Betsie River, or me trying to capture a flying fish with my camera. After a 30 minute battle, I finally got my photo. Unfortunately for the fish, it never made it high enough to get over the dam.

Upon discovering that, even in snowshoes, I was unable to walk over the five-foot snow drifts on the utility road to Big Sable Point Lighthouse, I had to figure out another way to get to the lighthouse. After using some good risk assessment, I decided my best course of action was to walk on the ice a few hundred yards off shore. After almost a mile and a half of treacherous walking and crawling, I made it to the lighthouse. Exhausted and hot, I made this image in seven degree weather, made chillier by 20 mile-per-hour winds. It was so worth the journey. D7000, F22 at 1/60, ISO 100, 10-20mm lens at 10mm

First Street Beach in Manistee is always a great place to photograph a beautiful Lake Michigan sunset. After a long, hard day of shooting, it warmed my soul to see the sun pop through the clouds just before sunset. D800, F8 at 1/60, ISO 100, 70-200mm lens at 130mm

First Street Beach in Manistee is always a great place to photograph a beautiful Lake Michigan sunset. After a long, hard day of shooting, it warmed my soul to see the sun pop through the clouds just before sunset.

I have been known to moo out loud at cows to get their attention. Usually, it doesn't work, and they just look at me like I am an idiot; but today it enticed this little one to come closer to me and my camera. My dad has taught me a lot of tricks of the trade over the years.

Clyde Butcher continues to teach people all over the world that swamps are beautiful. He photographs the Everglades in Florida and has done more to save the Everglades than any politician. His photographs move people emotionally and that emotion is what is spurring the action to save the Everglades. Today I am photographing a swamp near the Eastmanville Bayou along the Grand River.

The White River Light Station near Whitehall, Michigan is a beautiful lighthouse. It also has a very informative museum inside. Shortly after making this photograph, I laid down in the grass and warm sunshine and took a nap. I woke myself up snoring. I guess I needed some rest.

It has been interesting watching this old abandoned home near Silver Lake change over the last 20 years. My guess is that within the next year or two a good portion of it will collapse.

When I was a kid, my brothers and I spent a lot of time climbing trees in our neighborhood near Lake Michigan. One of our neighbors had a huge old beech tree in his yard and he would let all the neighborhood kids climb it. While I was photographing this tree in Marshall, Michigan, I could hear all the laughter and voices of my brothers and friends in my head and it made me smile.

Bay Harbor in Petoskey is an enchanting place full of beautiful homes and wonderful people. This tree, near the main entrance on US31, grabbed my attention as I was driving by. I turned my truck around and made a 30 second exposure. I love how the final image turned out. D800, F16 at 30 seconds, ISO 100, 70-200mm lens at 78mm

My dad and I enjoy photographing these Scottish Highland Cattle south of Hart, Michigan. This one stared me down and looked as if he might charge at me at any moment. I know that little wire fence would have done nothing to protect me, but I couldn't resist trying to make this image. I love his swagger.

Under Water at Big Sable

Our assistant manager, Rachel Gaudette, lives very close to Ford Lake in the eastern part of Mason County. For several years, she has been telling my dad and me to shoot a sunrise over her lake. Today, I finally took her advice and was blown away by the gorgeous sunrise that erupted.

Every spring since I was a very small child, I have spent time in the Michigan woods with my family looking for morel mushrooms. Today, I had the amazing honor of hunting for the elusive mushrooms with one of the best morel mushroom hunters in North America. Roger Thurow, a Scottville, Michigan native, has won the national morel mushroom hunting championship multiple times. He took me to a few of his favorite spots and showed me the ways of a master. I will never forget this day. My wife, Betsy, and our kids enjoyed eating the bounty.

A diseased tree had split in half about four feet up from the ground and a bird made a beautiful little nest in the remaining top of the stump. I put my 14mm wide-angle lens extremely close to the nest. This photograph was taken close up yet does not look like a typical close-up. With a wide-angle lens, if you do not get very close to the subject, the subject will look tiny and the photograph will often lack emotional impact.

This is the view from the top of the De Zwaan Windmill, located in Windmill Island in Holland, Michigan. Mesmerized by the endless fields of tulips, I locked in on this particular area of one field. I patiently waited for the sunlight to reappear from behind a large cloud and then for the wind to die down enough to make the photograph I had envisioned. D800, F11 at 1/320, ISO 1600, 70-200mm lens at

The older I get, the less pressure I feel to fit in with the crowd. My parents have always taught me to be comfortable being myself, but sometimes that comfort doesn't come for people until they are older. I was inspired looking at these red tulips and how they stood out from the crowd. I shot them with my 85mm 1.4 lens at an aperture of 1.4 so that the extremely shallow depth of field made them sharp and all the other tulips blurry.

My dad and I often tell our photography workshop students they need to think of themselves as puppeteers. We try to control exactly where the viewers of our work will first look in our photographs. By using a super-telephoto 600mm lens as well as a 1.4 extender, I had a very shallow depth of field. Then I moved within 15 feet of the flower, which is as close as that lens will focus. Finally, I set my aperture to F5.6 in order to have the shallowest depth of field possible. This combination of lens choice, closeness, and aperture helped me isolate one tulip in this photograph.

A good portion of the homes and cottages on Bass Lake between Ludington and Pentwater are seasonal. As I was capturing the beautiful sunrise this morning on the southwest corner of the lake, I imagined the people who own and rent these homes in the summer months can't stop thinking about Bass Lake all year long.