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

Have you ever been walking in a beautiful woods and felt like the trees were talking to you? While I walked to Inspiration Point inside Ludington State Park, I felt like if I just stopped walking and listened with my eyes, I would be able to hear the trees' stories. I tried to record their stories with my camera.

The beach house at Ludington State Park has recently been renovated by the State of Michigan. It looks more beautiful than ever. I waited a half-hour for the tall ship Peacemaker to get in just the right spot on the horizon to make this image.

This winter was brutal on the wildlife in Michigan. A friendly, hungry deer walked right up to me looking for a handout of food at Ludington State Park today. If I'd had food, I know it would have eaten right out of my hand.

As I was making this photograph tonight near the north edge of Epworth Heights along Lake Michigan, I was curious to know the history of this tree stump. Where did it come from? Why did it die? How long ago did it make it to the Lake Michigan shoreline? Even after all the years of extreme shoreline weather, this stump still looked solid and strong.

Boaters love to set course for Charlevoix, especially during the annual Venetian Festival. To capture the flavor of summer in Charlevoix I set out to photograph across Round Lake toward downtown during the blue light of dusk. Fortunately the night was so still that the sailboat moored in front of me was staying almost motionless, enabling me to use a long enough shutter speed to record the movement of two of the festival amusement rides.

After shooting the sunset in Epworth tonight, I walked back to my truck, which was parked at the First Curve in Ludington State Park. The sunset was average at best, but the afterglow proved to be the real treasure. As I was making this image, I knew this was where I belonged. I believe everything happens for a reason and God put me into position to capture this image. Maybe someday I will know why, but for now I am enjoying the journey.

Standing inside this 50-foot-tall ice cave on Grand Island, I had the strangest feeling I had been there before. With the warm sun and an occasional water droplet hitting my face, I felt like I was at a new beginning in my life. It was a spiritual moment for me.

I have photographed this tree on Kinney Road just east of Old US31 several times. Today, the clouds, fog, and radiant sunlight are all working together to make this scene look extraordinary. Photography is wonderful therapy and is good for my soul.

Kayakers enjoy the Michigan outdoors on West Bay in Traverse City while sailboats stay at their moorings until their crews have the time to get them back underway. Even an occasional voyage on Michigan waters tends to restore my soul. I am sure others feel reborn too when they set sail.

Don't be afraid to rotate your camera to the vertical position. We often find many new workshop students are hesitant to see the world around them vertically. Practice making photographs both horizontally and vertically.

For just a moment, from my vantage point on Grand Traverse Bay, sailboats underway fit perfectly into the spaces between the sailboats tending from their mooring buoys. My previsualization of what could happen has happened. My visual poem is complete; nothing left to do but to click the shutter. D800, F5.6 at 1/200, ISO 100, 70-200mm lens at 160mm

I have not experienced a winter with this much snow and ice since I was a little kid. I am in heaven this evening at the beach in Grand Haven. My dad and I love to photograph Michigan all year long, but we are especially fond of cold winter days when the sun is shining. D7000, F22 at 1/15, ISO 100, 10-20mm lens at

Each year many people get engaged in front of Michigan lighthouses. Our good friend, Eric Uitvlugt, recently proposed to his girlfriend at the Grand Haven lighthouse so I named this photo in their honor.

Every time I drive by this tree on US10 just before Chase, Michigan, I check it out to see if it is ready to be photographed. On this frigid February morning as two of my best friends, Sarah Genson and Rachel Gaudette, and I are heading across the state on a photo mission, we get out of my truck to make this image. Like usual, we are laughing at each other the entire time.

What makes the fire within you burn? What lights my life up the most is having deep conversations with friends, family, and complete strangers or chasing the light with my camera. Tonight while walking out to the North Breakwater Light in my hometown of Ludington, I enjoyed a couple of nice conversations with people I just met, followed by shooting a unique sunset being reflected onto Lake Michigan.

Pointe aux Barques Light is a long, slow drive across the state of Michigan from Ludington, but it is so worth the journey. The lighthouse is located at the very top of Michigan's thumb. If you haven't been there, go soon and bring your camera!

My great grandma, Martha Delite Shoup Benson, grew up in this house on Hansen Road in eastern Mason County. The house is still in pretty good shape, but the barn has seen better days. I wish I could travel back in time and have my great-grandma and her siblings give me a tour of the homestead in all of its glory.

In the last couple years, I have started noticing rocks shaped like hearts on Michigan beaches. Tonight, I am photographing this one in front of the Whitefish Point Lighthouse on Lake Superior. A workshop student once asked me how I find so many heart-shaped rocks. I thought about it for a while and decided that somehow they must find me.

If you love to find incredible beach rocks and occasionally add a few to your personal collection, I highly recommend taking a trip to Whitefish Point on Lake Superior. The diversity of the rocks in shape, color, texture, and size is mesmerizing. The roar of the waves and the sound of the rocks moving against each other have a strange calming effect on me.

This scene would look very flat and two-dimensional most days. Except for a few fleeting moments today, the light and shadows cooperated and turned the Ludington shoreline into a beautiful arrangement of lines, shapes, textures, and colors that appears to be much more three-dimensional.