Todd Reed: 50 Years Seeing Michigan Through a Lens

Underway and making way, slow but sure, a turtle plodded along the beach near the Ludington State Park Beach House. The turtle’s slow pace gave me time to create an artistic composition that emphasized the beauty of its tracks. The highlights and shadows resulting from the bright, low-in-the-sky evening light raking across the beach made the tracks more distinct and more beautiful. This is one of my son Brad’s favorite images of mine. Brad was ecstatic when he saw the Fuji Velvia slide of this image after I dug it out of the slide storage box it had been living in for years.

I made my favorite Ludington Daily News peak-moment sports photograph of all time during a Detroit Tigers game against the Milwaukee Brewers in Milwaukee on June 21, 1986. Tiger Chet Lemon was sliding into home plate head-first as Brewer catcher Rick Cerone was putting the tag on him and looking for the call from the umpire. Tiger Kirk Gibson, who had just scored, had an equally close, view. Lemon was called, “out”, causing a storm of protest from the Tigers, who went on to win 4-3.

I am certain I have watched more than 10,000 sunsets and afterglows. This one, along the Lake Michigan shoreline at Ludington State Park on May 24, 2014, was one of the prettiest I have ever witnessed.

Queen Anne’s Lace attracts me in summer as I travel the highways and byways of Michigan. On this still morning winter worked its magic to create this and many other “snow flowers” along a country road near Crystal Valley. Gotta love winter!

Sometimes you get to see something in nature so heartwarming it gives you a feeling of euphoria. This rare piping plover chick and two of its siblings had flown the coop and were missing in action. Well actually, the rare chicks couldn’t fly yet so they hopped away with their parents from the shelter erected by humans to protect the endangered species from predators and human footsteps. They hopped so far from their dune valley nest site that it was a couple hours before we spotted them by a pond over the next dune ridge. We were greatly relieved they were all alive and well. Being able to capture this parenting moment added to the euphoria.

365 Week

We had been trying unsuccessfully all morning to make strong still and video imagery of an eagle while shooting in 2007 for an upcoming book, Ludington State Park: Queen of the North. Some days are a bust; this started out being one of those. The eagles were not cooperating, and we had gotten wet and cold bouncing around choppy Hamlin Lake. In the Coast Guard, I learned that if Plan A does not work, always have a Plan B already in mind. So, despite being disappointed, cold and hungry, we turned our attention to photographing salmon making their annual return to the Sable River from Lake Michigan. It was the last week of October, and the fall color reflecting off the wind-rippled surface of the water made this salmon appear to be under stained glass. It was not the image I had set out to make, but it turned out to be one of my favorite images from a year of intensely photographing Ludington State Park. In years past I had made lesser photographs of salmon in the same spot, just under water on a spawning bed with fall color reflected on the surface. But on this day, Mother Nature blessed me with an extraordinary added ingredient. A brisk west wind made all the difference, agitating the surface of the water just enough to create a shower glass effect on the river. This faceted surface reflected various colors in various directions, turning my photograph into abstract art. I don’t like setting up an image. I love “found” pictures that are real-time moments in the Michigan outdoors. I am especially proud of this image because, while many people surmise it is not “real” and is somehow an electronic after-the-fact manipulation, it is as real, as purely Michigan at its genuine best as I have ever made. I love a lot of abstract art, but I don’t find myself drawn to setting out to make a lot of abstract images. But I do know a good abstract photo moment when I see one.

The Star Line Ferry Radisson makes way past Round Island Lighthouse in route to Mackinac Island. I photographed this scene from Mission Point Resort the morning of October 21, 2019 as seas were building in the Straits of Mackinac.

Pachysandras Surprise

I feel the spirit of these woods at Hartwick Pines State Park so strongly I am compelled to make an annual pilgrimage to Grayling to revere this place as much as to photograph it. Some of these native white pines tower 300 feet over my head. The view from lying on the ground at the base of one of these monsters is priceless.

Norwalk Lutheran Church has long been one of my favorite photography muses. I have studied the country church for years, knowing that one day I would be able to make a good image. On this snowy day the country church between Manistee and Bear Lake looked picture perfect. After making some storytelling images that included automobiles passing by on US31, I decided to make this simpler image without any vehicles. I have learned over the years that often less is more.

Photographers who remain distant from the edge of the shoreline when shooting in the morning or evening when the light is low in the sky miss the magic light that often appears where the water meets the beach and washes back and forth with the waves. When I saw these spectacular clouds over Lake Michigan, I hustled to the water’s edge, knowing those clouds would be reflected on the wet sand. These clouds were magnificent. Seeing them reflected, doubled their impact.

Spouting Offshore

Watching more and more of the birch trees in Michigan’s Lower Peninsula die from disease and disappear makes me sad. So much beauty lost. This stand of birch still looked attractive when I discovered them along a country road in 2004. When I returned several years later, they were all dead and disappearing. I am grateful for the opportunity to have seen them when they were still alive

With antlers like these, this massive bull elk is unlikely to find challengers. His appearance leaves no doubt he is the dominant elk of the herd at Amber Elk Ranch between Scottville and Ludington. Visitors to the ranch go on wagon rides during which they can literally touch elk. Michigan boasts dozens of game ranches and domestic animal petting farms.

Grandiose

I watched in awe for two hours as wave after enormous wave slammed into the Ludington North Breakwater Lighthouse on February 24, 2019. I have rarely witnessed or photographed bigger or more frequent waves exploding against the seemingly invincible structure. Many of my several hundred exposures show water flying up to 100 feet in the air and the lighthouse nowhere to be seen. Persistence paid off when I finally caught one huge descending wave still higher than the lighthouse as the next one shot skyward above the lighthouse during its ascension. I had never seen two waves tower above the Ludington lighthouse at once. I was fortunate to artistically document the rare moment.

I spent years on Coast Guard boats watching Lake Michigan waves curl and break. Their power and beauty demanded my attention then and commanded me to photograph them.

I could not resist exploring this cave Brad and I found while hiking on Isle Royale. The rugged yet beautiful view looking out of the cave made working my way inside well worth the effort.