Bonanza Falls on the Big Iron River
Here is, unfortunately, the only waterfall we were able to see on this trip. From pictures I’ve seen of this fall in the spring/summer it looks pretty large and powerful. However, most of the Big Iron River was covered in ice, and this was the best I could do. I think the ice adds something to this that you don’t get to see in other images of this waterfall.
Lake Superior Rocks after a Snowstorm
This was taken Easter morning after John, Tj, and I snowshoed (is that a word?) in to the coast of Lake Superior. We had initially set out to see Lake of the Clouds in the Porcupine Mountains. However, the road was closed, covered in ice, and there was no way we were making it the 7 miles on foot and then back again in time for Easter dinner (the thought did cross our minds however, because we’re that kind of crazy). Instead we strapped on some snowshoes, and headed out to the coast of Superior at Union Bay. Initially the sun was covered over with a predawn snow storm, however the storm broke just after the sunrise, and it was a fantastic thing to see.
Lake Superior Sunset
Here is another view from the coast of the Keweenaw at sunset. The ice formations out in the water were gorgeous to look at, I tried to do them justice with my camera.
Lake Superior Coastline Sunset
Here is an HDR Image I made up of the Lake Superior coastline at Sunset. This was taken in the Keweenaw Peninsula just a bit west of Copper Harbor. As you can see, there was still quite a bit of snow on the ground in the UP!
What do you think?
Ok, you probably know that I do a bit of post processing work on all of my images. Truly, it’s not much more than the camera would do automatically if I shot Jpegs instead of Nikon’s NEF Raw format. I like to do it in post on my computer because I have more control over each individual image, rather than a blanket setting that the camera would apply to all images. I occasionally remove things like stray tree branches or a telephone pole, but I do my best when framing the photo in camera to avoid including these distractions in the photo. This photo, however, is the first time I’ve ever intentionally added something to a photo that wasn’t there in real life. It would be impossible to capture the light from this lighthouse during this time of day, but I think it adds something to the photo. I can’t take credit for the technique either, I borrowed it from a professional photographer that I like to follow. Once again, let me know what you think in the poll!
Eagle Harbor Light
Here is another lighthouse in the Keweenaw Peninsula. We had to drive by this one to get to Copper Harbor, and drove by it again on the way back. I’ll let you decide which shot you like better, but this is a great example of how much the light changes in only a short amount of time. I didn’t change a single setting in camera, and the post processing for each was almost identical. The only thing that changed was the height of the sun above the horizon. Picture on the left was around 6:30 PM, and the picture on the right at around 8:00 PM.
UP Lighthouses
If you like lighthouses, the UP is definitely full of them. I only had time to see a handful of them on my short trip, and could only photograph two of them.
This first lighthouse is Copper Harbor light, located wayyyyy out towards the end of the Keweenaw Peninsula. This is yet another area of the UP that I’m going to have to explore more in the future. I am grateful that my traveling compatriots were patient enough to allow me to wait another 10 minutes so that the light would get just a touch better for this shot:
Old Mackinac Point Lighthouse
As we drove over to the little park where I took the first two pictures of the Mackinac Bridge at night, I saw this scene! I knew we had to stop here on the way back! I’m really happy with how this shot turned out, and I think it’s now one of my favorites. I’m not 100% happy with everything about it, but that just means I’ll need to head back someday and try again…. sounds terrible doesn’t it?
UP Trip Pics!
Ok, as you probably know I accompanied my buddy John up to the UP over Easter weekend to visit an old buddy of ours and his wife. I’ve got a couple shots up on this site from my trip to attend their wedding last June, and knew that in addition to visiting them, I’d love to get out with the camera and create some new content for this site.
I’ve always loved visiting Michigan’s Upper, and this trip did not disappoint. Before this excursion I had never been to the Keweenaw peninsula, nor into the Porcupine Mountains. I tried to do the beauty of this area justice with my pictures in the few short days I had there, and I know that I will venture back one day soon to see even more.
Please don’t fret, I promise this won’t be a boring “facebookish” travel album… As my tour-guide and our driver (just kidding, thanks you guys!) for the weekend kept ribbing me about, I was out to capture photographs and not to take snapshots… I’ll try to not bore you…but only try… I’m gonna post images as I finish editing, and they’ll work their way into my existing galleries at that time.
I’d also like to just take a quick second to thank everyone for the feedback you’re giving me, and to thank you for coming back and checking out my pictures so often. It’s been a huge motivation for me and has pushed me to create new images, and to see new things.
I’m only gonna throw in a few quick stories of our exploits on this adventure on my site, if you’d like to read more about our travels check out John’s blog at http://wanderlustandadventurebound.wordpress.com/. He’ll have some amusing stories in the coming days (probably as soon as his photographer gets off his lazy ass and sends him images). He also writes better than I do, so his keyboard-mashing will be more worth your while.
These first two images are from the drive up. We stopped at the Mackinac bridge at roughly 3:30 am to see if anything worthwhile would come of it, and I think we lucked out. I had the shutter open for a while in both of these, and used an upside down graduated neutral density filter to try and tame the light coming from the bridge as to get some star detail. I like the mini star trails in the images due to the long exposure, and I might have to explore this shot more in the future to capture a full star trail, we just didn’t have time this trip.
After that long-winded spiel, finally the reason you visited:
Mackinac Bridge
Mackinac Bridge
caseyendelman 