Flowers and fences

We went up to Monument Lake yesterday once more. I always try to shoot something new each time. Doing the same subject all the time could get a bit boring. Yesterday I took a different trail in that spirit. I'm thinking it's one the local residents created so they could get to the lake. Interestingly enough there was a rustic looking fence line to one side.

These looked a bit interesting so I photographed them.

 It was very windy yesterday so I had to use relatively quick shutter speeds, and every shot was handheld. I will be posting some more images in the next couple of days including at least one of the Great Blue Heron images.
Have a great day and try to enjoy your life a bit.

Old bridge

The old bridge in the photo has always interested me, especially since I'm a bit of a historian. When you see it with less vegetation you can see where the couple of spans ends so it's now a bridge to nowhere. I'll note it's not real easy to get to the place where I shot the image at. Pretty good image though.
The stream is Fountain Creek. Where the bridge appears to be is at the end of what's presently Mountview Ln when you look at it on Google Earth.

Being curious I've always wondered when the bridge was a bridge people used. I looked up maps from 1909, 1949, 1951, and 1961. The bridge came up on the 1949, and 1951 maps. I was thinking it was destroyed during the floods of 1965 but it was not. 

Below is a screenshot of part of the 1951 map. It's just left of the R in Roswell. The road going north from there I believe is present day Mark Dabling Blvd.

One point of note on the map is Pikeview Station where the power plant is today. The red line to the left of the station is present day Nevada Blvd. To the left of the red line you'll see a bunch of buildings marked. Those were the Anderson film company which also was an aircraft manufacturing company until the early '30's. They, however, went into advertising from then until I think in the 1970's.
Nichols Field is the other one. Doing a little research when you flew to Colorado Springs on Pan Am you landed at Nichols Field in the 1920's. It was basically the main airport though there was about 20 other airfields in the area.

I'm hoping you enjoyed this little foray into local history. Have a great day and enjoy life.

Lake Manitou Park

North of Woodland Park a few miles is Lake Manitou Park. It has a very nice trail system that rings the lake. Quite scenic in places and it's managed by BLM. There is a charge for the use of the park. In our case the fee was $3, though you'll pay $6 if you don't have an old fart discount however. 

There's several picnic areas where I shot a few of the images of the rock outcroppings. Last year when I shot it last I didn't get the rock outcroppings as well. Of course I wasn't using the circular polarizer, and ND filters at the time. Being basically a point and shoot on steroids both sets of filters are necessary. On manual the camera only gives me two f/stops to use so I'm pretty much reaching the limits of what it's capable of doing. It does at least give me lots of shutter speed settings however.

This is some of the first I've shot with the Stitz video tripod. Apparently they were made in the 1980's so basically I'm using a collectors item for photography these days. It's incredibly stable and built for a much heavier camera. Back in those days the camcorders were several pounds, and used VHS tapes.

About the only negatives so far is the fact there's no bubble level, like there is on most still camera tripods. It also doesn't allow vertical format images. I'll need to get an L-bracket one of these days so I can add that capability.
Without further ado here are what I feel are the best images.

Have a great and try to enjoy your life.

Shooks Run

The site of the earliest dairy in Colorado Springs was Shooks Run. Since then the dairy moved and some of the pasture property has been turned into a city park. It's not really the most photogenic of places. The last time I made any photographs of it was about a decade ago.

The stream is Shooks Run and the culvert runs underneath Willamette Ave. Personally it's my favorite image of the day. About a block away from where this image is captured the entire stream runs under the downtown area. I'm not sure where it comes out to join up with Fountain Creek.

On these blocks is where I was standing to get the first image.

This little footbridge crosses Shooks Run about a block from the culvert.

These two are about a block away from the culvert.

This was captured in the vicinity of the last three images.

A future shoot I have planned is Seven Bridges trail again. My MIL really likes the images I made there. I've presently ordered several 11 x 14's that we'll be hanging in her room at the nursing home.

Until next time have a great day.

Storm clouds

I always try to find various photo opportunities wherever I am. Sometimes I'll just study compositions and don't take any photographs. There are other times I'll even pull out my cell phone to practice composition. A few of those are actually pretty good. There are times I'll also pull out my Fuji. 

On the 19th Susan was in her match and walked over to an adjoining open field. I was wanting to get some of the wildflowers. There was too much wind however from the coming storm and the flowers kept moving around too much to capture a reasonable image. So, I started studying the storm clouds around the area. They were dark, and foreboding. In one part of the sky there was lightning. However there was a little too much clutter from the strip mall and power lines for my taste in that direction.

The two images I did end up uploading I also included links for. The third, and fourth, images had buildings I felt cluttered up the image a bit so I didn't choose those. I chose the second one over the first one because the clouds seemed to frame Pikes Peak a little better.

Well, I hope you enjoy. Here are the images.

 http://www.viewbug.com/photo/67367495

http://www.viewbug.com/photo/67367497

I'll soon be posting my Shooks Run shoot images.
Have a great day.

Helen Hunt Falls.

One of my favorite places to shoot is North Canyon which happens to be a city park. It's rugged, there are trees everywhere, and there are great photogenic streams. From the park, and through it, there are also several trails.

Today, we went to the park, and I wanted to get Helen Hunt Falls. I figured it wouldn't take too long especially since it was due to rain. Too long I guess is a relative term. Most of my photography is done on full manual mode, and utilizing a tripod which takes longer. I get better compositions however so it's worth it. 

I'll stand there a few moments and just gaze at the scene. I'm watching the interplay of light and shadow while over the top of the camera body. Many times I'll move the tripod a few times before I even turn on the camera and subsequently hit the shutter button. This time I was bracketing using my ND filter set which adds anywhere from 1 to 6 f/stops to the exposure.

I would have probably shot more but it started raining pretty hard as of the bottom image. It doesn't take much for a flash flood to happen when it's raining. After today I'll finally have to start using a different tripod. My Vivitar finally died after having it for about ten years. It stayed stuck open and wouldn't close up.

I know you wanted to see the photography so here it is. The first image was Susan's favorite.

When I can upload on Monday I'll get them up on Viewbug.

That's it for now, have a great.

Sand Creek

It's amazing the things you drive by every day and you don't pay attention to them in the least. This is Sand Creek near the Fountain Blvd bridge. I stopped about 7 am to photograph it. I've been watching it for weeks as I've driven by.
This first one there is a set of footprints to the right of the stream. I've also included a close up of the prints.

Enjoy your day. Until next time...