Ptarmigan Ptunnel

Some pics from our Sunday hike with a couple friends up to Ptarmigan Tunnel.

Taking More Gooder Pictures

Last weekend I got to go to Seattle to take an "advanced" digital photography class taught by a professional wildlife and travel photographer. Wolfgang Kaehler has worked for National Geographic and Life magazines and has made a successful career out taking pictures. Taking very GOOD pictures.

So, I went to his studio, joined three others hoping to learn how to improve their picture-taking skills, and learned a lot. We spent about four hours roaming around Pike's Market with Wolfgang, taking hundreds of pictures and challenging ourselves to think more about exposure, composition and lighting. Here are the best of my attempts.

Many Glacier

After relentless pestering over the past couple of months, I've decided not to give up on my blog. While I still haven't found much inspiration to post, I will continue to use this place to share my photography. But don't expect tons of photos with each post, since blogger is still incredibly slow at uploading images.

I spent the past two days helping with seasonal naturalist training on the east side of the park, which gave me a chance to see the Many Glacier Valley for the first time since 1992. I've always said that the Two Medicine area is the prettiest in the park, but after spending a night at the Many Glacier Hotel, I think I might have changed my mind.

Swiftcurrent Lake
Mt. Wilbur
Another shot of Mt. Wilbur
The Many Glacier Hotel
On Wednesday, I swung by the St. Mary Visitor Center to drop off a poster I made for the bulletin board when I noticed how calm St. Mary Lake was. I've never seen it like that before, so I took the opportunity to swing by the Wild Goose Island viewpoint and snap a few photos.

I'm still having a hard time figuring out my polarizer. Many of the photos I've been taking with it tend to be underexposed. But trying to adjust for it by changing the aperature/shutter speed seems to wash out the white areas. Maybe it's just a matter of me trying to take good pictures in bad light (when the sun is in front of me, rather than behind). I'll figure it out eventually.

Days 35 and 36 of 365

Day 35
Refreshing

There's nothing like spending an evening enjoying an episode of Battlestar Galactica with a cool Mexican Coca-Cola in your hand!

Day 36
Springtime

Spring is finally here! At least on our front steps, anyway. I actually heard my first warbler yesterday and saw my first swallows of the season flying around our house this morning. Sonja just started her surveys going up the Sun Road, but they've only plowed the first 20 miles so far. It'll be a while before she can get up near Logan Pass. Probably at least another month and a half.

Days 30 - 34 of 365

Doing a little catch-up...

Day 30
A Rock and a Hard Place

Day 31
Hostel

Day 32
Two Trees

Day 33
Busy

Day 34
The Feast

Days 28 and 29 of 365

I stayed close to home for these. I thought a study of the color green was very appropriate considering that it matches the shade of my sickly complexion these last couple of days.

Day 28

Day 29

Days 23 and 27

I missed a couple days in there this past week, but I chalk it up to the hectic schedule I had during the last couple of days of training. It was a tough two weeks, but I'm now officially a structural firefighter for the NPS!

Before I get to the next couple of photos for my 365 Days project, I wanted to share some video from the fire training I was at. This first one is a little boring, but I'm the second person on the hose as we approach a "propane tree". Our task was to "capture" the flames inside a cone of water. This would give us the opportunity to see how powerful a tool water can be to not only extinguish but also to move and manipulate fire. It also was a chance to gain confidence in the ability of our equipment to protect us from heat.

This second video perfectly demonstrates what I meant by "capturing the flame". I took this during our vehicle fire exercise. And believe it or not, but this is in real time. It's not sped up at all. That day was so windy it made for a huge and dramatic fire inside that van. It was awesome!

I had a great time at training, but I am so happy to finally be home. I slept for over 13 hours last night and plan on duplicating that again tonight.

So here are my Day 23 and 27 photos:

Day 23
Capturing the Flame
I didn't actually take this photo, but it was taken with my camera, and that person standing there with the nozzle in hand facing that huge ball of flame is me, so I thought it qualified by default. This was also during the vehicle fire exercise.

Day 27
Three-toed Woodpecker
With spring finally making an appearance (it felt, looked and sounded like spring today), I can assure you that you'll probably see many more bird pics in the days and months to come. Not only are the migrants starting to arrive (this woodpecker is a year-round resident, though), but the weather is finally getting warm enough that it's actually comfortable to be outside fiddling around with my camera. I ended up taking 287 pictures of this very cooperative bird, most of them from less than 10 feet away. I think it's the closest I've ever been to a Three-toed Woodpecker. And I can now vouch that he is properly named!

Days 17-22 of 365

I don't really like doing these multi-day updates, but since I'm still at training and have limited access to the hotel's internet tubes it's just gonna have to be that way. So here are the photos from days 17-22.

Day 17
Raven Over Lake Powell

Day 18
Engine 2

Day 19
Badge of Honor

That's soot on my helmet from my first live fire exercise!

Day 20
Horseshoe Bend on the Colorado River

Day 21
Lake Powell's "Wildlife"

Day 22
Inferno

Today was our "propane tree" exercise. The objectives were to give us experience working with a large, hot propane fire, demonstrate how to envelope a fire within a cone of water, and build confidence in our equipment's ability to protect us. Seeing as how I was able to stand less than 2 feet from that blazing "tree" without much discomfort I think the stuff works. This shot is of one of our instructors observing the exercise.

Days 13-16 of 365

Playing catch-up...

Day 13
Storm clouds over Page, AZ

Day 14

Day 15
After a tough day

Day 16

Day 12 of 365

Day 12
Got to spend the evening back at the Castle for a special evening program. Good to see they're carrying on the tradition of offering night programs periodically. Did I mention how weird it is to be back here and not have to work? I had to keep reminding myself to turn off my "ranger face".

Day 11 of 365

Day 11
Ok, so I missed a day. I would blame it on traveling, but that was today. I suppose I could have just posted a random picture, but the truth is that I didn't even touch my camera yesterday, except to pack it in my suitcase, so I don't even have the excuse that I just wasn't able to upload it.

Anyway, I may end up running into a situation over the next two weeks while I'm in Arizona at structural fire training when I won't be able to post for a couple days, but at least I'll continue to take photos each day. I'll just have to do multiple posts or something.

So today's entry is my friend's dog, Fiona. She's the most adorable bloodhound I've ever seen (he paid me to say that).

Day 9 of 365

Day 9 -- "Morning in West Glacier"

Day 8 of 365

Day 8

Day 7 of 365

Day 7
I'm beginning to see a trend starting the past couple of days. I think I need to broaden my repertoire a bit. But at least I'm experimenting with perspective.

Day 6 of 365

Day 6, March 15, 2009

5 of 365

Day 5
One of the skills I need to work on is indoor photography. Birds, mountains, flowers and rivers I think I can handle. But for some reason, when I bring my camera inside the small skill I have seems to fly out the window. I struggle with composition as well as the more technical aspects of photography (shutter speed, ISO, aperture, depth of field). I also seem to lose all inspiration. This evening, for instance, I spent a good 45 minutes just wandering around the house whining that I didn't know what to take a picture of.

The good thing about this "365 Days" project is that it will force me to work under conditions that are less than favorable, particularly those times when I procrastinate until the last few hours of the day. It will be interesting to see how (or if) my photography improves over the next year.

4 of 365

Day 4
I had to help perform the bi-weekly check on engine 2 today. While I'm not officially a firefighter yet, I will be as of a week from Monday. I'm heading to Glen Canyon National Recreation Area for structural fire training. I've somehow got to figure out how to pack all my fire gear (boots, helmet, SCBA (like SCUBA, but without the "underwater"), turnouts (fireman suit), etc.) into a single duffle bag. Should be interested. The cool part is that I get to spend two week playing with fire!

365 Days if Me: Day 3

Day 3: "Commute"

Every morning my commute to work involves a three-minute walk along the middle fork of the Flathead River, which forms the southern boundary of Glacier National Park. This was my view this morning.

I don't know what everyone complains about. This whole commuting business isn't so bad!

365 Days of Me: Day 2

Day 2

And here's an extra one that Sonja actually liked better than the one I chose. So it's today's honorable mention:

365 Days of Me: Day 1

I just haven't felt the blogging bug lately. I don't know if part of it is the fact that it takes forever for blogger to load each photo or if I just haven't been inspired much, but I just can't seem to get in the mood to post much on here. So, I decided to try a project.

For the next year, I will try to take and post one photo every day. I'm hoping that this will challenge me to improve my composition and technical photographing skills, plus force me to get online and make a post. I'm going to keep it pretty open, so some days I might comment a lot about the photo, the process, etc., while other days I may just post the picture. I can't guarantee that I'll actually follow through with this, but I'm sure going to try.

So here it is: Day 1