Wilderness Light Painting

Rabbit Blanket Lake

Darkness, real horizon-to-horizon nighttime blackout, is rare these days. Even in rural areas, the glowing aura of distant towns and the flashing strobes of passing aircraft compromise the night sky. Experiencing a landscape lit only by the faint glow of the Milky Way is a pleasure reserved for wilderness travel.  When I am on a trip far from man-made lights, I enjoy photographing the pristine darkness of the nighttime sky.


Using an SLR atop a tripod to capture enticing images of the night sky is something most
photographers can pull off with a little knowledge and good technique. When photographing the night sky, I include a portion of landscape like the silhouette of the tree line or a single, leafless tree on a thin slice of foreground. This technique grounds the image and gives the viewer a point of reference. Simply pointing your lens at the sky will render an image of stars, but chances are the viewer will have no idea what they are looking at. I have found that including the reflecting surface of a calm lake in the foreground adds loads of visual interest to the image.

To add a little extra magic to a nighttime scene, I use a portable light to “light paint” trees or other foreground objects.

I first came across the light painting technique in View Camera Magazine a few years ago. The artist had used an impressive array of  batteries, automobile headlamps, and long, multiple exposures to paint the ruins of medieval churches and castles with light. While the resulting photographs were stunning, applying this technique on a wilderness trip is not practical. Instead, I use my powerful Pelican “Heads Up” headlamp to do the painting.

To light paint a scene that includes the starry sky, secure your camera with a wide-angle zoom lens to a tripod. When your eyes have adjusted to the darkness, compose the photograph through the viewfinder (or live-view if you prefer).

Since there is very little ambient light to work with, set the ISO setting to 800 and the aperture to either wide open or stop the lens down one stop. With the focus set at infinity, set the shutter speed to 30 seconds. A shutter speed longer than 30 seconds will render stars as steaks of light instead pf pinpoints. With all lights off, open the shutter using a remote shutter release.
 
While the shutter counts down 30 seconds, run a beam of light over the foreground trees or landscape as if you were painting it. Avoid leaving the light in one spot too long or overexposed “hot spots” will appear in your photograph. Paint only the objects you want to see illuminated in the photograph, leaving everything else in the dark.

Light painting takes a little practice, but if you willing to stay up a little late you should be able to bring home some great images the first night out.


Photo: Rabbit Blanket Lake, Ontario
©RW Domm 2012
Nikon D300  Tamron 17-35mm f2.8
30 sec f3.5  RAW file

Outfoxed

                                  

                                             Outfoxed

One evening, while looking out my kitchen window as the last light pulled away from the winter landscape, I saw a red fox running atop the frozen crust of February snow.  It was crossing a neighbor’s farm field with the nervous, zigzag steps of an animal clearly uncomfortable at being out in the open. Although I could see that it carried something in its mouth, the low light had robbed the scene of detail so I could not tell what it had caught.

 As I watched, the fox abruptly turned away from crossing the field and chose instead to disappeared into the evergreen landscaping surrounding our neighbor’s house. I watched until dusk turned to night but never saw it re-emerge.

Catching a glimpse of such a shy animal is, for me, like receiving a rare gift. The opportunity to photograph an animal as beautiful as a red fox is even rarer. Several years ago, I had such an opportunity.

While photographing early-spring wildflowers on a forested hillside in Michigan’s Waterloo Recreation Area, I met a friend who was out, binoculars in hand, searching the treetops for migrating warblers. She told me of finding an active fox den at a nearby location in Waterloo, and being familiar with the area, I pressed her for details on the den’s location. It turned out her directions were precise and I had no problem locating the den. I resolved to set up a portable blind the next morning and attempt to photograph the family of fox.

At 5:30 AM the following morning, I sat shivering in my blind about 60 feet downwind of the den with my back to the edge of a small copse of trees. The den lie inside a small hillock covered with blackberry bramble and, from my position, I had a clear view of two of the three excavated tunnels leading inside. I waited as dawn slowly unfolded.

As if cued by the first morning sunlight spreading across the landscape, a small kit emerged from the den. After sniffing around for a few moments, he sat down facing the rising sun at the entrance to the den. With as much calm as I could muster, I checked the settings on the camera and pressed the shutter release. The kit’s ears twitched, but its eyes remained riveted straight ahead. In a moment, I would know why the youngster’s attention never wavered.

From across the field, the sunrise at her back,came the vixen carrying a hapless robin to feed to her offspring. A second kit came out to greet her when she arrived at the den but quickly, all three animals retreated underground. Transfixed, I waited to see what would happen next.

Several long minutes passed before the vixen emerged from the den. She paused, bathed in the morning light and I once again pressed the shutter release. Immediately, her head snapped around and she fixed her stare on the blind.  I took a couple more shots before she turned away and trotted off. I knew my cover was blown.

I waited twenty minutes or so and then, as quietly as possible, I took down the blind and left, taking care to remain downwind of the den.             
                        
Several days passed and I decided to try to photograph at the den again. After arriving before first light and waiting as I had before, sunrise came and went without a glimpse of either the kits or the vixen. I waited until the sun was high in the morning sky before quietly slipping out of my blind and packing up to head home.                             
  
As I stretched my stiff limbs and looked around, I saw the vixen sitting on a hillside behind my      blind watching me. I had been outfoxed!  I left quickly and never returned to the den.

©Robert W Domm 2014
www.robertdomm.photoshelter.com


Photos
Fox Kit and Vixen
Pentax LX   Pentax 500mm f4.5
Fujichrome Velvia

Do you always carry a camera?

                                                   
          
One Sunday morning in February, I repeated what has been a happy ritual for me for a very long time; I took my dogs for a walk. Although the dogs don’t seem to have a particular day that they favor, as their routine is firmly established, a faithful stop by the walnut tree to see if the squirrel is out and then bounding off to the path that circles the meadow, I favor Sunday for the quiet. This particular Sunday morning was especially so.

The winter air was frigid, and the cold wrung out the air’s scant moisture as tiny crystalline snowflakes that hung suspended and dazzling all around me. Braced by the wintry temperature and captivated by the morning calm, I was puzzled when a rhythmic whistle, a sound that was at once familiar and out of place, came toward me from above.  I looked up and out across the brown stubble of my neighbor’s cornfield.

Fifty feet above the rolling field, pounding the air with powerful synchronous wing beats, were two tundra swans flying directly toward me. Now in many places, seeing tundra swans is common, but in my own yard at that moment, they were as unexpected as a rare tropical bird.

I stood spellbound as they passed overhead through a halo of glittering ice crystals, stark white against the pale morning sky. Only the sound of the wind whistling through their long, white primary feathers confirmed that they were not an apparition. Seconds later, they banked over the treetops and were gone. 

The intensity of the moment passed and my focus softened. The morning’s stillness returned.

 “I love this place,” I said aloud, to no one.

Moments like this, even those from many years ago, live in my memory as a vivid picture. Could a photograph of such an unexpected and captivating event return me there with the same intensity as my memory does? On the other hand, perhaps I would have lost the moment fumbling with camera settings and the experience would have become a recollection of frustration.

It is true that a being a photographer has made me more observant so that, even without a camera in my hand, I am always looking for that perfect composition. Keeping your senses in tune with your surroundings also means that you will see things that others miss. Call it an obsession or simply practice, but seeing the world through a photographers eye has made me appreciate the beauty all around me, whether or not I get a photograph.

Creating an image to share an experience is why we take photographs. For me, better to go out with the purpose of creating a photograph than to let the camera get in the way when life hands you a moment of astonishing and profound beauty. Better to simply enjoy and remember those moments that we happen upon when we least expect them. 

©RW Domm 2014
  www.robertdomm.photoshelter.com