Here you will find all of the images to date from my Year of Photos challenge.Β While the primary distribution of the photos is via email, I wanted to make them accessible to those that may have joined the list late and even those that have not joined it yet.
Click on any of the images below to open up that month’s collection of images. Once inside click on any of the individual images to start a full-screen slideshow of that month’s photos.
Enjoy!
Chris
December
Bright yellow flowers abound in spring, and this one is just lovely as the first of a bunch to bloom and greet the sun. The pollen is just loaded on here, waiting for the bees to come and spread it around.
This shot from mid-November is of the Longs peak just north and west of Denver. The snow is just getting started in earnest and the raptor flying in from the left was a bonus as I was entirely focused on the newly coated snow caps and the beautiful fall day.
Another image from the very cold trip to the yurt in 2015. We had freezing fog which leads to ice crystals being deposited on nearly everything. I got several good shots of the ice (including this one), but I like the one below for the crazy amount of detail you can see if you drill in. I took this one black and white as the shadows here were very blue and it looked very unnatural without the context of a wider shot.
We were up on our annual yurt trip when I came across these footprints one morning when I went out on the deck. It turns out they were from me the evening before when I went out and stood for a bit and did some astrophotography. It was well, well, below freezing at the time (single digits Fahrenheit) so apparently, my feet were warm enough to melt these perfect footprints into the existing ice. My wife calls foul on this one as her feet are always cold and mine warm up within minutes regardless of how badly I treat them π I honestly can't even remember them being cold when I was shooting, I was way more focused on the stars and making sure I was holding as still as possible. #NoShivver.
Apparently, spring and summer 2015 were fairly short as we are already back into late fall/early winter (or I was busy that summer, something about a wedding?) β anyway, another shot of a pretty little bird on a bare branch against a deep blue November sky. Not sure of the type, in this case, feel free to let me know via reply email if you happen to know. I love the fact that we have birds in the area year round, it would be very quiet without them if they all left with the leaves.
Last of the dandelions today, this one has gone to seed which regarding dandelions is no bad thing. Again with the gossamer thinness of the whiskers on the seeds truly calls out the delicate nature of the flower. I am not sure which form I like better, the flower or the seed head, they both are beautiful in their own way.
Back to flowers and this one from the front porch. It's not a great shot (slightly overexposed and not as sharp as I would like), but the fact that the petals are still slightly curled as the flower unfurls is I think pretty darn cool. An hour later on this one and it would have been fully unrolled petals and a flat to convex flower. Again, getting up early gets you good light and access to some things not seen later in the day.
I was surprised to see this adolescent Swainson's hawk hopping around an open field on my route home from work. At first, I thought it was injured and couldn't fly, so I stopped to confirm with thoughts of calling the raptor rescue. It turns out she was just fine, and the reason for the odd behavior was a literal swarm of grasshoppers in the field, and she was having a feast. I don't know if an older hawk that was more skilled in mammal hunting would have behaved this way or if she was the only hawk in the neighborhood to figure it out but either way, it gave me an excellent opportunity to get up close and nearly personal with this beautiful bird.
Something simple today for a peaceful morning. A single sunflower was reaching for the blue sky in the morning sun with a few micro-pollinators along for the ride. A very early morning shot as it is high summer. Brings back great memories of a cool dewy morning walking the dogs and taking pictures.
Back to the flowers today for a whimsical one that I really like. In a manicured office park full of ordered flower beds something went horribly right in this one. I am sure the orange marigold plant looked very similar when small and without blossoms with its true nature only revealed in time. I love the incongruity of the size and color between the interloper and the masses, but what I like best is that the gardeners let it stay β a beautiful orange counterpoint to a melody of yellow.
A small break from the flower parade for a day to share this shot of a robin from our backyard. It honestly took me a while to figure out what this guy was as he didn't look like anything I had seen before. It turns out that an adolescent robin doesn't have the bright orange chest of the adult, rather this speckled brown and beige one. I had to hit the books to find out the true story with the confirmation being the orange tint under the wing that heralds the beginning of the color change to adult plumage.
Today's image is a follow onto the shot of the single Lilly of a few days past. Same bed of flowers, about two months later, this shot shows how different things can look when shooting under different lighting conditions. The earlier shot was taken in the middle of the day while this one is in the late evening and the difference is stunning. Also on this shot, I raised my perspective a bit and got the asphalt background (in this case fresh and black) and used it as a high contrast background to the yellow of the flowers. Add to that you have many more blossoms as well as some faded and shriveled blooms and you have a completely different feel than with the previous shot of the same flowers. Photography is fun π
On this shortest day of the year, a burst of color from one of the longest days of the year. This shot was taken on June 17, 2015, just days away from the summer solstice. Captured in the middle of the day you don't have the golden hours lighting, but in this case, the shadows its petals cast across itself make for a fascinating look. The neutral grey background actually asphalt of the road which runs alongside the flower bed, allowing it to go into soft focus gives you a nice look without revealing what it is. So in the midsts of an office park, and alongside a busy road, you get a moment of solitude that seems miles away from everything.
A photo of Colorado's state flower today, the Columbine. These grow wild in the high mountain valleys, but they can thrive at lower altitudes if adequately cared for. This example is from the front yard bed of one of the houses in the neighborhood that I came across while out walking the dogs. This example is in the traditional blue and white, but there is now a multitude of colors available. As I am getting old and set in my ways, I am partial to the blue.
As mentioned on Monday, the pollen was out and waiting for the bees to arrive, and while this isn't the same flower, you can see the bees are indeed on the job. This shot was from a series I took while out driving one day at lunch and chancing across some roadside flowering plants (weeds?) that wee covered in bees. I am not as dialed in on bees as I am birding but this particular fellow is quite a different species than some we have seen earlier which don't have the HUGE eyes that this one and his buddy do. Again in this photo hight clouds and vibrant yellow lead to an almost luminescent quality to the flowers. Now if only I could convey the scent and buzzing sounds the effect would be complete.
No matter how much I am out and about, I am always surprised and delighted by the curiosity shown by many of the animals I photograph. This common red squirrel was appeared fascinated by what I was up to while out on a shoot. We weren't anywhere near a residential neighborhood, so I don't think he was tame and looking for a peanut; instead just seeing what that big guy was up to.
Today's shot is another of my experiments in black and white conversions, and it is of an abandoned farmstead in extreme western Kansas. There are many, many places like this on the prairie as mechanization had drastically cut the number of people required to farm the same amount of land. It is an obvious reminder of the changing landscape in our way of life. While I thought the black and white conversion made it look old-timey, now I realize perhaps I should have left it color as it is something of the present, not the past. Interesting how our perceptions of color vs. black and white can trick us into thinking 'old,' even if we know better.
Another of our bold urban raptors today with this shot of a Swanson's hawk perching on a pine tree with a stormcloud behind. It has just stopped raining, and the sun had broken through which made it quite easy to spot. It was the tallest tree in the area, and she appeared to be enjoying the view. I would expect that she was just waiting for the last of the wind to leave along with the rain and for some updrafts to get started again be for it was time to be off soaring and looking for a quick bite.
Today's shot is one of those that I wish I had a slightly better lens for as with a bit more reach this could have been a truly spectacular shot. We are seemingly getting more and more raptors back into the city every year, and this Swainson's hawk was one of a nesting pair that had set up house in a dead cottonwood about 1/4 mile from the busiest intersection in my city. They seemed to be fully acclimated to the hustle and didn't seem to mind me being close to the nest too much. I caught this shot just as he was flying back up to the nest after an unsuccessful hunting dive. The transition from level flight with legs tucked up to landing position is so fast I haven't been able to capture it fully even running seven frames a second, but I did get this mid-way shot where the legs have dropped and are merely waiting to be brought up to branch level when the wings finish their backstroke β poetry in motion.
For reference, up is up π
With kildeer's, you need to be a little stealthier than you would with a duck or goose. I was able to get on my stomach and get quite a few good ones of this pretty thing, and it was worth a little dirt. The black and white stripes really stand out, and the red rim around the eye is very distinctive. I like that shorebirds aren't only for the ocean and I am always glad to see them come back.
A late flowering tree is the focus of today's photo. I am very unsure what type it is but if I had to guess I would say crabapple or choke cherry due to the size of the flower and the density. Dozens of flowers, hundreds of stamen, detail galore. Spring is awesome.
Another repeat appearance today with this blue-winged teal duck. You get just a tinge of the blue a few inches forward of the white feathers on his rear but nothing like the bright color you would see if his wings were spread. On this shot, I actually took the time to compose the whole shot, so I got the full reflection of him in the water this time. It makes it look so much more complete, and the etail in the water is quite good on this calm morning.
Pine trees are a common staple of landscapers in the Denver area, even though we are not truly the environment for them (as opposed to the foothills/mountains just 15 miles away). That said they are everywhere and seem to do quite well if they are well watered. The tree in this photo was happy enough to be producing pinecones, albeit baby ones, in early spring. Compared to the large cones with well-separated seeds that were spread on the ground around the tree, these have a ways to go. While not as cute as say, a baby rabbit, they are kind of cute compared to their end form in my eye.
The ducks also returned in the spring of 2015 but this pair choose an interesting place to nest. We had a very wet spring that year, and the reason this shot stands out to me is that the ducks were hanging out in a roadside swale that just happened to have water in it. You can't tell as I took a close shot but this body of water was about 10' wide and 30' long and not deep at all (you can see grass sticking up through the surface). I didn't keep up with this pair but the rest of the season was fairly dry, I hope they didn't end up regretting their choice of locale.
Another dandelion image today, this one in profile so you can see the heights the little curly q's go to. Zoom in tight on them to look at the spikes coming off of them. So much to look at in such a small flower!
I spent a delightful lunch hour taking pictures in a park that was covered in dandelions. While these are commonly viewed as weeds in the US by most people, I find them to be beautiful little flowers with a lot of exquisite detail to play with. The color contrast between the yellow and the green is striking, and the lighting was unique in that we had high cloud cover, so it was filtered rather than direct. This allowed me to get maximum yellow without blowing out the highlights as might have happened on a sunny day. Dive into the detail of the full image if you get a chance, the little curly bits are really cool π
Plants aren't the only early spring arrivals, and in a departure from birds, I share this image of a cute little bunny rabbit. Either he was scared to death, or he isn't old enough to know its time to run when something as big as me gets this close. Good thing for him I wasn't hungry. Take a moment to hit the full-size version of this one; the fur is just beautiful.
Moving into early spring, we have a photo today of that harbinger of the season, the tulip. Spring flowers in Colorado are the inevitable consequence of soaking spring snow, as are the broken curbs such as the one you see in the background. These occur when the snow plows cut a little to close going around corners and are as common a site as the flowers once the snow and ice are gone.
As I mentioned, I didn't shoot a lot of images during the winter of 2014/15, but I did come across this one. It is more of an exercise in how to shoot snow in the sunshine and not have it be just a white blur with zero detail (its hard to tone down the brightest of the snow without making other things black). Not sure what the magic combination was (I can see the shutter and f/stop settings on this one, but they weren't too far off f the others) but this one of all the shots taken that morning came out with the best tone balance. What I remember most was how incredibly cold it was.
Out on the plains near the abandoned farmhouse, we came across a flock of wild turkeys. While this shot isn't as crisp as I would like, the distance to the birds plus the crop I made after were a bit beyond the lens/camera I had at that time; I still feel it is worth including. This proud fellow had a whole flock of ladies following him around, and he was putting on quite the display to scare me off and protect his flock. I know from experience that the wildlife is moving back into the populated areas (we have skunk, fox, and raccoon in our neighborhood) and by the size of the flocks of turkeys I have seen in eastern Kansas, it could be that they are making a comeback as well.
I didn't take a lot of photos in the early months of 2015, but I did find this shot of what can only be a valentine rose (dated 2/15/15) and like with seagulls, I am fascinated by roses. Again, the cut flowers in winter are a little bit of spring/summer in a dark, cold time and combined with their loveliness make them a favorite subject.