Author Archives: David Blevins

Wedding Photography

I photographed my brother’s wedding a few weeks ago. Wedding photography requires a very different process from my usual work. You have one chance to capture a significant meaningful moment, and then it is gone. I am used to being able to work on an image as long as it takes to get it right. To mentally prepare for the wedding, I had to keep telling myself that the moment and the emotions were most important and that the more technical aspects of the images would just have to fall where they may. I am happy with the results, but I told Linda (the bride) that I could not take all the credit. I had some lovely subjects to work with, and Jason (the groom) cleaned up pretty well too.

Linda was ready for the ceremony with about 15 minutes to spare so I asked if I could set up my lights and do a quick formal portrait. I wanted to get an image of Linda before the ceremony but after she was ready. With all the hectic preparations before the ceremony and the celebrations after, this was my only chance to have a calm moment with her. I showed her where to stand and asked her to wait while I worked out the lighting ratio. After a few tries I had the lighting worked out, but then I realized she did not need any direction. She was waiting for me to finish with the lighting, and she had just the look I wanted to capture of her waiting for the ceremony to start. This was her moment. She was perfect.

I made a few more compositions, and then it was time for the ceremony to start. While I was photographing the wedding party getting their act together, I saw Linda peeking out of her dressing room to see if it was time for her. I had only a few seconds to make the image before she disappeared back into the dressing room.

Photography was not allowed in the sanctuary during the ceremony so this was my last image before assuming my position on the second floor.

I could not see faces or emotions very well from the perch where I was allowed to photograph the ceremony, but I did have an excellent vantage point to show the entire spectacle.

After the ceremony, the wedding party rode to the reception in a trolley. It was a rainy day so while we were outside the light was spectacular. The rain did not dampen any spirits, and the raindrops on the window of the trolley were beautiful.

When we arrived at the reception, all of the bride’s maids ran to the building to get out of the rain, and there was no one left to help Linda get her dress out of the trolley. Jason was still on board chatting with the driver, oblivious to Linda’s plight. I was in position hoping to get a romantic image of Jason helping Linda out of the trolley or at least the bride’s maids giving Linda a hand. While I watched Linda struggle I thought maybe I should help her, but before I could she took matters into her own hands. I love the look on her face as she realizes it is all up to her.

Photographing the reception was a lot of fun. The ceilings were suitable for bouncing flash, although it was challenging to balance the flash exposure with the ambient light because the room was so dark. I also had to filter the flash to match the color of the incandescent lights. My favorite images from the reception are of the bouquet toss. It just worked; I could not have photographed it any better if I tried.

Instead of throwing rice someone had the brilliant idea to have the bride and groom exit through a cordon of guests wielding sparklers. It probably sounded cheerful and colorful, but these were the biggest fire shooting sparklers I have ever seen. I was actually concerned someone might catch on fire.

Best wishes you two! And welcome to the family, Linda. It is wonderful to have a new sister.

Bloodroot

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It is so refreshing to see the first of the spring ephemerals emerge after a long winter, especially now with so many people caught up in the world’s economic troubles. They are reminders of the inexorable forces that create life and drive it forward. Forces that are far greater than anything we create.

Just after dawn I came upon a newly emerged bloodroot flower. Drops of rain still clung to the delicate unopened petals. Light shone through, and I could just make out the shape and color of the bright yellow stamens waiting inside.

Bloodroot

Florida Birds

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I recently returned from a bird photography trip to the east coast of Florida. I spent most of the time at the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge just north of Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Center. This is a huge undeveloped area teaming with wildlife.

Salt Marsh and Palm Hammock

Well, you can’t see any animals in that picture but trust me, they are in there!

My friend Lee invited me to join him on his trip to the Space Coast Birding Festival. I used to work with Lee in forestry at NCSU before he retired. Lee has more money than most people I know, yet uses coupons to save ¢50 on a hamburger. This works out well since I have less money than most people I know, and I could not afford to hang out with him if he lived closer to his means. On the drive down he suggested we split a $5 foot long subway sandwich. Lunch for $2.50, even I can afford that!

Each day Lee went on one of the festivals birding tours, and he let me borrow his Saab. The weather was perfect, and I had good luck finding and photographing animals.

I had a great time photographing the large wading birds. Each species has a different personality, resulting in behavior that I find visually inspiring. I can really identify with the little blue heron. They hunt just like I make wildlife photographs. They wait patiently, methodically, hardly moving until the time is right.

Little Blue Heron

You get a sense of the bird’s patient stillness in this photograph. I had to wait for it to move a little to create the circular ripples in the water.

The reddish egret looks similar to the little blue heron but has a completely different hunting style. This bird chases fish by running at full speed through shallow water, sometimes flapping its wings and spinning around. This reminds some people of drunken staggering, but I think it looks more like unbridled enthusiasm.

Reddish Egret

You can get a sense of how fast this bird is running from the forward leaning posture and the wake it is leaving in the water.

The green heron is a much smaller bird and likes to hunt from a branch over the water, especially when the water is too deep to stand in.

Green Heron

You can’t see its long neck in this photograph because it is coiled up preparing to strike. Just seconds after I made this photograph, it caught the fish it was watching and flew away.

I also had an interesting interaction with an anhinga. These birds swim under the water and spear fish with their sharp bill. They often swim with just their head and neck visible, the rest of their body submerged. This behavior gave them one of their common names, “snake bird”. I was surprised to see this one swimming toward me. It made for a very elegant composition to illustrate this type of swimming behavior.

Anhinga

After I made the photograph it just kept swimming toward me until it climbed up on the bank just a few feet from where I was sitting. I could not figure out why he was being so friendly until I noticed what was swimming right behind him.

American alligator

I guess the anhinga felt safer on the shore with me than in the water with the alligator. After the alligator swam away, the anhinga started drying his wings.

Anhinga Drying its Wings

A woman was nearby explaining to her daughter how these birds are not very well adapted to their environment because they have to dry their wings after swimming. I am always glad to see parents teaching their children about nature but it irks me when they just make stuff up. These birds are perfectly adapted to their environment! By absorbing water they become less buoyant and can stay under water without effort. Most birds that dive trap air under their waterproof feathers and have to constantly expend energy to stay under. As soon as they stop swimming they pop up to the surface like a cork. The anhinga can stay under without effort as it chases fish; the only downside is it can’t fly until it dries out a bit.

On the last day of the trip Lee and I planned to spend a few hours at dawn in the wildlife refuge before driving back to North Carolina. We were late getting out to the refuge because Lee discovered the hotel had slightly overcharged him. By the time he got that straightened out the sun was already up. This turned out to be a good thing. For the past three days I had driven past a marsh with palm hammocks on my way to the refuge. This is the same place pictured in sunset light in the first photograph. The light before dawn at this location was not interesting the previous three days. But this time the sun was up as we drove by the marsh and the light shining through the early morning fog was spectacular.

Sunrise over a Palm Hammock

We spent a few more hours in the refuge and then headed back to North Carolina; on the way we shared another $5 foot long subway sandwich.

Accidental Abstraction

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For years I have been toying with the idea of making very abstract photographs. One thing that intrigues me about abstract images is how they free the viewer to imagine their own meaning. Also, I find trying a different style or subject matter teaches me things I would not learn from my usual photography. This photograph of storm clouds over Boundary Bay in British Columbia was one early attempt.

Blue

It was the color and contrast that attracted me to this scene. I used a telephoto lens to isolate the most interesting part of the sky and eliminate the horizon and any sense of scale. Although this is more abstract than my typical landscapes, it is still recognizable as storm clouds.

Another attempt at an abstract image was with a flame azalea flower. The stamens on these flowers are very long and extend quite far from the petals. I pointed a macro lens straight down the center of the flower with the stamens pointing into the lens and with the petals filling the background. A wide aperture resulted in a very shallow depth of field which rendered the petals in the background completely out of focus.

Orange

I did not want the details in the petals to show because I wanted to make this image more about the color than the structure of the plant. But the sharp focus on the stamens anchors this image in reality and tells the viewer this is a flower.

While these images are more abstract than what I typically create, there was something about them that did not sit well with me. I liked them but they were just not the abstract images I was after. I did not understand what I was missing until I had an interesting accident.

Back in June I was trying to photograph a plant in an open field but it was far too windy. In desperation I dispensed with the tripod since it does no good to hold the camera steady when the plants are swaying in and out of view. Instead, I hand held the camera with the fastest shutter speed I could to avoid camera shake. To improve my odds of a sharp, detailed photograph, I set the camera to allow the shutter to release only when focus had been achieved. Then I manually focused the macro lens to give me the close framing I wanted. My plan was to just keep trying to frame the plant as it moved in the wind and hopefully the camera would only fire when the plant was in focus. My plan worked, by the way, but that is not the point of this story.

While trying to get my body into position for this shot I must have had my finger on the shutter release because the camera suddenly went off. Some random blade of grass had passed through the autofocus sensor at just the right distance and triggered the shutter. You can see the point of focus near the center of the frame.

Green

Although I gave this image little thought at the time, something compelled me to keep it. Only now, seven months later, do I think I understand why. This is just the sort of abstract image I had wanted to make! I usually base my compositions on some unique character of the subject. My earlier attempts at abstract photography were still locked into this way of thinking. Even though they were more abstract than my usual work, the idea for the photograph was still based on something visual about the subject. This composition is completely abstract; it is not based on anything! Maybe now I will be able to consciously break out of my usual pattern and make an abstract image on purpose.

Red-cockaded Woodpeckers

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Red-cockaded woodpeckers are unlike other woodpeckers in that they build nest cavities in live pine trees. Other, seemingly more sensible woodpeckers excavate their nest cavities in the softer rotten wood of dead trees. It is difficult to build a nest cavity in a live pine tree, and as a result, young red-cockaded woodpeckers often stay with their parents for years rather than move out and excavate their own cavity. This means the parents have some help raising the next set of young, but it also means there are fewer birds raising their own families. These extended families often forage together, constantly calling back and forth to stay in contact with each other.

Red-cockaded Woodpecker

Red-cockaded woodpeckers prefer to build their cavities in old growth longleaf pine trees. These trees often have heart rot that makes the core of the tree soft and easier for the birds to excavate once they hammer through the hard, sticky sapwood. Old growth longleaf pine has all but disappeared from the landscape, making it difficult for these birds to find suitable nesting and foraging sites. With their preferred nesting trees all but gone it is no surprise that the red-cockaded woodpecker is on the endangered species list.

It might seem like these birds are making things difficult for themselves by insisting on nesting in live pine trees. This was a good strategy hundreds of years ago when the frequent fires that maintained the longleaf pine savannas would have burned away any dead trees. In just a few hundred years we have changed the landscape to suit our needs by eliminating fires and converting the savannas to other uses. Some animals have benefited from these changes; the red-cockaded woodpecker has not.

The beach is very different at night

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I was reminded how different my experience is from most of the visitors to wild places while waiting for the passenger ferry to take me to Hammocks Beach State Park. Several families were also waiting for the ferry. I could tell from the coolers, lawn chairs, and swimming clothes that they were going over for the day to frolic on the beach. They could tell from my backpack, tripod, wide-brimmed hat, long sleeved shirt, long pants, and hiking boots that I was not. One man asked me if I was going camping. I said “yes.” Then he asked his young son if he would like to go camping sometime. The son said, without hesitation, “no!” The father asked, “why not?” The son said, “There are spooky things at night!”

I had forgotten about that feeling of being afraid to go into wild places at night. I love wild places, and the night can sometimes be most impressive. When the sun is high at the beach, I struggle. The sun takes a lot out of you, especially when you have fair skin. My favorite time at the beach is when the sun is near the horizon or at night.

When the sun is near the horizon, it highlights the patterns formed by the wind on the sand. I have always been fascinated by these patterns. The same shape line will repeat over and over again but with slight variations.

Sand Pattern

The beach is very different at night. It becomes a soft and gentle place. Soft starlight is bright enough to see by when it is clear, and if you are far enough from city lights, the stars can be spectacular.

Beach by Starlight

Hurricane Hanna

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I recently returned from a backpacking trip to Panthertown Valley in the Nantahala National Forest. I almost cancelled this trip because Hurricane Hanna was forecast to pass right over the area while I was there. I realized several years ago there is always a reason to cancel a trip. If I am going to make photographs, I just have to go anyway. So I went, and the hurricane ended up arriving later and passing more to the east than forecast. I actually had beautiful weather the whole time.

On the last day as I was driving home, I stopped on the Blue Ridge Parkway to watch the sunset. I was amazed to see that I was right on the edge of the hurricane. Huge curving clouds from the spiral arms of the hurricane filled the eastern sky and caught the light from the setting sun. Being on top of a mountain is an exhilarating experience but to be on the edge of all that power was sublime.

The edge of Hurricane Hanna

I have always admired time-lapse photography but never gave it a try. This seemed like a good time to start. When photographing a sunset, I always make photographs over a period of time as the light changes. There is no way to know if the photograph you just made is going to be the best one or if the light will improve in a few minutes. This time I decided to make a photograph at exactly 30 second intervals so I could combine them together into a time-lapse movie. The movie compresses 20 minutes into 6 seconds. I think it came out okay for my first try.

Hurricane Hanna Time-Lapse

Flying Squirrels

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I visited my parents over the July 4^th holiday. As evening approached my father asked me to take down the suet feeder so the flying squirrels wouldn’t eat it all. I thought… “hmmm, what if I don’t take down the suet and try to make some photographs instead.” Once it was dark the flying squirrels came swarming in. The flying squirrels basically ignored us and flew right by your heads and scampered around on the nearby trees. They moved fast and it was impossible to compose a photograph in the dark. I mounted a small flashlight to the bottom of my camera (enough light to compose by) and used the autofocus assist light on my flash to help the autofocus track them. The light was too harsh coming directly from a flash mounted on the camera so I asked my father to give me a hand. I had him hold the flash about 5 feet to the left of the camera shot through a diffusion screen to soften the light. The diffusion screen was a 3 foot diameter disc made of thin white fabric. When the light from the flash is sent through this diffusion screen the subject is lit by a 3 foot diameter light rather than the tiny flash head. This produced much softer and more pleasing light and helped the flying squirrel fur look much softer.

My father and I quickly developed a procedure to help us get through all the steps required to make a photograph with this lighting setup. First, I would say “focus”, and he would point the flash autofocus assist light at the squirrel. Once I achieved focus I would say “diffusion” and he would raise the diffusion screen about three feet in front of the flash. Then I would say “eyes” and we would both close our eyes as I tripped the shutter and fired the flash. Closing our eyes was very important because most of the light from the flash was reflected off the diffusion screen right back into our faces. The procedure worked great except for one time when I was a little fast on the shutter button and fired before we could close our eyes. I just caught a piece of it in my peripheral vision but my father caught the whole thing with his eyes wide open. Oops, sorry dad! Our night vision was ruined for quite a while after that. This procedure only really worked when the squirrels held still for a few seconds which they didn’t do very often. Although I suspect they were doing it more often than usual as they tried to figure out what those silly humans were doing by the suet feeder.

Southern Flying Squirrel

Another universe

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Last month I went to Swift Creek Bluffs to see if I could find some salamanders to photograph. I don’t have much experience with salamanders, so I did not have much luck. I knew they layed their eggs in ephemeral pools. These pools dry up in the summer, so there are no fish to eat the eggs. I found lots of egg masses in the pools but did not find any salamanders. I spent the rest of the morning photographing wildflowers and ferns and then headed back to my truck. I often run into people I know here, and this time I bumped into “Rock” Turner. With a nickname like “Rock”, you might expect him to be either a brute or a geologist, but this guy loves reptiles and amphibians. You have to put his nickname together with his last name to get the joke. Oh, and you have to know a little about what is involved in finding these sorts of critters.

When I saw Rock I thought, “this is my chance!” I asked if he could help me find some Salamanders. He agreed with his typical enthusiasm. We found several slimy salamanders, but they did not want to be photographed. Then Rock came up holding a salamander egg mass. I had seen them just beneath the surface of the water earlier, but I never tried picking them up. Out of the murky water it was easy to see lots of interesting details and color. Looking into this jiggling mass of gelatin in Rock’s hands was like looking into another universe. I had Rock hold the egg mass in the sunlight as I tried to make a photograph. He did not get his nickname for being “rock” steady, and every little body movement was making the egg mass jiggle. He had to hold his breath and brace his arms against a log to try and stop the egg mass from jiggling. After a bit of effort, I was able to make a sharp photograph, but because I was looking down into his hands, I was not able to get rid of the sky reflected on the surface of the egg mass. Still, I liked the idea of the photograph and decided I would come back another day after I figured out how to solve the sky reflection problem.

Spotted Salamander Eggs

I came back about a week later thinking I would be able to do something similar and block the sky reflection. That trip was a total bust; nothing I tried would completely eliminate the sky reflection. I just could not get the image I wanted. I wanted the image to feel like you were in amongst the salamander eggs, like being in another universe. But as long as you can see the reflections on the surface of the gelatin, it gives you the impression you are on the outside looking in. Then I remembered the miniature aquarium I built.

Back in 2002, I was making photographs to tell the success story of the salmon habitat restoration work of the Alouette River Management Society. I wanted to make photographs of the young fry in the river as part of that photo essay. I spent a lot of time chasing those little fry with my camera under water, but they were just too small and fast to make a decent photograph. To solve the problem I built a small aquarium designed to keep the fry within the depth of field of my macro lens so I could get an up-close and detailed photograph. This little aquarium was made out of two 4 inch square pieces of glass and a piece of metal strap used to bundle lumber. I attached it all together with silicon adhesive. It cost me nothing to make since I had all these materials lying about. It worked great; the only difficult part was catching the fry. This photograph, by the way, has been published more than any of my other images.

Steelhead Trout Fry

Anyway, I realized that if I put the salamander egg mass inside the aquarium, I could shoot horizontally rather than down and eliminate the sky reflection problem. Also, by pressing the gelatin up against the glass, it would eliminate any hint of the surface of the gelatin and give the impression of being inside it.

Spotted Salamander Eggs

The last piece of the puzzle was the lighting. The ambient light was too soft and did not provide the high contrast I had seen that first day with Rock. I tried several different flash setups and decided the one I liked best was one flash from directly above. This gave the eggs a strong spherical shape and helped define the bodies of the young salamanders.

Spotted Salamander Eggs

What was I doing? Oh yea, spring ephemerals.

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Spring is here and the woods are coming back to life! Today I worked at Swift Creek Bluffs. I arrived early in the morning when the light was gentle. High thin clouds helped diffuse the light well into the morning. Spring peepers were singing, a downy woodpecker was drumming high up in the beech trees trying to attract a mate, several chickadees were busy excavating a cavity in a dead beech branch, and the ground was covered in spring beauties, trout lilies, and the first signs of many other early wildflowers.

There was so much going on I was having trouble focusing on my subject. Focusing my mind I mean, the camera had no trouble focusing. Good compositions don’t usually just jump out at me, I have to work at it. At some point I have to stop taking it all in and focus my thoughts on what I am trying to photograph. In this case, I was here to photograph spring ephemerals. Swift Creek Bluffs has one of the best displays of spring ephemerals I have seen in this area. I started to think,

“these plants emerge, flower, produce seeds, and disappear, all within a few months. They start growing earlier than most plants in the forest so they can take advantage of the abundant sunlight, moisture, and nutrients available at this time of year. Conditions will become much more difficult for them once the trees start producing leaves, creating deep shade, and absorbing much of the available water and nutrients. It’s an interesting strategy, although they still have to contend with cold, and there are not that many pollinators this time of year. These plants tend to remain very close to the ground where it’s a little warmer, and they tend to have showy flowers to attract the few pollinators that are out. Ugh! You see, there I go! Stop thinking about ecology and focus on what you are doing!”

Okay, after beating myself up for a minute, I finally found a nice trout lily, got the camera out, set up the tripod, and started to get down on the ground for a trout lily’s perspective. That’s when I noticed the poison ivy. Now, you have to keep in mind that at this time of year the poison ivy has no leaves, just little stems sticking up a few inches from the ground, and they were everywhere! They look harmless enough but I have learned from experience not to lay down on these, because if you break them bad things happen a few days later.

So, after awhile I found another nice trout lily, this time without any toxic neighbors. I got down on the ground, found a nice composition and started fine tuning it and working on the lighting. Finally, I was in the zone, time was flying, and I almost had a composition I liked. I did not even notice how uncomfortably contorted my body was as I struggled to look through my camera suspended just a quarter inch off the ground. And that’s when I saw it, coming right at me. It took a second for my eyes to refocus from looking through the camera to what ever this was. It was about 8 inches long, skinny, brown, and about 10 inches from my head and closing fast!

“Snake! Oh never mind, it’s just an earthworm. I didn’t know they made them that big! I can’t believe it can move that fast. Where is it going in such a hurry? Okay, what was I doing? Oh yea, I’m photographing this trout lily.”

Trout Lily