Photographing in Bryce Canyon National Park and Winter Fest 2011

The good people at Ruby's Inn, just outside of Bryce Canyon, are holding the annual Spring fling on February 18^th and 19^th. They have asked me to come out and present a wildlife photography class on Saturday night. I am really excited to join them this year and look forward to spending a couple of days in the Park, even though it will be very chilly. I hope to come back with some snow photos for you to see later this month.

There is no place better to explore the play of light on a landscape than Bryce National Park. You can photograph direct light, reflected light and even re-reflected light. Don't be afraid to use your telephoto lenses to isolate features that interest you. I hope to see you out there this year. Here are a few samples to whet your appetite.  Let me know if you like what you see.  It would be great to hear from you.

A little bit of Photoshop Lightroom 3 goes a long way.

There is no question that I love Photoshop Lightroom 3. There is just so much that you can do to improve your images. I find that I can come close to matching the image I produce with the image that I envisioned at the time I captured it.  I am not one who believes that you need to improve on nature necessarily but lets face it, no film or digital sensor can record what your mind sees when you look at a scene.  Similarly, any woman looks better with just a little make-up.  (Boy, am I in trouble now.)  In Photography, just like with women, the trick is to apply just enough enhancement that it improves the presentation but doesn't become the subject itself.

My case in point is this image of Cedar Breaks National Monument.  Cedar Breaks has got to be one of the most beautiful  locations in Utah if not the world.   Unfortunately, no film or sensor can accurately record the depth of color or the range in exposure that is available in each scene.  The human eye and brain combine to create and image in the mind that is impossible to record on any medium known to photographers.  However, with the use of computers and software, an image can be manipulated until it mimics what is seen in the minds eye.

below is an image that I captured this fall on a visit to Cedar Breaks.  It is not a bad shot but does not approach the vision that I had in my head.



Using Photoshop Lightroom 3, I was able to take this same digital capture, apply a graduated neutral density filter (darkening the sky),  turned up the exposure (lightening the rest of the photo), increased the saturation (deepening the colors) and vignette (darken) the corners a little.   The resulting image below is very close to what I saw, in my mind, when I walked up to the edge of the canyon and took in the beauty that was presented before me.

Let me introduce you to one of my favorite animals, the northern elephant seal

The Northern Elephant Seal is the largest member of the order Carnivora.  Males can grow to be over 20 feet long and weigh in excess of 10,000 pounds.  They are also the deepest divers of all air-breathing animals.  They have been documented to dive to depths of over 7800 feet below the oceans surface.  In order to accomplish this, they have developed the ability to hold their breath for over 100 minutes.



Elephant seals have physiological and anatomical adaptations that enable them to store oxygen for these long dives.  They have a much larger quantity of blood than can be stored in their arteries and veins.  This extra blood is oxygenated and stored in sinuses located in the seals abdomen.  When their body is in need of the extra oxygen, the stored blood is released into the blood stream and pumped to the muscles and tissues.



Elephant seals also have a compound in their muscles called myoglobin that allows the muscle cells to store extra oxygen.



Twice a year Elephant seals haul their huge bodies out of the ocean and onto the beach in order to breed and shed their old skin.  The skin actually dies as a result of being denied sufficient oxygen during long dives.  During these times the males have no chance to eat. Since most of their water is metabolized from the food they eat, they must conserve all the moisture that they can in their bodies.



The large trunk on the males actually serves to recycle the moisture from their breath as they exhale.  This moisture is captured in sinuses within the trunk and is reintroduced into the animals body.  All-in-all, a pretty amazing creature.



The molt is a great time to photograph these huge creatures.  I recommend going to Cambria, California in early June and spending some time on the beach near San Simeon.  There is a large colony there and the action continues all day long.  The angle of the sun is best in the morning as it will be over your shoulder instead of in your face.