I took Allison on one of my father/daughter weekend trips just before school started. My next few blog posts will be highlights from that trip. We started off with Shenandoah National Park in Virginia. I was very disappointed – not by the park – but by the weather. It was foggy and rainy and visibility was minimal. I have read that the skyline drive is beautiful, but we really couldn’t see anything. However, when I started going through the pictures, I was pleasantly surprised. This won’t be your typical view of Shenandoah. But the foggy rain made for some very interesting and dramatic images. I ended up being very pleased with the results!
The image above was one of my favorites from the day. This looks black and white, but it's actually not. The fog was so dense that almost no color came through. I had a little trouble framing this the way I wanted it. The road is just to the right of the tree and below is a rock fence. I didn't want either in the shot so I had to get a little creative. This was shot at f/11 for 1/640 sec at ISO 800.
I framed this image above a little higher than normal because I wanted to cut out the road below. I was intrigued by the way the fog and light peaked through the trees. Tried this in both color and black/white - but really prefer the depth in the shadows that the black/white creates.
F/11 for 1/80 sec at ISO 800
The image below is the same general area - but this time I framed it with the road.
This image below was one of those grand vistas that I'm sure in better weather was beautiful. The best thing about shooting in weather like this is you are forced to think outside of the box. When visiting National Park's it's too easy to capture the stereotypical landscape shot - that in the end doesn't look any different than everyone else's. Since I couldn't see the landscape, I had to look for other interesting subjects. I particularly liked the flowers in the foreground with the dead tree almost silhouetted in the background.
f/11 for 1/1000 sec at ISO 800
We took the short hike down Fire Road to see a 300 year old barn.
The Rangers recommended the Stony Man Trail as a good short hike. We enjoyed it...and got wet!
This image below was technically just outside the National Park boundaries. The mountains in the background are part of the park (I think). This was one of those views that you see driving by and pull over to capture it. On a sunny day, I might not have even noticed this. But with the storm just clearing on the horizon, the old barn really jumped out.
This is an HDR (High Dynamic Range) - for those that don't know - an HDR is actually multiple images with different exposures merged into one. This allows for greater exposure depth in the image. I like the technique in images like this because you can see detail in the deep background, middle ground, and foreground.
