Out and about

Charlie and I went for a nice long hike on Saturday. I took my converted Infrared Camera but took the filters off from it.

I thought it would be interesting to see how it photographed without the nm spectrum filters on it. I used the snow to get a white balance. I like how the snow is white and the shadows are cool while the trees, bark, and foliage has a slight red tint to it.

That said, the lighting was different too. The camera was able to take in much more light than any normal camera.

Parts of the creek were frozen. These little strange holes were in the ice. I have noticed them several times in parts of the creek. I looked up Ice Stars and got a lot of different information about them. I know they appear in the creek after rain/snow/freeze/and more rain and snow and freezing. I always assumed it was because this part of the creek had water flowing up from tiny springs below.

These little ice stars only form in this section of the creek. Odd but interesting!

The water flows pretty easily a bit further downstream as more tiny springs add to the small creek.

I enjoyed just walking along and looking at the shadows on the snow and the reflections on the water. The wild life hadn't been moving across the area much and most of the snow was still pretty smooth.

I imagine on Sunday, that will change and the wildlife will be out feeding before the next weather system moves in Sunday night.

We are to get up to an inch of rain Sunday night and Monday. Heavy rain on top of the snow and ice we have will create some flash flooding and a hard run off of melting snow.

Thankfully, I don't have to go anywhere and I can hike down to the creek to watch the run off.

Charlie enjoyed our Saturday hike.

Infrared Day

The Meadow - not in infrared. 

This is the area I'd like to be able to clip in some fashion. 

I just don't see that happening for me. At one time hubby would clip it with his tractor and brush hog.

In other places where I'd knocked down the burdock and sourdock, the motherwort is flourishing. 

I just can't win!

This scene is peaceful and calming.

It was too hot to do a lot of things outside. I usually clip the herds' manes by this time of the year, but I'm going to wait for my 'farm' help to do that this coming week. Charlie was nagging me for a walk so I headed up the driveway with just the Infrared camera.

Driveway: 665nm Filter

While hot days with a midday sun are horrible for most photography, those are the prime conditions for Infrared. Different filters with different wavelengths of light give different looks. 

Charlie was very unimpressed with the heat and hot sun. I thought I'd cool him off by heading into the forest...

Charlie in Infrared. Zombie Dog!

Infrared does some weird stuff to the eyes of people and dogs! They look really odd.

I gave Charlie a ride back to the ridge and started home.

This was neat in IR but I sure liked it in Sepia black and white better.

Neighobor's Vintage Tractor. 

He has put it up for sale.

I dropped the Hot Dog off at the house with hubby. They proceeded to watch really old strange Westerns on TV. I am not into blurry crappy movies at all. 

I grabbed a 720nm filter from my pile of ancient filters I had. I wanted to experiment and enjoy the summer day some more.

The herd under one of the boxelders they love to use for shade. I took this shot in Infrared with a 720nm filter which turns anything with chlorophyll in it basically white. 

Infrared is fun to experiment with. Thank goodnes
the mules didn't appear to be Zombies!

The 720nm filter will produce white leaves and blue sky
if you have a converted camera and use the green grass to set
your white balance.

Weird, right?

I got mesmerized by the backwards light of things. The dark greens I saw with my normal vision were bright white while the trunks and branches of the trees were dark and moody.

I got caught up in gazing up at the branches into the light. I shot a lot of photos more for the dark patterns of the branches than for anything else. 

Most of them didn't turn out as I 'saw' them in my mind, but it was fun to see the intricate patterns of the leaves and the branches.

Infrared offers so many possibilities in a creative way.

Locust tree budding out next
to our house. Those are leaves
not flowers.
The flowers will come in a few
days.

Yes, I do experiment a lot. It is the one thing I am passionate about. Monday was just a great day for it.

Playing with color

I was feeling antsy and decided to walk to the ridge before sunrise on Friday. I did notice that a very light Hoar Frost had settled on the trees along with a low lying fog.

Taken with my unmodified camera. ")

Some wind blew as I passed the neighbor's yard and frost dissipated everywhere.

I'm just not able to help myself. I took the Infrared camera along with me.

I can't stop being curious about how things would look in a different light. I keep thinking that if I keep at it, I may even get proficient at it in all situations.

Seriously, I do not know exactly why certain colors show up. Items that reflect a certain kind of light appear a certain way. I can't explain it very well without referring to a long drawn out article on what spectrum the human eyes see and what we can't see.

In the 720nm spectrum, green leaves become white and the sky becomes very orange.

This is shot in the 665nm spectrum. 

I used a method called channel swapping to achieve these colors below.

The reddish tint on the trees can be yellow, reddish, or desaturated to be white.

And in the other direction...I removed the color in the trees but kept the bluish sky.

Have you gotten tired of Infrared? Two more samples from late afternoon.

This is with the 550nm filter. I haven't gotten the hang of it quite yet and I find I don't like it very much. The photo that comes out of camera is absolutely ugly.

I've did the channel swapping and the it still was horrible. More than likely it is because there isn't any bright green leaves, pines, or water to really make this sort of workable. Ick.

Edited to black and white, I find it somewhat pleasing, especially the sky.

The old car in the run off ditch is rusty colored but I sort of like this after I balanced the snow to pure white.

I went to black and white with this also.

And I loved it. The details in the rust came out like magic in B&W.

So maybe this filter isn't so bad as it shows variations in tone nicely.

Last year I did have one great day with that filter at the KVR big pond.

The thing I like about IR is there are no rules of color. It is like giving a kid a box of crayons and telling them to go wild.

...

Stay tuned for Dragons.

And a Foggy walk in IRChrome.

Teddy Tea Party and Infrared Fun

Hmmm. I was going to start this particular entry with something on the lines of Deep Thoughts. Nah. 

I'm just going to have some fun here. I had a notion that it would be fun to go out on the cropland with Charlie and have a Tea Party with my Creek Teddy Bears. I grabbed Percy and Chance. I've had those two since 2018 and the Big Floods. I did find Percy 1/4 of a mile downstream in one of the first floods.

August 2018
After I found Percy...

Now my Teddies stay on the porch unless I am going to take them out for Tea or some other playtime. Looking for them after the flood was pretty distressing. I mean come on, I felt responsible for them!

These two even got names. Percy and Chance. Perseverance and Second Chance.
Dumb, I know, but I thought they earned it after surviving that flood and being found again.

Chance...scrunched into a pile of debris further down the valley.

August 2018

I have another Bear. He is larger than the other two. I really love his fur. This bear looks so lonely all of the time. Not sure what name to give him.

There, I got sidetracked again. 

There is an area in the cropland that is an 'island of box elder trees'. The neighbor kids call it The Tunnel. I wanted to take the Teddies there. Sometimes I have an idea in my head and I just need to try it out.

I grabbed my Tough TG6 camera and the little Infrared Camera. Why not? I had a satchel of Teddy Bears and tea cups. I really didn't want to carry much more.

Heading up the neighbor's driveway to get out to the cropland.
Infrared with Charlie in the road.

I couldn't resist trying the Infrared camera. I used the 665nm filter. IR works better when there are leaves on the trees. But I find colors still interesting with a channel swap in the winter. The oak leaves and some of the branches still reflect enough light to make things interesting. 

Below, original shot before

channel swapping

with my shadow.

One of the things that IR does produce in the winter months is stunning black and white shots. The light refraction is pretty cool.

The Tunnel

We haven't had new snow in over a week now, so the deer and other creatures have left the snowy fields full of tracks.

Oh what do I see? 

Bears in a Tree!

And yes, we do actually have a real bear or two around the area as well as many other forms of wildlife.

But these Bears aren't so Wild.

They like having Tea in the oddest of places.

This lonely Teddy was waiting for someone to show up. 

All alone in the field.

I think I'll bring Chamomile Tea in a thermos next time and sit with him.

Color my world.

Oh not the song!

I recieved my 550nm filter on Monday and have trying it out in all sorts of lighting circumstances with the full spectrum conversion on my Olympus camera.

Infrared Photography let's me explore a different light spectrum than what the human eye can see.
Our eyes see green from the reflection of light. All of our colors are seen that way.
Okay, that is not a scientific explanation, but it is the best I can do in layman's terms.

Different spectrums allow the camera to see light reflected differently. The above shots appeal to the kid in me who still believes that a person should be able to color their art in any way they want to.
How fun is it that the leaves and grass turn out red?

Another question.
How will these look in the fall? As the chlorophyll is no longer produced in the trees, the absorption/refection of light will change too.

We see leaves as green because of the absorption by chlorophyll of the red and blue light wavelengths.

Okay. Enough of that.
If you want to read more about Infrared Light and Photography here is the Link:
Introduction to Infrared Photography.

All I know, is that I am having a blast.

Here is a shot with a 665nm filter.

665nm Filter unedited version

The light was poor and I took my white balance off from the dirt at my feet. A storm was coming in quickly so I had to work fast. I call this tree my Lolipop tree...well for obvious reasons. I thought it would be interesting to take the same shot with different filters.
Same shot now edited with what is called a Channel Swap of Red and Blue:

Last night I pulled out my Hoya R72 filter and put it on a different lens. White balance changed according to the grass at my feet.

I did a quick channel swap with this filter and got the shot above. I was really excited as to how the sky appeared behind the tree. To my normal eye it was blue but the clouds were not distinct like they are in IR.

I could have probably pulled some more yellow into the foliage of the trees, but I really like the way it turned out.

Then another shot with the 720nm filter on the Canon ELPH pocket camera that was converted. Same tree, morning light and fog.

The shot above is still one of my all time favorites. So otherworldly and dream like.

The twisted tree, yesterday with the Hoya R72. Again, the pale blue just appeals to me.

Then a few more experiments in the 550nm filter from my hike in the woods with Charlie and Sven. I found that in shady areas the shots would work for black and white conversion, but not very well for wild colors.

I did however have some luck with the elements, of sky, leaves, water, and grass.

For me, the wild colors are exciting and fun.

Oh I still do regular photography. I still love it.
But I have so much fun exploring the non visible spectrum.

This morning in fact I found out that little tiny Charlie could follow me on my bike.
I have to wait for him, but he sure was up for the pre dawn bike ride this morning! 
So many smells!

And for the parting shots.

IR 850nm. Used for stark black and white photography.

I took these on Monday night as the storm blew in.

Last word.
Many of my shots this week didn't turn out. I was simply experimenting with angles.
Can I shoot towards the sun? Not well.
Can I shoot at 90 degrees? Not so bad.
Shady? Good for black and white contrast.
Water reflections? Neat, but not always.
Overcast? Less color.
White Balance? Adjust often and know which color to balance off from. 665nm, 550nm balance off from grey, but you can use concrete or sometimes in my case..light colored dirt.
The higher ones? White Balance off from foliage.

What will happen in the winter? Ahhh, at least there are pine trees for the green!