Fishing and photos....

 We had a perfect day ... to go fishing. 

With Steve's help, we made it to Lee Lake in Cazenovia once more. And...the fish actually were biting. It was only the little fish, but at least the guys had fun deciding which one was going to be the BIG one.

It was a great day to take my Infrared Camera and more than one light spectrum filter. Below are the two guys deep in conversation...or they are just sitting quietly enjoying each others company. These two do chat but have long silences in between.

Some conversations start with ... Do you remember when....???  I listen intently to those stories because it is a history of things that occurred before I met Rich.

To think these guys are in their late 70's ... and have known each other since they were in their late 20's. 

Their friendship never ended but their lives took different directions with the two of them connecting up every once in a while.

Below...Steve tied a table umbrella to the dock so Rich can stay cooler in the shade. He thinks of everything!

Infrared Photo...

Bassy the stuffy fish did come along! Rich said she couldn't stay on the dock with them. He was afraid that she'd blow off as we actually had a breeze.

Cell shot....

The cool thing about Infrared is that you can get so 
many different looks with one filter. This
bench was filmed in the spectrum of

550nm.

This first shot is what it looks like

in camera. Startling blue foliage

and an orange hued sky.
Red becomes pink.

This is the black and white version. Basically I just desaturated the shot

and upped the contrast a bit.

The shot below is achieved by

what is called Channel swapping.
IR only picks up a few colors.

This is very hard to explain and it

is pretty technical.

I know that I enjoy the results.

The world looks foreign.

Here are a couple more views of the man made lake in Infrared using different light spectrums.

I really had fun with the Infrared camera. Hot sunny days are the best for using this camera.

Below are shots I did with my upgraded but not very fancy Google Pixel 9a. My 6a was on its last legs. What did surprise me [aside from the price] was the new ability of the camera to take 'long' exposures. So I went and tried it out by the Caz Dam.

I've been fighting off using my cell phone as a camera for a long time. But I can see its uses while hiking a long distance and not lugging along heavy camera equipment.

I did some other experimenting with a clearfield center diopter filter I found at a second hand store for $1. It was the filter I used in the very first shot which allowed the center to be in focus and the edges become blurred.

I can see where it will be very very handy in some toy photography.

This is the Lady of Pain from the Dungeons and Dragons collection. I thought she'd go perfect with a poison dart frog.

We had more adventures after leaving the lake. 

Eventually we did make it home safe and sound and tired out. But Rich and I are looking forward to our adventure next week.

Infrared in Winter?

 Are you nuts? Infrared is so much better in the summer. 

Except.

Sometimes I just think I like a challenge. I took a filter that I didn't like so much and a 25mm lens which is 'fast' so I could shoot in the low light that the weather had gifted me.

Here is an original shot and then the edited shot of the creek in my neighbor's valley.

The filter I used is a 590nm filter. The camera has been modified to be able to 'see' Infrared Light. Most cameras have a filter to shut that light out.
Shooting IR is pretty technical when it comes to finding a proper white balance along with something called channel swapping in post work.

I like both versions of this shot. It was certainly more colorful than normal color. [I hear that winter can be rather colorless...]

The bluish color in the first shot shows the plants that still have chlorophyll in them and they reflect light in a different way.

This time of the year can be a bit dull, so I figured I'd have some fun with the colors that we don't see with our eyes.

I even used the improper white balance for this filter to pick up a different type of color. Though, really I feel that it is up to the person with the camera to decide what they want to visually see.

What I saw through the lens:

And then my version of what I liked. In some cases, I like the odd blue above a bit better. 

How far can I push the illusion of what we can't see with our eyes?

Why not do this? It is like creating a fairy land.

The challenge just like any challenge in photography is to find an interesting composition or subject. And I had a particular tree in mind.

Charlie and I hiked across PeeWee's valley to a particular tree that has roots that climb the steep hill.

The weather was supposed to get gnarly around 11 or noon. The winds were to gust up to 50 mph and as the temperatures dropped, there was to be snow squalls along with some sleet.

Charlie and I headed back home before the bad weather hit.

And boy did it ever hit!

It was time to hunker down and drag out some things for the Christmas Chair. I going with the old Captains Chair this year. 

It was a good way to stay out of the bad weather and trees that might blow down.

October ...

Say goodbye to October.

The colors were incredible, the weather was quite beautiful but awfully dry. It was really a month to celebrate fall.

My camera was busy.

I hiked around our farm and sought out trails.

I enjoyed the beauty of golds, reds, and the colors of October skies. 

I watched wild life while leaning up against an ancient old oak. 

I listened to the birds chatter as they migrated through, stopping to rest in the yard and meadows.

I chuckled at the squirrels who scolded me from the Hickory trees.

I often sat quietly on the porch or a log in the woods, just to live in the moment.

and now we move on to the next chapter....

November....

Rest is nice....

 Almost a full moon!

And love is in the air!!!!

In fact, love is in the air so much, that he jumped the hot wire after the doe did and....he ended up chasing her through our front pasture and beyond the forest to the west.

Cold frosty mornings bring out the Rut Season and the bucks become mate happy. They can't help it. But it sure is fun to watch.

I stood behind a tree [wearing insulated coveralls, little gloves, hat, and insulated boots for about 40 minutes in the dark waiting for the first light.

I was rewarded with the following views.

I do this right up to the start of gun season in the early mornings and late afternoons. It is my quiet time, where I can sit or stand still and just be...

and watch wildlife....

Coyote visitor to our side/front yard while I was up at the neighbor's shooting the Northern Lights.

Back again...I wonder what attracts them?

However, it seems they don't go into the pasture as the mules would not tolerate their presence.

And then off again a couple of nights later. I changed the location of the camera and set it to a 10 second video along with 3 shots.

We'll see what the coyote is up to perhaps from a different angle. In truth, our land is 1/4 mile long but it is 500 deep wide. 

So they could just be going from the woods to the east to the woods to the west. Rarely do they track through the area where the girls are. The mules chase them and if they caught them, they could very well kill them.

~~~~~~

We've had 3 nights with temps below freezing so the hard frosts are here to stay at least until tomorrow. But the flowers are done, the leaves are dull, and the winds are picking up to blow them away.

Oh Fall Beauty, you were so fleeting but enjoyable!

Duck Egg walk... & Charlie

 Sunday was very windy and a bit chilly in the morning for those used to 80 degree weather. It was in the 60's when Charlie and I went to Duck Egg. Really, I don't know why it is named that, but it is a county park with a huge dam that was built ages ago to deter flooding from the Springville Branch of the Bad Axe River.

In the 1950's this Bad Axe branch wiped out most of a small town called Newton in a flood with a mere 4" rainfall that came down hard.

I chose to walk through lower Duck Egg because it is easy to get out of the wind while in the steep valley. I decided to go early in the day to check out the leaves and the light. That first shot is from the trail looking up at the west ridge above the valley taken with my cellphone. The colors look pretty flat but the light wasn't that great.

It didn't matter, the air was crisp and Charlie was having a ball. 

He does love cool morning walks.

Thank goodness he went up on the foot bridge where I could stand on the ground and get a ground level shot of him. He has 3 inch front legs. Seriously, how can he hike like he does?

The vet said to keep him active and let him be a dog and not a couch potato. Charlie seriously loves his cuddly blanket and snoozing on the couch.

He also loves snoozing on a chair we have for him. In the morning when hubby and I are having coffee together, Charlie jumps up here and curls up. 

The walk was quite nice. Not as nice as the spring walks I take there to find bluebells and so many other wild flowers, but still very quiet and pleasing. The winds whistled above us on the trail.

We eventually made it to the pond and I was surprised to see whitecaps on it. The wind was gusting so hard there were waves on the valley pond.

On our way back to the car, we encountered a young man carrying a bucket, a fishing pole, and to my utter surprise, what looked like an AR-15. 

"Holy Crap," I said to him, "are the fish so huge out there that you have to shoot the suckers???"

He laughed and said, "No. I'm going to catch some fish and hunt squirrels on my way back." He smiled and nodded at us and continued on. They make AR-15 style rifles that are .22 caliber. But I've squirrel hunted a lot and you don't need an automatic to shoot them if you are going to eat them.

I carried a single action bolt kid sized .22 when I squirrel hunted. Generally you only get one shot to get the job done.

I shrugged and kept my thoughts to myself.

I was out to enjoy the scenery and the fresh air and that is what we did.

Falling into Autumn...

 This is just going to be a few shots and not much else. Fall is starting to show up and I am spending time just admiring the sun angle and the deep woods around our farm and on local trails.

Charlie sitting on a bluff.

Hiking...at the Reserve...

The forest that surrounds us... I got stuck on stuck leaves!

Much of the canopy is still green but slowly turning and in places the leaves are brightly colored on damaged limbs.

Many leaves were slowly drifting down from above in the forest making a noise almost like a rainfall.

....

And then I was stopped by this.

Light, dark, shadows, yellows and colorful.
Everything we look for in Fall Colors. 

The color yellow

I thought that I'd go with another color. I picked a really difficult one.

Yellow.

This is one of the pumpkins that grew as a volunteer plant in the pasture. It isn't truly yellow, but it is yellow and orange. Maybe orange can be the next color I target.

I chose to go out very early in the morning and look for yellows. This was a very hard task. 
Below is a macro of a yellow cosmos. These cosmos are both bright yellow and tinted orange.

I took a shot of the seeds below. They are so easy to collect and then simply reseed anywhere. 

For years, I wasn't a fan of any yellow flowers. I avoided orange and yellow flowers in my garden but the colors have really grown on me. Next year, I think I'll be adding many more yellows. I'm eyeing marigolds. 

Below is a pumpkin flower.

This one decided to grow in and among my Nasturtiums. So far, this plant has provided us with 3 small white pumpkins. [I gave out as many extras as I could to the little neighbor kids for their fun]

Finding the color yellow got harder as I left the porch and garden areas. I went out to the meadow to see if I could find some Golden Rod.

Most of the Golden Rod was too faded to provide a colorful photo.

But...

The Orb Weavers were Back!

This one was wrapping up her breakfast which was a grasshopper she had captured. When I shifted my position to 'get' a better and closer shot, she left her breakfast and sat still on her web. She didn't drop off the web like others, but waited patiently for me to leave.

The second shot is the first one I took of her, it is a close up of her wrapping up her meal. Does the yellow and orange colors on her count as Yellow?

I don't really love spiders. I do appreciate the work they do. They are absolutely fascinating to watch. When I worked in Security, I recall the nights I spent in the guardhouse watching an Orb Weaver create the most beautiful web. She showed up each night for weeks. 

We called her Charlotte.

The fog and mist were lifting as I headed back towards the house. I saw the box elder showing off some yellow and headed out towards it. The box elders really put out the seeds this year!

I checked the old oak tree and found just one or two leaves that had color. They usually don't change first so I was surprised. The branches must be damaged in some way to produce dying leaves right now.

Sunday promised another HOT day and it produced it. By late afternoon, it was 90 in the shade and even hotter on our porch which gets full sun through the fall and winter.

This last shot was up through the old oak, I was going for a sun star flare and got one.

The yellows were hard! I need to walk up into my neighbor's woods where he girded some maples which are showing off some great colors right now. This week is going to be a hot one. 

Stay cool.