Aurora and a traffic lit skeleton tree
From this late August Aurora Borealis storm, I leveraged the lighting spillover from late night traffic into the fields along Highway 8. Here, this weathered tree stood out from its neighbors due to the headlights passing by. The Northern Lights stayed low along the northern horizon and played a supporting role in many of the images I shot that night.
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Evening hawk in Autumn
Sitting here with several inches of snow on the ground it feels like autumn has passed by now. I hope it comes back but I found a few photos of this hawk.
I think it is a red-tailed hawk but it could be a Swainson’s. Either way it was beautiful and I enjoyed watching it on the fence-post for a couple of minutes before it took flight.
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The see saw between winter and spring has brought a full variety of weather from each. A couple of weeks ago, this storm rolled over the prairies west of Cochrane, the wind bringing rain that became snow later in the evening. At this point, a little after dinner time, the clouds seemed to be inviting the trees to dance. In my imagination, they appeared to be reaching down to touch them – extending a hand with the invitation.
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A raptor perched on an old house.
I had a beautiful encounter with a snowy owl on a barren hilltop near Namaka on Family Day. That was preceded by a mutual fascination that this juvenile prairie falcon and I shared for a long-abandoned house on the prairies.
I was driving the backroads after sunrise primarily to look for snowies. I like these drives on the winter prairie as the views are expansive and I always hope to see something unexpected. I had not visited this worn out farmstead before and I stopped to have a look. It was -27°C so I was content to take a couple of pictures out of the rolled down window – until I spied the falcon perched on the peak of the roof. Then I got out and walked slowly closer.
After 15 minutes, I was set up beside one of the sheds a little ways off from the main house. The falcon watched me approach but was more interested in scanning the field to the east. I kept my lens trained on the roof for a few more minutes until the bird launched.
It flew over the field and out of my view. I trudged back – it always seems farther and colder when returning from an encounter than it was getting there. My hands were happy to get out of the wind and I was happy to have some nice images of this beautiful, hardy bird.
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Here comes the sun…
As the eastern sky brightened yesterday morning, sunlight painted a line through a thin veil of clouds above the horizon. With the sun heralding its imminent arrival, I was happy to wait and watch it rise. A beautiful start to the day.
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A Black Diamond rainbow
A couple of weeks ago my son spied this rainbow as it arched out of a storm cloud rolling over the prairies east of Black Diamond. I am very glad he did!
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Snowy flight over the Prairie
I found this snowy owl perched along a forgotten fence line north of Lyalta (which is east of Calgary). After a trek across the field to get to about 60 meters away, I leaned against a post and waited. I set my exposure so that I would have a slower shutter speed at the start. I wanted to show some motion in the wings and estimated that 1/200th of a second would allow for that. Fifteen minutes later something drew his attention and he launched perpendicular to me and the fence.
I had two nice images of him flying towards the sun before he was past me. The first had a soft blur in the wings as they were near level. The other caught the wings at their full extension upwards. Both images kept the head sharp so luck played to my hand when I was panning with the bird. The shutter speed worked out well. I continue to try slower speeds but have yet to nail one of those with a sharp face. I will share those when I do.
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My favourite landscape photographs from 2017
It was fun to look back over the past year’s photographs recently and recall the story behind them. I’ve created a gallery of my favorite images you can check out here (or click on any image to open that page in a new window). I moved in new directions with my landscape work which, through trial and error, yielded some work I really like.
I practiced a technique where I change the focal length (zoom) the lens during a long exposure which creates a variety of effects that I have had great fun exploring.
I walked into some of my images, to provide scale in some and interest in others, which I want to continue to explore and build on. I also hope my children will join me for some of those in the coming year – if I can wake them up early enough!
I had a lot of fun scrambling around valleys and peaks in Banff and Kananaskis. I wanted to hike more in the warmer months and was happy with the images I made from those outings to new locations. I photographed through many nights along the lakes there and enjoyed seeing these amazing places under the stars. I have always loved the mountains and that love continues to deepen.
A trip to the Palouse in Washington in May was a definite highlight. The agricultural geometry laid over the rolling hills is beautiful. Exploring the area and searching for interesting compositions filled a long weekend and a couple of memory cards.
Excursions on the Prairies, searching for snowy owls in winter and a long list of other birds in the other seasons, were regular for me in 2017. These are often solitary travels for me and I find the landscape imagery often reflects that. Lone subjects, standing as islands on endless fields, stand defiant under the massive skies in one image and vulnerable in the next. I have much more that I want to create out there in this new year.
There were many pieces of last year that bring a smile when reflecting back. And a few that well some tears up. They combined to make for a good year. For me, this gallery reflects that. Thank you for following the visual journey I share here.
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An autumn sunset in the sky
The sky in late October near the Rocky mountains often serves as a fantastic canvas for clouds, wind and sunshine to paint as they mix, blend and tear apart. I live on the eastern flank of the Rockies and am fortunate to be able to see a fair number of these beautiful collisions. This one was just before sunset in the third week of October on a recently paved country road off of Highway 8 between Bragg Creek and Calgary.
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My first night with the Northern Lights this fall
September closed out with several strong Northern Lights displays that reached down to southern Alberta. I was happy to make it out to the Foothills to photograph in the middle of the night for two of them. These images are from the first foray which started around 11:30pm and continued rippling when I finally headed home around 2am on the 26th.
The clouds seemed to move in slow motion and picked up the glow from Cochrane differently as the night progressed. Above, the aurora’s color palette shifted into pastels. A few of the later images reminded me of cotton candy and were fantastic to watch slowly ripple then fade away. I imagined these were tie-dyed waves rolling in both over the pond but also the sky they were reflecting.
Ursa Major and its Big Dipper were constant companions in the sky behind the dancing lights. The stars would run in and out of the clouds, hiding at times and burning brightly at other times. There was good magic to watch throughout.
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A coyote’s stroll across the fields
The warm February in southern Alberta has melted most of the snow on the Prairies. This has made traveling over the fields much easier for wildlife. Over the past couple of weeks, I have seen deer, elk, moose and coyotes on the grasslands near my home west of Calgary.
This coyote was hunting a little bit as she paralleled the TransCanada Highway near Springbank. I hoped for a pounce but she was more focused on distance than hunger it seemed.
After she crossed an off ramp, she paused to stare in my direction before moving on.
I left at that point, not wanting to spook her and make her hurry across Highway 22. I stopped a kilometre or so down the road and watched her wait for a quiet moment. When that came she ran across the pavement and into another field.
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Fox kits playing tug-of-war
At one point when I photographed a family of foxes in May, there was a ragged piece of cloth which served for a long-running tug-of-war at one point in the evening.
These three kits were the main players and they alternated between 1 on 1 and 1 on 2 battles.
For a while, a fourth looked interested in joining but they didn’t join in for very long.
Christopher Martin Photography 