Whigg Meadow is one of the most breathtaking spots on the Benton MacKaye trail. Not that I would know, since I haven’t hiked the whole Benton Mackaye trail but someone said that about it in the New York Times at some point.  It’s a pretty nice spot anyway.

At about mile marker 6 on the Skyway there's a 2 and a half car parking lot and a sign that says “Mud gap trail” a short hike brings you to

 

this little hill with 360 degree view, from 4,931 ft. at the top.

And to the right of that tree down the hill is

 

this little pond filled with a bunch of cheerful frogs.

 

 

 

 

It’s a great place to watch the sun go down.

 

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Seeing a waterfalls like this makes it all worth getting up     

 

at some ridicules hour of the morning.

 

I didn’t see any fire and I didn’t see any gizzard. Where do they get these names? 

 

The morning light was too perfect.

 

I’m going to sound repetitive here, but the morning light Was Too Perfect.

 

By the cave entrance there were some icicles even though it didn’t feel that cold.  

 

1/250 sec      f/7.1   50mm    ISO 200

 

1/15 sec     f/16       50mm      ISO 200

Same falls just slowed the shutter way down.

 

1/4 sec   f/16   50mm     ISO-200

Made from 3 bracketed shots.

This waterfalls is off the Fiery Gizzard trail just before the Dog Hole intersection. Like I said, don’t ask me where they get these trail names!

Rhonda said there wasn’t any water flowing in July when she was there last, so in addition to the poison ivy being not so bad at this time of year there are also better waterfalls.

I remember the first time someone told me about HDR I was mildly interested but didn’t really know what the heck he was talking about.

Then one day I saw an HDR image but just thought the guy took amazing out of this world photos. Found out it was HDR and had to try it.

 

So I did. I was quite pleased with the odd ridiculous look and thought that’s just the way HDR looks.

Recently I’ve seen some very nicely done HDR that has inspired me to keep trying HDR.

 

I found the bracketing button on my camera and remembered how to use it. Set the timer to take 3 pictures so I won’t wiggle the camera pressing the button. I’m not going to tell you about the day it took me half an hour to find the timer or the family picture that I’m not in because I didn’t know where the timer was.

 

I made the HDR image and then just played around with the sliders until I thought I liked it. It looks kinda flat. Then I scrolled past the 3 presets it came with and something popped up asking me to load more presets. Load presets? I don’t have any presets to load. How do I make presets?

Off to Google I went. As it often happens I didn’t find what I originally set out looking for. Instead I found  a bunch of free presets from some generous person over at deviant art! Right there in the comments they told me how to install them.

 

The same image with one of the presets applied.

 

Whatever this preset is, it’s just what I was looking for!

Thank you The-Yard-Collective street photography club

 

1. To see the shades of morning.

 

2. To see the sun before it rises.

 

3. To walk out into fields and not care how wet the dew is.  

 

4. To have wet shoes and pants before 7am. 

 

5.  To try an HDR image.  

 

6. To take 4 pictures and learn how to stitch them together to make a panoramic.  

 

7. To Realize  that there are Two deer not just one right behind you and all the cars that stopped are not stopping to look at you and think you are cool just because you didn’t hit snooze at some ridicules hour this morning.   

 

8. To be wide awake and have the rest of the day in front of you. 

 

9. To just smile and say this world is a beautiful place.

 

Ten? Nope, there’s just 9 today. I got up early.

 

What is HDR? Well, it looks cool.
I know this much, I need three photos of the same thing

One under exposed

one over exposed

and one just regularly exposed. 

(To make this collage I used Picasa because it is SO easy to make a collage and it’s free) 
Then in Photomatix I select the three photos and tell it to align based on features, that  way if I moved a bit while taking my three photos it’ll do it’s best to line them up. It kinda stacks the photos on top of each other and then you can run these adjustments on how dramatic of a look you want.



A little over the top, maybe. I like it on this bus.I did a more subtle HDR on a waterfalls photo. I was inspired by some beautiful waterfalls photos nicely HDR-ed by a photographer from Nashville. Mine wasn’t nearly as nice as his
but I’ll keep working on it.

This looks like little gnomes might come hopping out any minute.
Or maybe trolls.