Photo Friday: Lightning and Thunder (And 300th Post!)Posted by drfl on July 30th, 2010

Besides being Friday, of course, today’s Photo Friday is a special one because it represents my 300th blog post!  I don’t plan on stopping anytime soon so to quote Buzz Lightyear, ”To infinity and beyond!”

Today’s post was taken the same evening as “Ominous Overhead“, a spectacular storm and subsequent sunset that had everyone in the city talking.  I managed to make it to the country, and watched the incredible lightning.  You could pretty much just point a camera, click the shutter for 20 seconds and get a spectacular show, it was that crazy.  This image is a single shot taken in rural Sarpy County in eastern Nebraska.  Another cool Midwestern storm!

Technical Details:
Canon 5D Mark II, 17-40 f/4l @ 17mm, f/9, 13 sec.
Rural Sarpy County, Nebraska

Photo Friday: Ominous OverheadPosted by drfl on July 16th, 2010

Since I’ve had a few weekly series of photographs, I haven’t had a “Photo Friday” in a while. On Wednesday we received an incredible storm followed by an even more incredible sunset. While I was unable to be out during much of either I did hop in the car for a jaunt out of the city. Here, the clouds were still picking up the red hue of the sun even after the sun had set 45 minutes prior.

Technical Details:
Canon 5D Mark II, 17-40 f/4l @ 17mm @ 21mm, f/9, 15 seconds
Rural Sarpy County, Nebraska

5 Arguments Against “Is That REALLY How You Saw It?” – #1: Are You Empathic?Posted by admin on June 11th, 2010

The best photographs are the ones that evoke emotions from the viewers.  No emotion, no connection.  The problem with photography is that it strips all the other senses from the image, leaving it a decidedly one sense experience.  No smell of the fragrance of flowers, no feeling of the wind whipping around one’s body, no evidence of the sound of water lapping at one’s feet.  As humans, we rely on all our senses to help build a scene, and as we experience the events unfolding before us, we develop emotions related to these events.  As photographers, we are in the thick, capturing images, all the while feeling these emotions.  The camera strips it all, except for sight.  As artists we must become cognizant of not only our feelings, but how to portray them within this confinement.  We must build the serenity, the joy, the sorrow, all the feelings that the scene invokes in us, into the image. 

Going back to the question posed for the week, “Is that REALLY how you saw it?”.  Perhaps, but the better question is, “Is that REALLY how you experienced it?”  Our experiences are what needs to be transposed to print, not just a stale, static scene.

At the beginning of the week I promised I would address how I feel the best way to handle the objections from viewers that question the validity of images.  Simple, I tell them “That is how I experienced it!”  If we can give our viewers even a glimpse into our emotions, our mind, then we have succeeded wholly as artists and that is the only answer that is needed.

Mass Believability? - 1 That must of have been an electrifying unreal experience!

Technical Details:
Canon 20D, 70-200 f/4l @ 91mm, f/5, 3.1 sec.
Omaha, Nebraska

Announcing “The Quiet Beauty of Nebraska”Posted by drfl on November 2nd, 2009

For the past few weeks I have been putting the final touches on my book “The Quiet Beauty of Nebraska”.  I’ve neglected my blog and some other duties, but I am finally ready to make it available.  Comprised of over 40 photographs from across the state of Nebraska, this book focuses on the scenic landscape, nature, and native wildlife that I have travelled far and wide to capture. 

To see a preview of the book and/or purchase, please take a look, it would make a great gift for the upcoming holiday season!
 

The Quiet Beau…

By Derrald Farnsworth…

Book Preview

Photo Friday – Tumultuous ThunderPosted by drfl on September 4th, 2009

A couple of weeks a nasty looking storm moved through eastern Nebraska which I tracked and realized that would hit the Platte River near South Bend near sunset.  I have photographed this location previously (Patterns in the Sandbar - More Nature Abstracts) and kept it in mind as there is a converted trussel that now serves as a footbridge across the river that would allow me to position myself anywhere above the water.  As the clouds and rain moved through I took several images attempting to capture some lighting in the distance.  This photograph was the best of the storm with a lightning strike, some blurred cloud movement, and cloud to cloud lightning resulting in some colorful light in the distance.

Technical Details:
Canon 5d Mark II, 17-40 f/4l @ 20mm, f/6.3, 30 sec.
Platte River, Nebraska

This image is available on my website at: Tumultuous Thunder – Storm and Lighting Over the Platte River, Nebraska

Photo Friday – Storms PassingPosted by drfl on August 14th, 2009

I’m going to be starting a new trend here on Traveling the Journey of Light, I’m going to post a new photograph every Friday.  While I will still post photographs through the week, I’m making sure that something new and visual shows up on Photo Fridays.

Today’s image was taken atop a hill in eastern Nebraska near Herman.  It was an awesome display of light as a storm just passed overhead as the sun was setting in the west.  I have seen many photographs of this day and people still talk about it in Nebraska as the quality of light was simply stunning.  Besides this photograph I captured two others of rainbows and a couple of the passing storm.  Nature at its most remarkable.

Technical Details:
Canon 5d, 17-40 f/4l @ 17mm, f/8, .4 sec., 3-stop hard Singh-Ray ND-Grad
Near Herman, Nebraska

This photograph can be viewed on my website at: http://www.journeyoflight.com/journey06/photo.asp?pictureid=StormsPassing&xmlfile=/journey06/xml/color/midwest.xml