art, photography, travel

wyoming: my remaining days (part 1)

after elle left, i still had a few days to “work”.

i put work in quotations because most people with think, “work??  you call that work?”

well, yes i do.  but i sure do love what i do.

i hung around teton park for the next few days… capturing some old familiar scenes, and looking for new, unique angles.

just before dusk the first night, i came upon a bear jam!

it was a gorgeous adult female.  she checked me out for a second, then continued rolling around in the tall grass.

that evening, i perched myself at the north end of jackson lake to capture my first of many star pictures that night.

i have sort of become obsessed with night time landscapes.  partly because they are so haunting and beautiful, but also because i never really know what i’m going to get.  i’m getting more and more experienced with them, but there’s no way to ever really know what your sensor will record.

variances in the season, position of moon (or lack thereof), light polution, human light sources (i.e. cars, campfires, flashlights, etc.), clouds, etc, all can be major factors in your final outcome.  of course, the time of exposure, aperture, and film speed are all very calculated.  but so many factors go in to how i determine the exposure.  and then of course just the planning during the day to find the right shot.  it’s kind of hard to properly frame a shot at night…

anyway, i worked well into the night.  each shot was at least a 30 minute exposure.  then you add in the drive times between locations… it was a long, but fruitful night.

with the three shots from this night, i was hungry for more.

i would shoot at least that many again the next night.  this time at new locations.

i decided that i have shot enough up here during the day… now i’m going to focus on my night shots…

all images © andrew r. slaton | photographer 2011

Standard
art, photography, travel

wyoming: day 5

elle doesn’t have the flexibility of schedule that i have, so her time up here was short.

we had to start heading toward jackson, where she would fly out early the next morning…

we hung around teton park for a while.

then i received a stern “talking to” for some reason i can’t remember… but i bet she can!  haha.

we stopped on pacific creek road and took a nap while the afternoon showers passed.

then we decided to go for a short hike.  it was a section of the jenny lake trail that we hiked last year the day before she had to leave.

we took a spur trail off the main, and found a fantastic overlook that elle said was her favorite view of the trip.

so we thought we’d see if we could find that spot again, and enjoy the view before she had to go…

sure enough, we found it.  no more than a 30 minute hike in too… great!

she looked out at the landscape, but this time didn’t cry.

last year when we were here (see “somewhere in the middle of montana… err… wyoming“), we weren’t engaged yet.

poor girl didn’t have much to lean on regarding us.  but this time, we’re married.  and i know she realizes that we’re both in this for the long haul.

and probably the only perk for marrying me, is that you for-damn-sure will get to go to wyoming… a lot.

so she knows that this is not the last time (by a long shot) that she’ll look out over this view…

and i am comforted to know that this is not the last time that she’ll be by my side up here.

seeing what i see, and reveling in all this raw, untamed beauty.

all images © andrew r. slaton | photographer 2011

Standard
art, photography, travel

wyoming: panorama

i just finished a few panoramics from the trip, and thought i’d share…

the green river drift… my elle’s in there somewhere amongst all the cows and dust.

the view from my favorite campsite, upper green river valley.

beaver park, near the base of squaretop.

afternoon shower brewing in the tetons.  taken from the jackson lake dam.

side view of the tetons and jackson lake.

the winds river mountains from soda lake.

all images © andrew r. slaton | photographer 2011

Standard
art, photography, random thought, travel

wyoming: day 3 & 4 (a full-fledged squaretop obsession)

i’ve been admiring this view for quite some time now. if any of you know me, and/ or my work, then you’ve seen countless images of this mountain. i just can’t get enough of it.

i think Elle is under the impression that i might try to name our firstborn son (or daughter for that matter) squaretop slaton. that’s not the case… entirely.

but just as the title of this post suggests, i am a little obsessed with this giant slab of granite. at least photographically.

and for those of you that might be curious to know… yes, every single photo in this post has the distinctive profile of squaretop in it, except one.

so we woke up in my favorite campsite again… this time with some nice, dramatic clouds over the winds.

the green river was running high but glassy.

we decided to do an overnighter into beaver park… wait for it… at the base of… wait for it…. SQUARETOP!!

so we set off, with the handsome mountain (as i often call it) as our prize in the distance.

squaretop from the upper lake with an afternoon shower imminent.

the green was overflowing it’s banks at beaver park.

we set up camp very near the base of the mountain. the whole time, i was looking for just the right spot to shoot a star picture that night… think we find the right place… but i would have to wade out into the frigid overflowed green to get the shot i wanted.

the moon was out and slowly moving it’s way right over the plateau of squaretop.

elle enjoyed a front row seat as the moon jostled into position…

it was a spectacular sunset. couldn’t have asked for a prettier evening to spend with my best friend.

oh yeah, and my wife. haha, just kidding honey!

elle and i sat by the fire, under the light of the moon and talked about everything.

i really am lucky… my wife really is my best friend.

squaretop is only a lagging second.

and then, as elle fell asleep, i trudged out into the barely-above-freezing river, and planted my tripod for this 30 minute exposure.

it’s one of my favorites from the whole trip. that’s a pretty good looking model… i couldn’t have screwed that shot up if i tried!!

we woke up the next day with our quiet friend looming over us…

it’s hard to decide whether i like morning light or evening best on squaretop… or even just moonlight…

i guess i just like it all. like i said, i’ll never get sick of photographing the work of art that is squaretop.

we just had to get one last photo with our friend.

sort of felt like an awkward family photo with a shy uncle that just kind of hangs in the back of the photo not really connecting with anyone, unsure of whether he’s even in the shot or not, deer-in-headlights look on his face, and no one that’s actually in the shot smiling, even realizes he’s back there. you know?

but we knew. and if we had had big enough arms, we would have gladly pulled him in close and included him.

then it got creepy… he just stared at us as we kissed…

farewell old friend! i hope to see you again soon… perhaps october…

all images © andrew r. slaton | photographer 2011

Standard
art, family, photography, random thought, travel, writing

wyoming: day 2 (riding the drift, etc.)

we woke before the sun came up… it was a big day.  i made some coffee and we set off to meet Mike and Ellen at kendall bridge.

from there we would follow the horse trailers towards union pass, then off-road in the direction of a cow camp near a bend in the green river.

we finally stopped.  all in all, there were 4 or 5 trailers and about 8-10 cowboys/ cowgirls.

Mike helped saddle pistol pete for Elle, and they were off!  riding the drift…

my Elle was kind of easy to spot with her sombrero and bright green patagonia jacket…

the two Ellens riding together…

now that’s some real cowboyin’!

can’t have a true cattle drive without the iconic western dust haze backlit by a slowly rising sun!

so they rode off deep into the sunrise… and Mike and i decided to go look for bears, like we’ve done so often the last 6 years.

good ol’ squaretop… such a handsome mountain.  i really don’t think i’ll ever get sick of looking at and photographing it.

we ended up seeing more dogs that morning than bears.  and i saw my first ever river rafting dachshund!

the Ellens finished their cattle drive early… round about noon, and my Elle was exhausted.

so after eating a little peanut butter and honey tortilla lunch, she caught  a nice afternoon nap.  much needed.

Mike and Ellen came back again that evening to have dinner with us.  we took a few more campfire photos… like we did the year before.

Elle got a really cool shot of me…

then i got a shot of her, and made a ghostly appearance in it…

and then i got to shoot another squaretop star photo.

it was another great day in our favorite place in the world, doing all sorts of fun things.

man, if you ever hear me complaining about anything at all, just punch me right in the jaw.  seriously.

all images © andrew r. slaton | photographer 2011

Standard