Tag Archives: star trails

art, photography, travel

preview: vermejo

i’m sorry for all of these “previews”, but i’m just very anxious to share some of my newest work before i have full posts ready.

as you may know from previous posts (see vermejo, nm, bear encounter: proof, vermejo again, and 4 weeks in vermejo), i have been blessed enough the last three years to have great friends and clients that hire me to go out to vermejo park ranch in new mexico for a few weeks every summer to shoot.  and last year, vermejo hired me to come out for another two weeks to shoot for them.

well this year is no different, and i’m back for two weeks in august.

i must admit, it is one of my favorite jobs of all time.  i hope it never ends.

so this year, with my new star picture obsession, i decided to try to capture the beauty of this place at night.

here are a few i shot last night…

i’ll share a lot more images when i get back.  the internet here is very slow.

all images © andrew r. slaton | photographer 2011

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art, photography, travel

wyoming: my remaining days (part 2)

i woke up to a very familiar view.

the night before, i finished working way too late.  so i had to stay at my “secret” campsite, that i learned last year is a very active wolf and bear area…

the last time my brother and i were here (see like brothers on a hotel bed), we could hear wolves howling just yards from my tent.

not a sound that lulls one to sleep…

but i didn’t hear that sound, or any for that matter last night.  i slept great.

so i decided to scout locations during the day for my night shots.

and again today, i tried to get some shots i’d never thought of…  tetons through a moving vehicle…

blurred motorcycle with tetons…

during the middle of the day, when the light’s not all that great for shooting landscapes, i figured i’d take a nap.

and when i woke up, the clouds were really starting to gather in dramatic wyoming fashion…

so, i set up again for the first of many star pictures.  i wanted to start at the north end of jackson lake again becuase i thought i could do better than the night before, and it’s the farthest location form all the others.

well, i didn’t do better.  it’s a beautiful shot, i think, but no star trails.  so i decided to move on.

oxbow bend is a really famous spot for photographers, and for good reason.  but i usually shy away from it because of the crowds and the sheer volume of great shots there are from that spot.  but, i’ve never seen a really great star photo from oxbow.  so i found my spot, and gave it a whirl.

oh, how utterly devistated i was when i got home and saw it on a big screen… BLURRY!!!  ugh.

something must have moved the tripod during the 40 minute exposure.  ugh.  it was so beautiful too…

oh well, have to try again in october…

the next shot i tried was another very famous, very overshot point.  snake river overlook.  once immortalized by ansel adams himself, this spot is photographed thousands of times every single day.  but i am unaware of any night shots there…

i loved the way this one turned out.  finally, one of the three actually went as planned!

the fog really started to roll in over the snake river valley.  haunting.  but i was sad not to be able to see the snake as it actually “snakes” it’s way through the frame from this vantage.  oh well, guess i’ll have to shoot it again in october!

then i just wanted a classic, uninhibited shot of the tetons.  this was probably the least dynamic of the successful shots of the night.

and then the fog started to roll in.  so i kept the tripod set, and continued shooting…

though i missed the first two and came away with only two total that i liked, it was a successful night.

i learned even more about making star pictures, and i also determined a few spots for the next trip.  i’m excited about october…

all images © andrew r. slaton | photographer 2011

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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

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art, photography, random thought, travel

new years: bongos and puke

elle and i went to inks lake state park near austin to camp for new years this year…

it was kind of a disaster.  some college kids pulled in next to us late the first night.  no big deal, i thought.  they’re camping for new years… i’m sure they’ll be respectful of our space and peace.  expectations crushed.

they were playing bongos until 5 0’clock in the morning.  awesome.

and to top it off, i must have undercooked our bacon wrapped jalapenos, because elle got violently sick in the middle of the night.

it was an interesting way to ring in 2011.

but, we still managed to have a good time, strangely enough.  and i get the feeling it’s a precursor for what the rest of our lives might be like:  shattered expectations, sickness, rude people, etc.  rolling with the punches.

in spite of it all, we enjoyed each other’s company, and were glad that we had one another with which to share this incredibly odd time.

here’s to 2011!!

all images and content © andrew r. slaton | photographer 2011

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art, photography, random thought, travel, writing

big bend birthday, year 2

if something happens at the same time two years in a row, does it become tradition?  could we say “our annual big bend birthday extravaganza”?  well, i’m going to.  starting now.

elle and i took our annual big bend birthday extravaganza a little early this year.  you see, some friends of ours decided to get married out in marathon at the gage hotel the day before elle’s birthday.  “great!” we thought.

another good excuse to create/ continue, a short-run, but beloved “tradition”.

“what do you want to do for your birthday?”  i enthusiastically asked elle a few weeks before her birthday last year.

“i wanna go backpackin’!”  she screeched back.

well, there aren’t many places to go backpacking in texas, unfortunately.  and my favorite place, big bend national park is about a nine hour drive from dallas.

so… in spite of the drive, we decided we would hike the chisos mountains of big bend (see sharing big bend).

this year, it really wasn’t much different.  her enthusiasm was the same; wide-eyed, youthful, jubilant.

the main difference was that we decided to wander the desert this time, instead of the mountains.

we camped at a bend in the river, so our view (even though camping in texas), we could see the rio grande, mexico, and then the chisos in texas.  it’s one of my favorite views in the park.  makes you think a lot about borders and survival, and how small we really are…

as night fell, the stars caught our attention.  oh the stars.

the next day we woke up and my front left tire was completely flat.  the road we were on claims many tires, and personally, it has claimed more tires (and cars for that matter) than i care to remember.  the river road.  it’s a 50+ mile long 4×4 “road”, if you can call it that in some places.

three years ago, my fourth vehicle found it’s final resting place on that road.  long story… i’ll tell the whole thing if you ask me.

anyway, back to the task at hand… i put the donut tire on, and we fled the chihuahuan desert to find a new tire.

we had fun on the drive to alpine.  elle was a belle about it.  even though it killed an entire day for us.

there may or may not have been a few swigs of wine on the way back from alpine, but i’ll never tell.

the next day we hiked into santa elena canyon, one of the park’s many popular attractions.

later that day, we also hiked one of the hidden gems of big bend, cattail falls.

and then later that evening, we did another short hike up the lost mine trail in the chisos.

that night we stayed at grapevine hills, just like we did the first night one year before.

it caused us to be a bit reflective, and think on the past year.  and laugh a bit at how far we’ve come together.

we had some dinner and some wine, and talked about where we are going.  love and marriage, etc.  life.  together.

we can do this.  life together.  some of it will be mountain tops, and some will be the lowlands.  but we seem to have a knack, and more than that, a commitment, to hiking through all of it together.  and i think that’s pretty stinking beautiful.

we woke up bright and early.

we had to leave that day to make my friend’s rehearsal dinner in marfa that evening.

but we had just enough time for one more hike…

our sojourn to balanced rock wasn’t very long but we took our time, it was beautiful.

winding through earthen spires of stone and sage and sotol.  the desert began to funnel us toward something.  neither of us had hiked this before though, so we didn’t know where or what.  but we kept going, though the landscape at times was eerie and foreboding.

along the way, ellie would jump up on the tallest rock around and scream with joy.

and that made me smile.  how couldn’t it?

and then we reached balanced rock.  it’s somewhat of a big bend cliche.

but then again, aren’t cliches cliche for a reason?

it was really amazing.  like the stonehenge of the desert, though clearly not human-born.

massive boulders balanced perfectly with one another for centuries, millennia.

resting on one another.  creating something good.  awe-inspiring.

all images and content © andrew r. slaton | photographer 2010

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