Another photo taken while driving with my iPhone…of course I wasn’t driving. I enjoy this type of landscape, barren but every once in a while something cool pops up!
Another photo taken on the drive home of two of my favorite subjects, clouds and trees…
all in a row…
If you know me at all you know I love trees, especially “naked trees”…without leaves of course! This was taken while driving on the way home from Florida…fyi…I wasn’t driving! A crisp cold morning, brrrr. There is a bit of dirty windshield showing up on the right hand side but I really liked this so excuse the dirt!
A belated Merry Christmas to those who celebrate…this photo was taken Christmas night from my daughters balcony. It was taken with my iPhone as I forgot my camera!
a blustery day
cold wind biting deep
taking the longing to sit!
where is spring?
How has your spring been so far? Ours hasn’t arrived yet…check out our snow banks! As I am writing this it is snowing, in the morning the temperature is supposed to be -26F or -14C with the wind chill! …could be worse right?
more sunsets…
It is interesting how I’ve not seen the sunset for months and recently I’ve been able to capture it three times..awesome! This one wasn’t as intense as some, but then it was just setting, I find the colors more vibrant a short while after the setting…didn’t stay around to see what happened that night as I wasn’t dressed warm enough!
This photo was taken a few weeks ago right after a warmers spell…you can see the ridges of ice that built up due to the winds and then colder temperatures…makes for dangerous snowmobiling and walking…
sunset anyone…
Took this photo with my iPhone 6 last night…began using the phone Friday evening so don’t know what I think about it yet…made sure I found a solid clip on case as I have a tendency to drop my phone. One shattered screen is enough! As you can see we have snow again…it is cold today so it just might stay for a while this time!
“freezing fog”…
Photo was taken from my back deck(gray-scale)…it is somewhat foggy outside…which is creating “freezing fog”…http://www.theweatherprediction.com/habyhints/359/ As you can see, the needles on this tree are weighted down…
strange season…
The majority of snow is gone…for now… but we are left with ice build up along the shore line…this has been such a strange fall weather wise. I know we aren’t the only place to experience such unusual weather patterns, just stating a fact. This was taken around 4:30pm yesterday…it was foggy over the water but not so much over the land, made for interesting photos.
This ice build did not melt and will make for difficult walking and snowmobiling once we get more snow, but is something that is beyond our control and happens often as the winds are strong off the lake…
winter is here…
It snowed all day Sunday…on and off since…not heavy but steady, is expected to continue the rest of the week! As you can see I didn’t get around to putting away the table and chairs…
flowing…
I had the chance to take a few photos last week…thankfully we have lost most of the snow we accumulated in the mini snow storm we had last week…but the lake still looks very solid…no dark patches at all yet, so it will be sometime before there is open water!
This creek is certainly running fast…hard to tell from my photos though…
cobalt blue & pine trees…
this is one of my neighbors garden areas, a bit of a hodge podge, but I’m fond of the cobalt blue flowers. I’m hoping to be able to do some planting this year?!
this photo is one that I took from my moving vehicle, I rather liked the scene…I know it is a bit blurry but I think it looks like a painting rather than a photo…
snowy day…
We got up to a snowy day on Saturday…wasn’t supposed to be but “surprise”! It was snowing and blowing on and off all day.
Did I mention it was darn cold a well? This street is one over from Lake Nipissing…couldn’t get to the public access anymore as the snowbanks are too high!
This coming week is supposed to get colder again! Both these photos are color but with the blowing snow they almost look B & W.
winter…
In the spring, summer and fall this is a beautiful park area beside Lake Nipissing…it is still beautiful but rather stark with the snow…when I was a child this was a busy happening place. Not so any more, I visit once in a while and there are rarely any people swimming here. Rather sad actually that such a great park isn’t utilized much…although we have a few that aren’t being used a great deal.
red barns…
In November I went to Sudbury with my son and his wife and of course along the way I took photos from the moving vehicle…so keep in mind all these have been taken from a moving vehicle… Some of you will know I have a thing for old buildings, barns, vehicles, etc., when I looked over these photos I realized I’d captured a few red barns…you can read here http://home.howstuffworks.com/question635.htm why barns were painted red originally and why the tradition continues in some cases. 
I spotted this yesterday afternoon…not sure what it is all about as I don’t visit this area much…I was up a slight embankment and couldn’t walk down to look at the plaque beside it as the snow was too deep. I’m thinking it is some kind of beacon, totem pole, but honestly don’t know what or why it is there. I will find out eventually. The triangular shaped top looks like green glass. I did it in black & white as some areas of the snow and clouds were just too blue and I couldn’t eliminate it in Photoscape…notice the ridges behind it, they are all along the shore line but the rest of the ice as far as the eye can see looks fairly smooth…I’ve not heard if the ice is safe enough to venture out but I did notice a number of people taking ice huts out so I’m hoping so!
bumpy ice…
it has been warmer the last day or so, in fact it is sunny and -4C right now, so it that keeps up hopefully this will melt and smooth out! I could wish for lots of snow to cover this but the solid pieces could be dangerous…I’d rather it melted. This makes for difficult walking, cross country skying or snowmobiling when the ice is thick enough! It is NOT thick enough, we haven’t had enough cold weather.
frosty…
This was taken on Friday morning as well…the trees did look beautiful. The clouds were rolling in fast as you can see behind the trees…
I’m sure most people would think this photo was taken in the country somewhere…but what is on the other side of the red roof buildings is Lakeshore Drive, a busy road in North Bay…there are many areas along Lake Nipissing that look like this…this was taken from Sunset Park looking east…while the bay is open there is a very thing layer of ice on the water…
I know this is a rather simple photo of pussy willows, but I have to say this was a huge surprise to me…the tree had to be 8 or 9 feet tall…very scraggly with only the buds you see in this photo…I didn’t know they grew that tall…
anyone who visited in the winter time saw my post regarding the snowmobile “drag races”, well this is what is left of the drag race track…you can still see the banks on either side, showing the location of the track…
experimenting…
I visit a number of photography blogs and every now and then I’m inspired to try something different with the processing of the photos. I’m limited to some extent with the programs I have, Photoscape, and Picasa…I also have gimp but I’ve not taken the time to get into it. recently I”ve seen a few blogs who are using some form of HDR effect, which I rather like so I checked Picasa and it has a setting called HDR-ish…so I gave it a try with a couple of my photos…if you’ve been visiting for awhile you will know I’ve a thing for gnarly, naked trees…the waterfront on Lake Nipissing offers a few great ones due to the very high winds blowing regularly in the area…below is the original photo.
below I’ve used the HDR-ish setting…
of course this one is a simple black and white…more dramatic…
this one is black & white with HDR-ish used…
reflection, Mallard, floating
I went back to Sunset Park yesterday…I wanted to see if there were any changes since Sunday…not much really, with the exception of more snow piled up on the small islands off the shores of Sunset Park. I rather liked this piece of ice floating along…
on my way home I stopped at the Eva Wardlaw Conservation area…the creek flows into Lake Nipissing…it was like glass yesterday…allowing for interesting reflections…
saw this Mallard Duck come out of the culvert and swim along towards Lake Nipissing…he didn’t appear to care that I was there, although he did make sure to stay close to the opposite bank…I saw a number of Mallards at Sunset Park but they didn’t like me around and quickly flew away…
spring is working on it!
here are a couple more of the ice breaking up…all were taken on Sunday. this is facing the area/bay where I grew up, if you look closely you will see a water tower above the tree line on the left just past the clump of trees in the foreground. my home as a child is to the left of that…I know you can’t see anything but this may help visitors understand why I love the water so much!
I like the dark and light of the pieces of ice…some pieces are more saturated with water than others…I heard on the news last evening there is a possibility of flooding on Lake Nipissing…they feel it could reach flood levels by the weekend…
some of you may remember I shot a photo from a similiar angle in the winter…looks different…I’ll take another when the grass is green…
more winter photos…
this was taken yesterday…the wind was bitterly cold, but when I first went out it was somewhat sunny..I’ve been meaning to take a photo of this tree since last fall and just got around to it yesterday…I took the shot at the wrong angle because it is difficult to tell that it is leaning right over the beach area…I should have taken it from the side…another day. this is looking west out over Lake Nipissing…still frozen solid, but it is starting to open up at the shore line and it is a good sign when we see dark areas in the ice…
below is some of the ice as it begins to move at the Waterfront, Lake Nipissing…I’ve got some really interesting shots from Sunset Park this afternoon of the ice movement…haven’t had time to process them yet, hopefully tomorrow
this is the nw side of Sunset Park…the water is down right now but not nearly as low as it usually is…the sand that is visible is usually covered with water in the summer time.
grayscale…
a blogging friend did a bit of black & white recently and I rather liked the look so decided to do something other than what is usual for me…I found three shots I and did them in grayscale…as is expected it changes the look considerably…it is good to step outside the norm on occasion…
beautiful day…
today is gorgeous…a blue, blue sky, which I absolutely love, sunny, a bit windy, but 49F which is none to shabby at this point! I managed to snap a few shots on my walk at one of the public access for Lake Nipissing. The whole lake is still completely frozen, but it is beginning to open at the shore, at least it is a start…there is already a small amount of debris on the shoreline, always is in the spring. It is from the people who ice fish out on the lake in the winter, they are supposed to cart their garbage/debris home with them and most do…if you look closely at the second and third photo you will see the debris…it will eventually get washed up on shore and be cleaned up.
FYI…these photos were taken with my iPhone 5…
sap is running…Mr. Woodpecker has visited!
last week on my walk I spotted a couple of things that I’d not see before…keep in mind this is a residential street I’m walking on and generally I walk down the street in one direction, no special reason other than I’m a creature of habit…this particular day I decided to be “wild & crazy” and walk from the opposite direction…pays to change directions…below is a photo of maple trees with pails hanging from them collecting sap…something I’ve never seen before in this location…but coming from the opposite direction I wouldn’t…in this photo you can only see two pails, look closely…but there had to be at least 8…
something else I spotted was this tree above, where Mr. Woodpecker has been very busy for sometime now…
looking west…
I wanted to play a bit with this photo as I thought it had great potential…as you may have noticed I’m a huge fan of contrasts…so that is what you will see today…below is the original photo…this was taken last Saturday before I went the the Radar Runs…
this is threshold adjusted…
sepia of course…I’m becoming a fan of sepia, it adds interesting colour to the photo, giving an aged appearance to the photo…
up close and personal…
I hunted for these two photos last week and I couldn’t find them…I found one similiar but not the right one…then yesterday when I was looking for something completely different, of course I found these two…the one below is a terrible photo, I was inside the house and there is a very large over hang, like a huge wooden umbrella so it didn’t allow for a great shot, terribly dark and I tried many things to do something with it…but it shows how close the deer came to my house on the lake…
on his way home…as you can see the water is not up to full levels.
Sunset Park…
I took a few photos yesterday at Sunset Park, before venturing over to the Radar Runs…it was such a beautiful day yesterday…today is pretty good as well…sunny and relative warm for a winter day! -2C but 28F for those using Fahrenheit. the photo below is looking out onto Lake Nipissing…to the west. I rather like this one below, something about the trees that always appeals to me…think I’ll do a bit of experimenting with it in a few days…
the next two photos are looking north west along the Lake Nipissing shore line….
radar run…
today was a beautiful day…sunny, no wind to speak of and not terribly cold! I saw in the paper the snowmobile Radar Runs were taking place today at Sunset Park,Lake Nipissing, so I decided to take a few minutes and take a look…I used to love going to these events when I was younger…driving a snowmobile was very high on my list of a good time…I managed to get a few photos, but I have to say the lack of attendance surprised me…there were a large number of participants but very few spectators…years ago when I attended it was wall to wall people, it was difficult to get a good viewing spot for each event…
the photo below should be to the left of the photo above…didn’t know how to pan with the camera so did it in two shots…regardless of the lack of spectators the participants to enjoyed themselves…if you look very closely at the top photo you can see the track just left of centre in the photo…
just finished his races…
I’ve been playing around a bit more…rather like the results, especially with the luminance and the reverse black & white…
original
snow day photo…luminance
original photo
low visibility or bright & sunny…
yesterday was bitterly cold, more important the wind was very strong & raw, it was a north west wind so it came of the lake, whipping up the snow and blowing it around…I took two photos yesterday of ice huts on the lake to show you what kind of day it was…today I took photos of the same ice huts to compare…
above is yesterday…visibility was very low…below is today, still very cold but nice!
again above is yesterday and below is today…the wind is still cold today but nothing like yesterday…
there was a time when I enjoyed ice fishing, snowmobiling…I’m passed that now! 🙂
more snow photos…
the weather here has been so strange…tons of snow…bitter cold, warm and rain, now back to bitter cold today…makes it difficult to walk! which I miss, can’t take photos…the photos below were taken back on Feb. 13th…
I liked the snow on the pole like this, with the blue sky and branches in the back ground…
the next two photos are of the same bush/hedge, the first is of course head on… 
it amazes me how these branches can hold up with all the snow on them, as they look very delicate, as branches go… 
what a differnce a season makes!
the photos below are of the same tree, take frnm slightly different angels & of course taken at different times of the year…I added the double photo below as it was something I was trying with PhotoScape…turned out alright but it cuts off the original photo…would have to take the time to crop the photos to fit…the individual photos are below this one…
this tree is in Champlain Park, in North Bay…we are very fortunate here to have such a beautiful lake…the sad thing is this park has very little use…when I was a teenager I used to visit this park all the time…it was crazy busy then.
now the park sees very few visitors, except a few people walking their dogs or people bringing children to play, or those who use the boat ramp off of Lavasse River…rather sad when you think of such a beautiful area not being used to its potential…
do you know why?
I found this photo of a Key West sunset and it is rather pretty but there is a very large halo above the sun…can anyone tell me why this happened? did I have the flash on? I’ve also had photos with circles in them…again not sure why this happens…
for those of you who enjoy the snow photos here is one of a tree that pretty much obliterates the house with the snow on it!
a mixture…
when I went for my walk yesterday I only managed to get one photo…didn’t see anything new and interesting, this is the only thing that caught my eye…happens that way sometimes…I’ve walked past this tree many times but always from the opposite direction so I’m assuming I didn’t notice the gnarly branches/trunk…I will have to walk that way again to see if I can get a better view of the one branch in particular…
I won’t tell you were I found this web… 😉 I will say spider webs are very interesting…the intricacy and designs always amaze me…
snow!
I’ve not been for a walk for a couple of days…way too cold for my liking…with wind chill -26F, over night with wind chill -38F…brrrr…I have to go to the post office today so I will take a walk around one of our Malls…that’s the best I can! 😉 One of my visitors told me she looked forward to seeing my snow photos so I’m going to show three more today…these were all taken on the same day last week…after one of our snow storms…
this poor little bush was weighed down with all the snow…
I thought this one was rather interesting with the red of the branches & white of the snow…nice contrast…rather heavy load on the delicate branches though…
the photo below is the kind of visual that appeal to me…I love the way the branches curve & bend every which way…they are their own abstract painting! 
colourize & colour enhanced…
I’ve down loaded a new photo software program, PhotoScape…it is simple to use, easy to find my way around, for the most part…especially when I take the time to play a bit…of course there are settings I’ve no idea of what they do but that will come with experimentation. I tried GIMP a couple of weeks ago, while I’m sure it is a great program I found it too complicated for me right now…I would have to learn the software before I could do any thing and didn’t want to take the time…PhotoScape I could jump right in and do things right away…so I did a bit of experimentation today to see what I could come up with.
this has been colour enhanced…I rather like the little sparkles all over the photo…and the blue is part of the enhancement…
I simply colourized this photo…”pretty in pink”
this is one of the public accesses I like to stop at on my walks…this was taken November 13, 2012, on a blustery day…Lake Nipissing is famous for being calm one minute and gale force winds the next, which has led to some rather frightening times on the lake, when I was younger…not gale force this day but windy non the less…
this is the exact same location…a bit broader photo, you see more of the trees on the left. this exactly one month later…December 13, 2012…looks more calm and serene this day!
clear skies and ocean…except one!
I have many more snow photos but I thought maybe I should show you something else…we did get some snow last evening…not sure how much…enough to need to shovel!
this is in new town in Key West…it is not far from where you come on to the island…pretty but I prefer old town, it is much more quaint!
Key West marina…there is a nice boardwalk, with restaurants, in case you need to keep your strength up…
this is Lake Nipissing when the water has been drawn down, the left hand point is called Cheery Point…they draw down the water every fall to avoid flooding in the spring…I used to live to the right of the photo…we had a huge sand bar, often similiar to this, most falls…in the twenty years we lived there I remember a couple of times we had flooding in some areas along the shore line…we had damage done to our break wall and water came up very close to the house…I moved from this house in 2010…
more snow coming…maybe!
these photos were taken two days ago…I’ve a few more, but will wait awhile before I post more…as I don’t want to over do it with snow! Having said that we have a snow squall watch for later today with possible low visibility… I ‘d like a mild spell before more snow thanks 😉
both the photo above and below is a house I walk past almost daily…the trees and shrubs are gorgeous any season of the year but extra specially pretty when laden with snow…
this tree is just up the street from the photo above…you see I take photos of what I see when I’m walking…my intention is to go for a drive and take photos of something other than where I live but I haven’t gotten around to it yet…one day! I must say the two photos above have only been re-sized/cropped nothing else…the one below was back-lit as I thought it brought out the branches more, while leaving the sky alone…
snow day!
the scenery today was amazing…we had fresh snow over night and this morning it looked like a “winter wonderland”…as much as I’m not a fan of winter I have to admit days like today are so beautiful, especially when it is sunny as it was today! today I used the Sony camera my son lent me and I think the shots turned out much nicer…the whites are much nicer, whiter and brighter!
this is my favourite photo I think…all I did with this photo was add the copyright symbol and resize it…
see how delicate these branches are, yet they are able to carry such a heavy load!
signs of the times…
I’ve visited this public beach access often during my walks this fall, always finding it clean…but…the other day when I stopped by to take photos I found these two signs, along with the full garbage can? we have such a beautiful water front, we should respect its beauty…it is such a sad state of affairs when it is necessary to post signs to remind people to clean up after their dog!!! never mind the logic of people who feel it is acceptable to throw their garbage around the access…as I mentioned I’d always found this access clean but on that day someone had walked their dog and didn’t clean up after it…were they snubbing their nose at the sign? truly sad…
by the way…there is the blue snow again…
Heather Cote... 
