its a “sundog”…
had to drive to Huntsville last night, approximately an hour and 15 min. drive and the sky was so unusual…it couldn’t seem to make up its mind what it wanted to do, from one mile/kilometer to the next…anyone who visits knows I love clouds…I captured over 300 shots from my moving vehicle last night, some I’ll post but most I’ll delete…certainly worth effort to have a few!
on the way there…before the skies broke into the shot below…
this was on the way there…not sure what that colored section was all about as the sun wasn’t even remotely close by? It rather looks like part of a rainbow, but that is all there was to it and it was only in a specific area during the drive? NOTE: a visitor to my blog explained to me the mini rainbow is called a “sundog”…they are formed when the sun is low on the horizon, either to the left or right of the sun…here is a good explanation…http://weather.thefuntimesguide.com/2009/11/sun_dog.php
on the return trip as the sun was setting…
drive to Rosseau Market
this past Friday was rather foggy on the drive to Rosseau Market..we leave North Bay at 5:00am so on a cooler morning we often see some fog, but this was more than usual…nothing serious though. fyi…the first two photos were taken from the moving vehicle!
by around 7:00am most of the fog had lifted…
we saw this fellow as we came around a curve…Mr Porcupine…he certainly wasn’t in any hurry to get across the road!
definitly not serious!
if you visit on occasion you will know clouds are a favorite of mine…I rather liked the placement of the ones below!
clouds and light…something that attracted me, nothing more!
some of the last of the season…the growing time is short!
angry clouds…
I have to admit I’ve a major weakness for dark, moody, angry looking clouds…I don’t want any storm to accompany them, I only want to watch the clouds. I stopped along the waterfront earlier today as we had such clouds rolling around in the sky, no storm, just fabulous clouds! It is amazing to watch them change before your very eyes…mesmerizing! I’ve not done anything to these photos…this is how the clouds looked…I may try HDR, on these photos another day… for for now this is it.
when I see the lake this calm with clouds like this I always think, “the calm before the storm” I’ll let you know…
black & white & color
I saw this old barn on the drive home from Florida this winter… in Kentucky I think. The photos was taken from the vehicle out of the passenger side window. The roof has seen better days…thought I’d try it in both color and black & white…do you have a preference?
these of course are more of the gnarly bent trees…
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…
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…
I’m around…
I thought I should do a post to let anyone who happens to stop by that I’m away…left February 15th returning March 17th. with the exception of answering emails, I’ve not been online…I will visit and post when I have the time…below are photos from Florida…
this fellow is having breakfast in Dunedin…
Lake Dora, Tavares, 
part of the Clearwater Beach skyline…
these are the first photos taken with my “new to me” Nikon DSLR camera…I’m having fun experimenting with it…after only a few days I realize already I need a macro lens, possibly a stronger zoom lens? will see after a bit more working with it…
favourites…
I’d decided to show you a few of my favourite photos today…but…I’ve been having an issue with the photos showing up on the page properly…anyone else having a problem with this?
more experimentation…or playing if you will!
I’m enjoying experimenting with the settings in PhotoScape…it is a free program that is basically for beginners like myself…it does have a few advanced settings, at least to me they are… of which I’m trying to understand but for the most part it is very simple to work with!
below is the original photo…love this area of Leesburge, Florida…
grey scale…I would like to figure out how to do the grey scale, but adding a punch of color…for instance in this photo the bird or some of the docks could be coloured…that look appeals to me.
worked with the saturation on this one…
and of course the reverse black and white…I love contrasts…
experimenting with the levels…
yesterday I took this photo of the gnarly birch tree…I love trees with limbs like this one so interesting, always makes me wonder why the limb grew the way it did? I took the photo of the whole tree but it is in front of what I think is one of the City yards and there are work buildings etc., which doesn’t contribute to an interesting photo…too much going on when I wanted to concentrate on just the tree, so as you can tell it is cropped…
then I decided to play a little with the tools in PhotoScape as I’ve not done a great deal with it yet…this one is colour enhanced slightly.
this one is of course grayscale…
on this one I adjusted the luminance curve…
and finally…this one is reverse black and white…
very interesting to see what can be done with a relatively simple program…for the time being PhotoScape works for me…I know there is so much more that can be done with PhotoShop, but I don’t have the time to learn the ins and outs before I begin using it…this works for 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… 
moody skies…
I love a moody sky…something about them that has so much character…now don’t get me wrong, I love the clear blue sky with soft, fluffy white clouds as well…each has their appeal to me…
this is of the same island I’ve been showing on and off…this view is south west of where I lived, I would be standing at the far end of the break wall to take this photo…this is of course before the water has been drawn down…some years it is later than others.
another almost naked tree…this tree still has leaves on it today…I can see it out my window…
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…
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!
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!
beautiful sky…
what a glorious day for a walk…it is warm today, sunny and smells like spring…what more could I want? I know the warm spring like weather is only just for a day or so but will enjoy it while I can…the sky was that strikingly beautiful blue with some fluffy, powder puff type clouds…I live in a small city so it was very difficult to get any photos of the sky with out trees…now don’t get me wrong, trees are one of my very favourite items in nature to photograph…but today was about the sky! I’m going to have to take some time and go for a drive outside the city…
I captured some descent tree shots, but was very disappointed with some of the lake nipissing shots, not sure what happened…when I took the photos into the sun the sky was close to natural but with the sun behind me the whole photo is terrible? Oh well…another day to try…
was feeling like a water shot today…doesn’t look like much but there is a tiny outside restaurant to the left…we go there at least once when I visit my Mother…it actually is very quiet, and peaceful…good food as well!tree fence…
I like tree fences such as this…makes for nice privacy in the back yard…it isn’t mine though…if it was mine I’d trim about two feet off the top come early spring…will ensure the body of the fence grows denser…
off premier road, lake nipissing
this was taken a few years ago…when I lived on the shores of lake nipissing…funny how when something is there for 20 years it becomes common place, but when gone you feel the lose! This was part of my view for twenty years…I moved two and a half years and miss it more each day…
Happy New Year to you and yours…may 2013 bring you health, happiness & prosperity!
second half…
I’ve begun using my son’s Sony camera and I don’t know if it has a panorama setting, so I took this photo in two sections, I can do a panorama shot with my iPhone but it was too cold for it that day…the sun was setting behind me giving the sky a beautiful look!
to the left of where I’m standing taking the photo is a unique outdoor establishment serving cold beverages, and delicious food…
Heather Cote... 
