Way up on the North Carolina side of the well known, Blue Ridge Parkway, is the charming and quant town of Brevard, North Carolina. The town is full of small, locally, owned shops that make one feel like they are taking a trip back to “the good ol’ days.”  Nostalgia is flowing through the air here.
Naturally, this nostalgic breeze leads locals and tourists up the hill, shall we say.  Here, in the heart of the Parkway one can capture the essence of nature, and that is exactly what I planned to do.  Luckily, I had my hiking boots on! We traveled deep into to forest and what we found, can only be described as a Mecca for the outdoor lover.
The trees here in North Carolina, especially those that inhibit the Parkway, are known for their verdant and lavish colors, which are known to assault ones senses with their richness.  Your eyes are naturally drawn to every fiber of chlorophyll that is fleeing these trees’ leaves.  It was honestly a simple and convenient backdrop to anything, and finding one of the many bodies of water, especially this waterfall here, was just whipped cream on old timepiece of apple pie.
We went on a beautiful, crisp, fall day, and stumbled upon a group of kayakers.  To some photographers, they could have been impeded on their ideal backdrop, but for me, they were just characters in the natural moment I was trying to immortalize.
Of course, when you are going out into a public location you run the risk of running into people who are also there to enjoy the beauty that you are soaking up as well.  Don’t always try to avoid these people, just simply add them to their natural environment, and you’ll be capturing a real moment in what life is really like.  And life here, in Brevard, is 100% Americana, kayakers and all.

Babcock Mill

It is the time of year for that one special hunt …… the hunt for fall colors. As the season changes from summer to fall most photographers start the ritual of trying to get those great fall colors.  It is easy to get a picture of leaves changing but I was out for more than color. After seeing picture of a mill in West Virginia at Babcock State Park, I knew that was where I should begin my hunt.

I left Stokesdale, North Carolina at 5 am on a Saturday and drove to the mill.  It took about 4 hours. We were told that the best light this time of year was about 9 am, but it would not have mattered on an overcast and dreary day like this.

What could we do? We did what any other photographer would do! We took some photographs of the colors which were almost at their peak. But without the sun’s natural light to make leaves pop, and a bald white sky you do the best you can. The overcast sky created a large soft box which gave us nice even light without hot spots or hard shadows, but it does tend to mute the colors some what.  But with a little help from Photoshop we were able to get extremely similar results.  We spent the rest of the day driving around New River Gorge looking for other opportunities with mixed results.

Grandveiw WV

Cataloochee is a valley in the Great Smoky Mountains of North Carolina. This weekend I had the opportunity to spend a day and a half there. The weather was very overcast and rainy (got to love early fall in North Carolina) but that never stops me from trying to get some shots.  It is still a little early for fall colors, but I hope to return in a couple of weeks to capture that amazing spectacle.

In 2001, 25 elk were reintroduced to the area. Then in 2002 another 27 were added to the herd. The elk that were reintroduced wear radio collars and are monitored. Project partners include the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, Parks Canada, Great Smoky Mountains Natural History Association, Friends of the Smokies, the U.S.G.S. Biological Resources Division, and the University of Tennessee.

Elk once roamed the southern Appalachian Mountains and elsewhere in the eastern United States, but they were eliminated from the region by over-hunting and loss of habitat. The last elk in North Carolina is believed to have been killed in the late 1700s.  In Tennessee, the last elk was killed in the mid-1800s.  And by 1900, the population of elk in North America dropped to the point that hunting groups and other conservation organizations became concerned the species was headed for extinction.

The elk is an amazing animal, and to see it in its natural habitat is something everyone should experience.  Grab your camera and head to the closest natural habitat in your area and see what you can capture with your lens, you never know when it may disappear.

Need something to do this weekend?  Head up to Sparta, NC to a place that has the nickname of the “Tractor Graveyard.”  The president of one of the camera club’s I belong to, had grown up with the family that owns this great piece of history. So naturally, I wanted to check it out…

My buddy and I decided that we were going to get there for the first of the morning light, he got to my house around 4:50 AM for our drive of less than two hours. We set the GPS to the address and off we went.  We raced against the sunrise while we tried to get to this unknown wonderland.   As we reached the mountains we contemplated taking our time and to just simply catch a few good sunrise shots, but we decided to press on.  The Tractor Graveyard at sunrise was an amazing opportunity that we could not miss.

As we came closer to our location a light fog was slowly rolling in.  We came around the final bend and we could see an abundance of old tractors lined up on both sides of the road. We had arrived just before sunrise. There was heavy morning dew on the ground, and we quickly noted to bring water resistant shoes next time, but the moisture didn’t put a damper on the amazing backdrop that was before us. The sun gently came through the trees and we had a great look at what we had to shoot; tremendous amounts of old, decaying tractors, covered in moss, dew, and spider webs.  These tractors were full of personality that needed to be captured with a lens.

On Tuesday the 1st of September we had our photo contest at the Bokeh Photography Club, and honestly, there were some amazing images there. Sadly, I did not take first place; however, I did have two images that were in a three way tie for third place. First place went to John Poer and in second place was Stephanie Thomas. We had a panel of three judges, which included, Pam Krist, owner of Dalmatian B&W Lab in Greensboro, Deanne O’Connor, art director and photo editor of Our State Magazine, and John Carroll a award winning photographer from Winston Salem, NC.

The whole event was incredibly fun, but the best part of the evening was when Pam took control of the computer along with the other two judges and began critiquing each image and showing how each one could be improved. To have people of this caliber give you feedback on your work is a welcomed and valued moment.

And here comes some even more good news! Pam will be back to judge our B&W contest and she is asking that we include a raw image of our entrée and she will select a few and do the conversion of these to B&W the Dalmatian way! For those of you that don’t know, Dalmatian Lab is by far the premiere B&W Lab in the country, and prints many fine art prints for some of the best photographers in the world.

I can only hope that she picks one of mine!