In the Moment:
Michael Frye's Landscape Photography Blog
by Michael Frye | Jan 6, 2025 | Announcements
Wave splash at sunset, Oregon Coast
Using Lightroom’s Local Adjustments to Create Powerful Visual Stories
“Dodging and burning are steps to take care of mistakes God made in establishing tonal relationships!”
— Ansel Adams
Successful photographs use light and composition to draw the viewer’s eye to the right spots – the places the photographer wants people to notice. But, as Ansel Adams points out, sometimes nature needs a little help!
When processing images, I probably spend 90% of my time on local adjustments. That includes dodging and burning (lightening and darkening), but also many other subtle and not-so-subtle changes to the luminance, color, and contrast in particular parts of the photograph.
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by Michael Frye | Jan 5, 2025 | Announcements
The votes are all in and counted, and here are my top photographs of 2024!
We had a great response this year: 627 people looked through my initial selection of 45 images and voted for their favorites. A big thank you to everyone who took the time to look through these photographs and voice your opinions! I also really appreciate the kind words so many people posted in the comments or sent by email. I wish I could respond to everyone, but please know that I’ve read them all and am very grateful for all your support.
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by Michael Frye | Jan 4, 2025 | Announcements
14. Dappled light above the Colorado River, Grand Canyon NP, Arizona
Just a reminder that this is the last day to cast your votes for my best photographs of 2024. You have until midnight! Again, please don’t send your votes to me by email, or post them in the comments, or they won’t be counted. Use the form at the bottom of my previous post to cast your votes.
(Voting has closed.)
Thanks to everyone who already voted! I appreciate your help. 🙂
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by Michael Frye | Dec 31, 2024 | Announcements
Happy New Year! Once again I’m inviting you, my faithful blog readers, to help me choose my best photographs from the past year. I’ve posted 45 of my favorite images from 2024 below, in chronological order. After you look through these, please use the form at the bottom of this post to list your ten favorites.
The voting deadline is midnight Pacific Time this Saturday, January 4th. Voting has closed.
You don’t have to list your ten favorites in any order; just pick up to ten images. Once the votes are in I’ll post the top ten or twelve on this blog. (The number for each photo is in the caption underneath the photograph. Also, you can click on the images to see them larger.)
As always, I reserve the right to override the votes if one of my favorites gets panned. But I’ve rarely had to exercise this power because my readers have excellent taste. 🙂
Thanks for your input — I appreciate your help!
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by Michael Frye | Dec 29, 2024 | Light and Weather
Yosemite Valley at dusk with stars and Jupiter, Yosemite NP, California. This storm cleared just after sunset. It was dark enough for stars to appear, but with a post-sunset glow still lingering on El Capitan. 25mm, 10 seconds at f/4, ISO 2000.
We’ve stayed close to home this month, but I’ve been making lots of photographs. I previously posted photos of fog in the foothills, and ice in Yosemite. But I’ve also been able to photograph Yosemite with clearing storms, and mist, and a moonrise, and with just ordinary, beautiful winter light.
Yosemite Valley is small – only seven square miles. This tiny area is renowned for its grand scenery, but it also contains a wonderful variety of beautiful details and intimate landscapes. No matter how many times I go back, I always find new things to photograph – or find that the same spots look new, and different, under different conditions. There’s always something to photograph there, if I look.
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by Michael Frye | Dec 24, 2024 | Announcements
Comet Tsuchinshan-Atlas over St. Mary Lake, Glacier NP, Montana
I made this photograph of Comet Tsuchinshan-Atlas back in October, in Glacier National Park, just after the amazing auroral event we watched there. I haven’t had a chance to post this image before, but it seemed appropriate for the season, both for its symbolism, and because this celestial object evokes (at least for me) feelings of joy, wonder, awe, and mystery. We live in an incredible universe, and I feel lucky to experience its wonders every day.
Claudia and I wish you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy Hanukkah! We hope you have a beautiful holiday, full of peace, joy, wonder, and the love of family and friends.
— Michael Frye
by Michael Frye | Dec 22, 2024 | Light and Weather
Fog and sunbeams, Sierra Nevada foothills, California. I made this image Wednesday morning, after the sun rose high enough to rake across these layers of fog and trees. In color it was all one note, with everything a pale gold color. Since it was monochromatic anyway, I tried it in black and white, and liked that much better. I think the color distracted from the main story of the photograph, which is about the layers, patterns of light and dark, and tree shadows. 321mm, 1/200 sec. at f/11, ISO 100.
California’s Central Valley is often filled with fog in winter. Usually a shallow layer of fog forms during the night, then burns off the next morning as the sun warms the air. There’s a temporary, low-level inversion during the night and early morning, where the air near the ground is cooler than the air higher up, but when the sun penetrates the fog and warms the ground the inversion ends.
Sometimes, however, the fog in the Central Valley is so thick it doesn’t burn off. The weak sunlight on short winter days never penetrates the fog layer completely, so the fog lasts all day, and into the next night. If the fog persists for a couple of days the inversion will grow deeper (it can get up to two- or three-thousand feet deep), and the fog will gradually lift off the ground into a low overcast, or stratus deck. And then that higher-altitude fog layer will push up into the Sierra foothills. A stratus deck like this can last for several days, or even a week, until a disturbance in the atmosphere (like a storm, or even a weak, dry front) mixes the air and ends the inversion.
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by Michael Frye | Dec 15, 2024 | Advanced Techniques, Composition
Ice fingers, Yosemite NP, California. 400mm, 1 second at f/16, ISO 100; 18 focus-stacked frames blended with Helicon Focus Pro. I needed to photograph this detail at an angle to get the orange reflections, requiring focus-stacking to get everything sharp. (It’s a reflection of a cliff lit by the setting sun.)
Last Thursday, Friday, and Saturday two smaller storms moved through the Sierra, bringing rain and higher-elevation snow. But for a couple of weeks before that it had been dry and warm – reaching the upper 60s at our house in Mariposa.
Early last week, as we were starting our workshop in Yosemite Valley, temperatures cooled off a bit, allowing ice to form along the banks of the Merced River. It’s always fun to photograph ice like this, with its beautiful patterns, designs, and colors. But it can be challenging, both technically and creatively.
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by Michael Frye | Dec 1, 2024 | Light and Weather
Sunlight breaking through clouds and fog, Oregon Coast. During our workshop we waited out a brief-but-heavy rain shower by sheltering underneath a dense tree canopy. After we emerged clouds blocked the sun for awhile, but eventually sunlight broke through and backlit the wave-generated mist for a few beautiful minutes. 28mm, 3 seconds at f/11, ISO 100, ND filter.
Sometimes I’m out with my camera on a clear, sunny day, and a passerby says, “What a beautiful day for photography!” I just smile and agree; there’s no point in discussing the finer points of landscape photography with a passing stranger.
And of course you can make good photographs on clear, sunny days. Those conditions are perfect for many subjects and scenes. But landscapes are usually more interesting and photogenic with clouds, fog, mist, snow, or rain – and the light that weather helps create, like sunbeams, rainbows, dappled light, colorful sunsets, and so on.
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by Michael Frye | Nov 28, 2024 | Announcements
Sun setting behind a small tree, Oregon Coast. I’m grateful I get to see so many beautiful moments like this.
It’s Thanksgiving Day here in the United States. Whether or not you celebrate Thanksgiving in your part of the world, I think there’s value in gratitude – to giving thanks for all the things we have to be grateful for. We really should do that every day, but it’s good to have that reminder once a year.
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