On This Day - June 2020

Walther Park 001, 06/30/2013

It's a 'moon tree'. Yes, there is such a thing. If interested enough to want to know more, there is an article about them on the NASA site at... https://www.nasa.gov/centers/kennedy/news/moon_trees.html In short, astronaut Stuart Roosa carried a container with seeds from a variety of trees aboard the Apollo 14 mission in 1971. It was done as an experiment to hopefully determine if the trip to, and 34 orbits of, the moon would impair the seeds' ability to germinate upon returning to earth. As it turns out, many germinated just fine and are now growing well throughout the U.S. How the one attached here wound up in DeSoto, MO of all places is beyond me, but...here ya go.

Ottawa Canada 003, 06/25/2004

I was in Ottawa, Canada in June of 2004 for an annual business conference and spent some time moseying along a riverside walk when I happened upon this abstract reflection in the water.

Lake Tishomingo 012, 06/20/2010

This fungi on the side of an old oak tree near our community house struck me as a sort of organic PacMan about to inhale the 'drops' of fungi nearby. And no, I had not been partaking of any 'shrooms' at the time. :)

Jefferson County 003, 06/18/2008

One from the opposite end of the lake from most I've included in this project thus far. And one of only 4 captures from this session. And the only 'landscape' orientation shot. Given this was captured roughly an hour prior to sunset, I'm not sure why I didn't hang around for sunset. Perhaps those few scattered clouds disappeared and left totally clear skies. Or maybe I just needed to pee. :D

Roah High Bluff Overlook Trail 12, 06/13/2014

Should I ever return to the Roan Highlands area in northeast Tennessee, this trail would be one of my prime focuses. There are so many photo ops of trailside intimate landscapes, I think I could spend an entire weekend just hiking up & down this trail.

Cherohola Skyway 006, 06/08/2003

Another one from the 2003 North Carolina trip. I was beginning to make the trip home on this morning and left time to buzz the Skyway on my way out of North Carolina. Though it is a bit out of the way of NC 'hotspots', I found it to be a very interesting drive. Loved the fog filling the valleys on this morning, and would be surprised if it wasn't a good option to capture fall color later in the year.

Navy Pier Chicago 008, 06/04/2005

I've lived in the St. Louis, MO vicinity for pushing 50 yr now, but I've been to Chicago only once. And then only for a business trip. Not a knock on Chicago. Urban environments just hold little appeal to my photographic tastes. It was nice to get out on Navy Pier on this particular evening and have the opportunity to have the short time window to capture this scene without a herd of boats going by.

Lake Tishomingo 0091, 06/29/2018

This is what I call a 'seed' image. It's something I would capture because it triggers something in my that leads me to believe there may be a project available to me if I can flush out the underlying idea more fully. While this one won't make the cut itself, it does represent one for a series I've tentatively entitled 'Slivers' and have been working for roughly a year now.

MO Botanical Garden 0006, 06/26/2019

Each time I visit 'the Garden', I always take at least a spin through the Japanese Garden area. And each time, I stop and look at this small intimate scene and think there's gotta be a picture here. This one is probably the perfect example of what this photoblog is about...while it's 'nice', it doesn't rise to the level of 'portfolio worthy', but as might be expected for such subject matter does have a serene quality to it.

Fox Theatre 002, 06/22/2019

One from a one day workshop shot inside the 'Fabulous Fox' theatre.

Tremont 026, 06/16/2014

I had spent the previous few days up around Roan Mtn State Park & Carvers Gap in NE Tennessee. And it seems any time my car gets the notion it's anywhere near Great Smoky Mtn National Park, it just automatically heads that way. This one is from the Tremont area of the park.

Castlewood State Park 0054, 06/12/2019

This may well be one of a series eventually. Though I have a fair number of images available for the series, I've struggled finding a presentation style that works well. Working on this one today, it did spark an idea on that front. Time will tell.

Wheels of Time 04, 06/07/2003

A portion of a spring 2003 trip to North Carolina took me to the western portion of the state ostensibly to do some mountain biking with a group of friends originally discovered on the old Compuserve 'social media' site. One morning while there, we did some touristy stuff that included a drive-by visit to Clingmans Dome in Great Smoky Mountain National Park as well as to a local car 'museum' known as the 'Wheels of Time.' I didn't do much shooting there, but did make this one attempt at a bit of an abstract of one of the vehicles on display.

San Francisco Skyline 006, 06/03/2006

A business trip took me to San Francisco for a few days. Stayed at the Stanford Court Hotel and captured this one from my hotel window.

Lake Tishomingo 013, 06/28/2010

Yes, it's another shot of the home lake. The one aspect worthy of note for this one is the location of the setting sun. Given this was captured on 6/28, it's setting about as far north as it will in this neck of the woods. I.e., just right of where the tree line starts rising. On a December 28, it would be setting behind the tree line on the left...approx 1/4 of the way in from the left edge of the frame.

Forest Park 058, 06/27/2006

At the time this one was captured, I was living approx a 10 minute drive from Forest Park, the big city park in St. Louis, and would frequently buzz through there with camera gear in tow. I had been shooting other subject matter on this day in 2006, and after I finished that session, I was driving slowly down a park road when I spotted this piece of sculpture. I *think* it was a fairly new installation at the time. And as I was driving by, I couldn't help but notice how it nicely framed that oak tree behind it. As of this writing (6/27/2020), I'm not sure it's still there. I have this vague recollection...that may be totally erroneous...that the installation was temporary. I've driven by this spot probably a bajillion times in the interim, and I don't recall seeing in...I don't know how long. Of course, I don't recall not having seen it either, so I guess I'm going to have to make a trip up to the park to determine if it's still there.

Castlewood State Park 0037, 06/19/2019

While out hunting ferns for an ongoing project last year, I spotted this bit of color in an otherwise 'green' image. The ferns themselves didn't make for a compelling composition in this case, but this lone little 'shroom made the intimate landscape scene just interesting enough to trip the trigger.

Round Bald, Carvers Gap 056, 06/14/2014

A great weekend with a bunch of other photographers for my first visit to Roan Mtn State Park in NE Tennessee. Ostensibly, we had traveled to the area to capture the rhododendron bloom that occurs roughly the middle of June each year. There are so many catawba rhodedendron in that area that the town of Roan Mtn actually hosts a festival each yr the 3rd weekend of June. We were fairly lucky with our timing that year and hit pretty close to the peak blooming time. But this image features the flaming azaleas which were in bloom at the same time, and though I could easily be wrong, I believe those were peaking at the time we visited. It doesn't show well, but there actually is another photographer in this image. You can *barely* find his baseball cap almost dead center vertically and a little below the right side of the most prolific blooming bush (second from the left). If I recall, it was a charcoal colored hat...though it appears a bit on the warm side here. Gives a bit of perspective on just how large these bushes are.

Tishomoak 004, 06/11/2013

Wildflowers found on the edge of my own yard.

Dillard Mill Historic Site 042, 06/06/2015

Dillard Mill is one of roughly a half dozen old mills in southern Missouri. This one is in the southeast portion of the state roughly a 1.5 hr drive southwest of St. Louis.

Wrightsville Beach NC 019, 06/02/2003

#OnThisDay: 06/02 Captured while on a trip to North Carolina to visit my sister who was living in the Raleigh-Durham area at the time. As part of that visit, we made a day trip over to Wrightsville Beach. Wandering along the beach I was intrigued by the interplay of light & shadow on the ripples of sand. Toss in the one little piece of vegetation struggling to eek out an existence and I just had to snap the shutter.

Tishomoak 016, 06/24/2012

Another wildflower captured on my own property. While flowers fairly commonly tend to be very formal in their structure, I most appreciate those with a bit of non-conformity to them. This one, from 2012, with the one petal seemingly rising above the norm with siblings on either side sort of hiding from view give it just that random touch to make this one a bit unique.

Shaw Nature Reserve 0015, 06/21/2019

The fern garden at Shaw Nature Reserve. Though this visit was undertaken for fern shots to add to an ongoing series, I found this scene with the ferns hugging the base of an old persimmon tree attractive as well.

Tremont 047, 06/17/2014

One of those small wet weather waterfalls that can occasionally make for interesting intimate little compositions when water flow is robust. I check this location out any time I'm in the area...'just in case'. And this occasion was the one where this section of the 'falls' was more than a little trickle. Somewhat surprising given it was captured on a 6/17 date in that I've been here much earlier in the spring when robust flow might be expected, and not seen this much water. Perhaps most interesting to my eye at the time was the coloration in the grasses(?) dangling from the facade. That's not bad processing on my part. :D This is actually what was there at the time. I actually knocked down the saturation somewhat while processing.

Lake Tishomingo 010, 06/15/2012

Another sunrise on the lake. Considering this is looking darn near due west, it must have been one extraordinary sunrise looking east!

Lake Tishomingo 012, 06/09/2008

Another 'after the storm' shot...this one on the lake community where I reside. Though the rain from the storm had ceased by this time, I remember the wind still being rather rambunctious at the time of capture.

Almond NC 002, 06/05/2003

A scene revealing the 'layers' so commonly available to shoot in the Smoky Mountains. This one from a 2003 trip to North Carolina captured near Almond shortly after sunrise. If I read the Google Map correctly, the body of water is part of the Nantanhala River.

Thirty Thousand Feet 01, 06/01/2006

#OnThisDay: 06/01 Captured on a flight from San Francisco to St Louis, this shot illustrates why I always try to get a window seat when flying. I just enjoy seeing the variety of abstract patchwork quilt like scenes created by man's interaction with the earth below.