Monthly Archives: December 2021

It was real, and it was spectacular

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The capitol Christmas tree is nice, don’t get me wrong here…and it’s decorated with ornaments sent in by folks like you and me. But it wasn’t all that long ago when we still had a real, live, organic Christmas tree in the Memorial Hall each Christmas season.

I remember talking to Governor Dalrymple and his wife one evening when they mentioned that they were receiving pressure about fire code when it came to having a real tree. The writing was on the wall at that point. North Dakota has already managed to burn down one capitol building already, after all. So in 2015, when we got the new artificial tree, it wasn’t that much of a surprise.

Thankfully I took lots of photos of the real trees so I can still enjoy them. And yes, I do still enjoy the “fake” tree every year.

I fall for this photo every fall

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Morton County is one of the best places in North Dakota for a photographer. It has so much variety of terrain – Badlands-like formations in its southeast regions, scoria roads in the west, buttes and wetlands dotting the landscape within its borders, and plenty of the “old farm stuff” I like so much. Then there are places like this one.

This is perhaps my favorite shot of this spot. It may be familiar to you…it was the cover photo for a calendar produced by one of my clients. I love the sky in this one too. Guess what – I had to Photoshop the sky in the first one. Those darn cloudless skies again…but this one is 100% legit.

I like the first one because it gives Morton County some props. It will always be one of my favorite places to roam!

Background check

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I know Photoshop has a “sky replacement’ tool now, but I’ve never tried it. I did this one the old-fashioned way. I posted the original a while back with a perfectly blue sky. I’ve also mentioned in another recent post that I don’t really care for cloudless blue skies, because I find clouds so much more interesting. I’ve taken photos of just cloudy skies before in case I needed them for a project, and I decided to put one of those photos behind this windmill for effect. I’m pleased with the result.

It’s important for me to disclose that this photo is artificial as a matter of photographic integrity. I don’t mind this sort of pic, but in the proper context. I suppose I’m a bit of a purist in that regard.

The grass was greener

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I actually have a backlog of photos to share, and most of them are from prior to “the autumn browning” which arrived some time ago. So here’s a cool old barn I spotted while bolting to another photo location.

I thought this yellow house looked pretty cool, too…although it’s from yet another photo trip. It’s interesting…I can look at a photo like this and tell you where it’s at and the photo trip from whence it came. Considering I have around 150,000 photos in my collection, that’s saying something.

A slightly different perspective of the same old house on a hill. I was blessed with interesting skies that day. I actually dislike going out on clear, sunny days…clouds make photos so much more engaging, and I had perfect clouds to work with this day.

I’m going to work on that backlog of photos to share, and hopefully get some interesting winter photos to add to them! Stay tuned.