Fallen Farm Friday

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Half barn, half house? The very distinctive shape (shapes?) of this house had me jamming on the breaks and whipping around for a quick photo. The part of the house on the left looks like a barn, yet the front makes it look like it collided with a house at some point. The peaks of the roof are like an architectural cherry on top.

This building sits stoically along the road to Fort Ransom, boarded up and tucked into the trees. Spotting such a Fallen Farm building was like stumbling on a hidden photographic treasure!

Just in time

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This is the first year that I’ve been able to enjoy a State Parks vehicle pass in my truck. Don’t ask me why it’s taken this long…I can’t explain it. In any case, I’ve got one now, and plan on putting it to good use yet this year! For instance, this recent bolt up to the blockhouses at Fort Abraham Lincoln. I got there just in time to catch the fleeting sunset.

Some of the tourists there looked amused as I rolled up in the Monster Truck™, grabbed my tripod and camera bag, and ran out into the middle of the forts to get the right angle. Later, as I was wrapping up, a couple walked by and asked how the sunset turned out. Thankfully, as you can see for yourself, it turned out just fine.

A shot of the twins

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I took a ride on the Fort Lincoln Trolley this weekend with my lovely bride, and the trolley operator told us about a pair of twin fawns that have been spotted (pun intended) around the tracks from time to time. I was out at Fort Lincoln since then and saw them for myself around dusk, playing around and walking with their mom. They didn’t seem to be alarmed by my presence and gave me plenty of opportunities to photograph them before bounding off into the trees.

Meet the star of the show (UPDATED)

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This is the magnum opus that created such a buzz during this year’s Capital A’fair: a 3D chalk drawing by Shawn McCann. His illusion took many hours of work and thankfully didn’t encounter any rain this year!

The effect of this chalk-drawn illusion becomes far more dramatic when an element of realism is introduced. In this case, we’re talking about the artist himself. Once we have a real person perched atop the faux protrusion of the drawing, the effect is complete.

Pretty cool, huh? This is the effect Shawn was shooting for. It looks really neat with the capitol in the shot for added perspective. Some days I’m really happy I have such a wide angle lens, and this is one of them.

As Shawn will point out, this is drawn to work from a very specific perspective. While this is a really neat angle to fit the capitol into the shot, it blows the illusion because of the way things are drawn.

Update: I took my boys to take part in the fun this afternoon (for about four minutes, given the blazing heat) and the chalk is weathering fast. In the afternoon the sun casts a shadow across this piece, so I stuck with a tight shot. Around noon would be better. You probably have another day or so to check it out, even less if the rumors of rain I hear are true!

This is one bear with a splitting headache

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I’m old enough to remember Clyde, the former star of the Dakota Zoo. If I remember correctly, I think he was the world’s largest Kodiak bear. A life-size wood carving of Clyde has been placed inside the zoo’s Discovery Center in his honor…that’s one tremendous bear!

A friend of mine once told me that there are three things that concrete does: it gets hard, it turns gray, and it cracks. Well, wood carvings do a couple of those things. As the wood ages it often develops cracks in inconvenient places. This carving of Clyde appears to have done so. I don’t think it detracts from the statue or its tribute at all, but it did make an opportunity for a “splitting headache” joke!

This statue really is quite large, as was the real Clyde. To get this shot I had my camera on a monopod, with the foot wedged into my collarbone, and the camera fired by remote as I held it aloft. Oh yeah…I was standing on a stump at the time, too. Here’s to you, Clyde!

This isn’t the only remarkable tribute to Clyde, although it’s far more permanent than my other favorite. Right after Clyde’s passing, someone made an enormous sand sculpture of Clyde lying on his back on the sandbar beneath the original Liberty Memorial Bridge. It was quite plainly visible while driving over the bridge until nature took its course and slowly whittled away at it. I wish I had been a photographer back then! I’m sure pictures of it are floating around somewhere…just not in my collection.

Butterfly surprise

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I was out roaming this weekend when a friend called to tell me that butterflies and caterpillars were having a heyday in her flower beds, especially around the milkweed. Since milkweed is poisonous, Monarch Butterflies eat it to prevent birds from eating them. Amazing how God’s creation works out, isn’t it?

Naturally I bolted over. I lamented the fact that I sold my razor-sharp 100mm Canon macro lens this spring to buy more accessories for my new 7D camera. Then I had an epiphany: during some free time at work last week I stumbled upon the fact that my 10-22 wide angle lens will focus to around four inches! That’s very close, and means I still have a “macro lens” in my arsenal. That’s what I used on the butterflies.

As you can see, it works just fine. That really made my day, since I’d really been missing that 100mm lens! Now I’ll have to try more situations with my wide angle at short distances, and see what kind of ideas it gives me…

July Flame

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July Flame
I’m seeing fireworks
They’re so beautiful
Tell me why it hurts

July Flame
Ashes of a secret heart
Falling in my lemonade
Unslakeable thirsting in the back yard


On the last day of July I braved the heat and humidity to capture the sun as it set between a couple of those awesome buttes north of town. These are just north of the Square Buttes, but part of the same formation. The lyrics are from my favorite July song EVER, “July Flame” by Laura Veirs. You can check it out on iTunes by clicking here.

By the way, that island in the foreground is made up entirely of birds. LOTS of birds. And from the sound of things, they were having quite a bird party.

Boy…July sure came and went quickly, didn’t it?

Blockhead photographs blockhouse

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I like hiking up to the blockhouses at sunset. I don’t like hiking back in the dark so much. I got a great view of the evening sky in between, though! I got there too late to capture the sunrise, and there were clouds moving in from the northwest AGAIN…but there were some shadowy rays tracing off into the darkness as I began to head down the hill, so I did not come back empty-handed.

Catchin’ some rays

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I need some wildlife video for a project I’m working on, so I worked my way down toward Fox Island to see what I could find. Along the way I couldn’t help but notice this beautiful sight in the sky, with awesome streaking rays of sunlight radiating overhead. I was able to catch it before a huge, looming cloud obscured the whole thing. Then I got some really nice HD video of a very cooperative deer before heading home.

Tuesday night sunset

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My last-minute dash to Menards accomplished its purpose, but put me a little behind the sun. As I rolled into Double Ditch I had to scramble to catch the end of the fleeting sunset. The sky above was so perfectly blue that I didn’t actually fret too much about missing what was happening on the horizon. A few wispy clouds speckled the sky, and the weather was perfect.