Recently I went to a lot of trouble to figure out a problem that I had encountered when trying to open multiple “Smart Objects” in Photoshop into one document. I tried the “click and drag” method, “copy and paste”, “paste into”. I tried waving a dead chicken over my head and reciting ancient Druid incantations. Nothing worked. But I was determined to solve the problem. And I did……and posted a very detailed and laborious tutorial.

Moving forward. My son and I attended the “20th Anniversary of Photoshop” celebration in San Francisco. It was a great gathering. Lots of notable Photoshop gurus in attendance. This was a retrospective of Photoshop from the very beginning to the present and some insight into the future. The evenings presenters would demonstrate all the advancements made in PS. When it came to the “Smart Object” segment I was paying close attention as I really like to use this function. The first thing the presenter (I don’t remember who) did was to open multiple “Smart Objects”. I thought, very smugly to myself “Only I know how to open multiple Smart Objects into one document”. Then the presenter(my memory has not improved, so I still don’t remember who) proceeded to “click and drag” the multiple “Smart Objects” into one document. I was stunned. When did they make this function work. Did they do this just for this “fancy smancy” get together. I left  that night feeling like a betrayed lover. My one shot at Photoshop stardom dashed.

Well, it looks like the secret to this move is to “click and drag”  one “Smart Object” up to the tab of the target “Smart Object” and hold until the tab highlights and the target document is visible. Now the final trick to making this work. You then have to drag the outline of the “Smart Object” you are moving into position in the new document window and then release it. Voila.

So what did I learn from this experience? You can do just about anything in Photoshop in different ways……just some are easier than others. I think I will use the easy way.

Oh, and as to the look into the future of Photoshop. There is some amazing “Content Aware” capabilities coming in CS5. It will just blow your socks off. Also, and this is from Jeff Schewe himself, Photokit 2.0 will be released in conjunction with CS5. He says that all the sharpening features except “Creative Sharpening” are incorporated in Lightroom 3.0.

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I have managed to get out a few times to take pictures recently when the weather cooperated as we have been having a pretty good winter so far. On the bad days I have been sorting, rating and cataloging a serious backlog of my work. This brings me to a couple of new sites that I have found to be extremely helpful. One is an online weather station for the Eastern Sierra……Dennis Mattinson’s Eastern Sierra Weather Center. This is a great resource and I am adding a permanent link on this blog.

The second site is one funded by the Library of Congress. It is dpBestflow.org. It is a series of videos on the management of digital libraries and is hosted by Peter Krough. His books on digital asset management(DAM) are standards in the industry. This is an area that a lot of photographers have problems, how to handle all the files that we generate with our digital cameras. I know this has been an ongoing problem for me, as I have had several tries that failed after a lot of hard work. I am in the process now of re-cataloging my library so that my workflow will be more productive.

One of the benefits of forcing myself to do this is that I have gone back through and have gotten rid of a lot of stuff that I will never use. Images that I saved because……oh, someday I might want to do something with it. I have a general rule about my analog housekeeping, personal belongings and such, that if I haven’t used it in the last six months to a year, I get rid of it. While going through my digital library it dawned on me that I wasn’t carrying over this rule for my business. So what do I have? Several HDD’s full of “stuff”. With this re-cataloging I am getting rid of anything that I have rated lower than 3 stars and these are being reevaluated with a very critical eye.

I found this to be a little difficult at first, but then I realized that it was really freeing me to concentrate on the very best that I have. So, ever onward and upward. So far I have gotten through 2009. Next up, 2008. And with the new system I am hoping that I won’t have to go through this again.

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I have found some really great blogs lately. I hope to have links to them up soon. Two were on business……that nasty thing that seems to stump so many of us.

Update: It was late last night when I posted this. I have been having a terrible time with my system. I have been working with both Apple and Adobe engineers trying to figure out what is wrong. So I had been working late. I just found Seth’s Blog. I really find his writing refreshing and very insightful. Highly recommended. The second was an article from Kevin Kelly’s blog. I haven’t had much time to really go through his writings, but this article ” One Thousand True Fans” was an eye opener.

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Well, here is a new look for the images that I will be posting. It took a little while to work the kinks out of the process so that I could create an action in Photoshop to do all the hard work. If anyone would like to download the action it is available HERE, it is called “Photo Matte”. The action resizes the canvas to add a 4″ matte around the image, offsets the image by 3/4″, adds a stroke,  resizes the layer to 95%, adds a new full size layer underneath for the drop shadow. You can look through all the steps in the action to see what is being done. The action can be easily modified to suite your own needs.

Also there is another action that I created based on the B & W conversion in “Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers” by Schewe and Evening. Hope that you find them useful. If so drop me a line and let me know.

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Well it certainly has been stormy lately. I really love the way the storms come in over the Sierra and the way they linger. It puts on quite a show. It doesn’t make any difference whether it is winter, spring summer or fall, they are all spectacular.

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I was debating whether to show the finished product at the start or the finish of this tutorial. I decided on the start as the images in the tutorial are not finished, but raw untouched files. This is a tutorial on using “Smart Objects” in Lightroom and Photoshop CS4. This is a three shot panorama using a Nikon 24mm PC lens. I exposed all three images to get a mid point between blowing out the highlights, the sun and the waves, a crushing the shadows, the rocks in the lower section.

I am not a great fan of Lightroom. I use it because it does a lot of stuff that I can’t do with other programs. I really like the adjustments, but not the brushes or the gradient tool, as these are really quirky and not very precise. The steps that I am outlining in this tutorial can be accomplished by using ACR. I just happened to be using Lightroom when I began developing this procedure.

Here is what led me to this procedure. I had the three images that I wanted to export to PS Photomerge. I knew that there was a lot of work to be done to get the adjustments to all three images so that I could get a good blend. I made adjustments in Lightroom and exported to Photomerge. The results were pretty bad as it is difficult to get all three images to match when you are working on one at a time. With this option I had a daunting task of getting what I had envisioned for this panorama.I know you can open multiple images to compare in Lightroom. This got me close but not good enough. I thought how nice it would be to export the images as Smart Objects into one document so that you could stack them and do a rough mask so that you could get a good match of tones and colors. Only problem, Lightroom and Photoshop don’t play together that way. I could only export a single image as a Smart Object.

To make a long story short the following is what I came up with:

Step 1: Export your images as Smart Objects from either Lightroom or ACR.

Step 2: Right click on the empty area next to the layer name. This will bring up a menu as shown. Select “Export Contents”. Do this for each image. Close the images without saving.(You may want to leave them open the first time you try this, just minimize them.)

Step 3: Save the exported images.

Step 4: Create a new document. The size will vary with the size of your images. My images were 2832 x 4256 pixels. So I made this one 9000 x 4256 pixels. It’s more than 3x but I wanted some wiggle room. Make sure that the new document matches your color space and resolution.

Step 5: Go to “File” and then select “Place”.

Step 6: Select your saved image (from Step 2) and click “Place”.

Step 7: The image will open in the new document with a large X through it. This is to inform you that you can adjust the size of the placed image, not recommended for this project. Just click on the “Enter” key. You can now arrange the image accordingly.

Step 8: This is how your document will now look.

Step 9: Repeat Steps 5, 6 and 7 for each image. Your document will now have multiple Smart Objects.  By double clicking on the Smart Object icon you will now be able to make all of your adjustments with ACR.

Step 10: After you have your images adjusted, you now need to export the layers as files. But first you have to “Rasterize” the layer. Right click on the layer in the empty area next to the layer name and select “Rasterize Layer” from the menu.This is so that you can import them into Photomerge as Photomerge does not work with Smart Objects. The last part of this step is to delete the “background” layer. This makes Step 12 much easier.

Step 11: After you have rasterized each layer go to “File” then “Scripts” then “Export Layers to Files”. This will create a new document from each layer.

Step 12: Open all the new documents that you have created. You will notice that you have a document with a lot of empty space. You will take care of this by going to “Image” then “Trim” and checking the “Tranparent Pixels” button in the dialogue box. Do this for each image and save the change.

Step 13: That’s it. Now open Photomerge and select open documents. You will be very surprised at how much time this will save you on very difficult images.

If any of you out there are up to speed with scripting for Photoshop this would be a great one to have (I’m biased).

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In the September/October issue of Audubon Magazine is an article that afficianados of fall color will learn a lot from. There is some good news and some bad news. The good news is that with the increased levels of CO2 the colors will get more intense. The bad news…..with increased levels of CO2 the fall displays will start later with the rising temperatures. This dilemma is the focus of several scientific studies.

If we don’t change the way we live on this planet……Nature will change it for us.

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This weekend was an interesting trip. I have tried on two different occasions to make the tour of the Little Petroglyph Canyon that is sponsored by the Maturango Museum in Ridgecrest, California. I got bumped twice. Once, because the Navy canceled the tour and the second was due to weather. They were expecting tempuratures in excess of 120 F. This weekend was my lucky weekend. The weather was great and the Navy wasn’t blowing stuff up.

I left Bishop with plans to stop off and check out Fossil Falls and then proceed to Ridgecrest. All I can say about Fossil Falls is……I will definitly return. When I arrived at Fossil Falls it was just past mid day and the light was really harsh. So I hiked around the canyon and scouted the area. This is an area that would best be photographed in a subdued light situation because of the reflections from the basaltic rock that is worn smooth by water erosion. So I figured that as soon as we get some really nice overcast or stormy days I will return.

After arriving in Ridgecrest I checked into my motel room. It was a little after 3:oo p.m. I figured that I had at least another  1 1/2 to two hours of light left so I headed east to the Trona Pinnacles. These formations are “tufas” like the ones found at Mono Lake. Only much bigger and in a dry lake basin. This was well worth the drive as they are really spectacular. I imagine that with some stormy weather this area would be great to photograph. I will be watching the weather for this area this winter.

Sunday morning was the start of the tour. I won’t go into all of the details of what goes into the tour but it entails a very thorough search of your vehicle and all the contents by a well trained security team. The reason for this is that the Little Petroglyph Canyon is on the China Lake Naval Weapons Station. Because this area has been under the control of the Navy since World War II access has been very restricted. Consequently there is very little vandalism to the rock art. It is too bad that we can’t restrict the rest of the sites in this country in the same manner.

The canyon is really incredible. Over a mile long it is lined with basaltic rock. This was the canvas for the early native Americans. And did they ever use it. There are over 6000 petroglyphs in this one canyon. Date estimates are that some are over 10,000 years old. If you are the least bit interested in primitive art or archeology in general, I would recommend this tour. It is very well organised and the tour guides are first rate. Contact the Maturango Museum for information.

I really do love exploring this part of the country. There is always something new and fascinating around ever corner.

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Went out today to get a cooler out of the storage shed as I am going to Little Petroglyph Canyon on Sunday. As I walked along I noticed a wonderful collage of leaves that had blown up against the fence at the back of the yard. It looks like they have blown in from all over the neighborhood. Luckily the gardener missed this area. His crew is usally very thorough in their work.

The colors and patterns were very intriguing and I spent the better part of an hour just studying and taking it all in. Nature has a way of giving us these wonderful little gifts. This gift was a gentle reminder of what a wonderment the fall is in this beautiful valley. Everyday I find something to be grateful for. Here it is not too hard.

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Whew…..just checked. I spelled it correctly. Just a little update to the previous post. Brasso also does a good job of getting rid of the scratches on your camera LCD cover. It works well on most plastics. But just to be safe try a small spot first.

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Some time ago I lent my iPod to a friend….won’t do that again. When it was returned the screen was completely covered in scratches. It looked as if it had been sanded with a coarse sand paper. I did some searching on the web for replacement screens and what I found was that they weren’t too expensive, but a hassle to replace. Or if you wanted someone else to replace it you had the expense of shipping and cost of the shop time.

Being of Scottish ancestry, I began to look for an alternative. What I found were several concoctions that didn’t seem like they were worth the time to mix. Then I found a very interesting article that suggested that you could use a jewelers rouge. Well one thing led to another and I came up with this product that is available from your local hardware store. It’s called Brasso. It’s a brass polish and cost less than four dollars. With this and a little elbow grease I soon had an iPod screen that looked as good as new.

But wait…..there’s more. This evening I was working on some images using my Wacom Intuous 3 tablet. I have had this ongoing little niggle about the surface of the tablet. It seems to have developed some scratches that when the nib of the pen ran across them it resulted in this annoying little “tick” almost a hesitation. I really like a smooth surface for the pen to work on. Well, I gave the surface a thorough cleaning and could still feel the “ticks”. Out came the Brasso and within a few minutes I had eliminated the problem. Great product. Some day I might try it on what it was designed for…..brass.

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I have been busy for awhile now going through all the pictures that I have taken since this spring……..all the ones that I have ignored…….that means all of them. My Bad. It was a nice surprise to find this one. It was taken with a Nikon 24mm PC lens. It was the first real photograph that I had taken using the tilt to increase depth of field. And on top of that it turned out pretty neat.

I found this area as I was leaving the Alabama Hills. It was one of those drive by spottings. I was anxious to get out of the area as I was not familiar with the roads and the sun was setting. I just caught a glimpse out of the corner of my eye as I drove  down the dirt road. I used to get these glimpses driving and would always tell myself that…..”OK, now make a note to check that out on the next trip.” Well that just doesn’t work. Because I found myself either not remembering where it was or just completely forgetting about it. I now stop and go back to verify what I thought I saw. Most times it will be just that, a glimpse. But other times it reveals a gem. I’m glad that I turned around and checked this one out.

I hope you enjoy this as much as I do.

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This little gem of a tool gets overlooked by most. Yet it is one of the most useful tools in the Photoshop tool box. So how does it work and where do you find it? You can access the “Fade” command from the “Edit” menu. I use it so much I have assigned a function key on my Wacom tablet to it. “Fade” gives you the ability to adjust not only brush strokes but many of the filter effects by adjusting the opacity of the effect and the blend mode.This gives you an extraordinary amount of control.

A great way to try out the “Fade” command is to open and image and add an empty layer above your background layer and set the blend mode of this layer to “Overlay”. Select the brush tool and set the foreground color to black and the opacity to 50%. Now just paint in an area of the blank layer in a continuous motion. You will see that you have darkened it considerably. Here is where the fun begins. Now access the “Fade” command. The keyboard shortcut on the Mac is “shift+command+F”. Adjust the opacity slider and watch what happens. Pretty neat. You now have control of your brush strokes in a new and very useful manner. Now play around with the blend modes and watch what the effects are. This opens a whole lot of possibilities. You can also see what your original brush stroke/filter effect looked like by clicking on and off the preview button.

The one “gotcha” of the “Fade” command is that it will only act on the very last action you perform. For example if you are painting in a mask and you interrupt the brush stroke, when you apply the “Fade” command it will only affect the very last action. It only has one level in which to work.

So give it a try and I think you too will agree that it is a great tool to add to your arsenal.

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It was a pleasant sunrise this morning. Later in the day a front moved in and we lost sight of the mountains for awhile.

Here is an article from the L.A. Times that I thought was interesting and troubling at the same time. The general consensus with most of the photographers that I have talked to this year is that there has been a general decline in the quality of the “Fall Color Season” in the Eastern Sierra. Nothing really drastic, but noticeable. I contacted a researcher at the White Mountain Research Station, a John Smiley, and asked if he had any information on the condition in Colorado and if it was something we should be looking for. He informed me that there were no current studies of the aspen in the Eastern Sierra, but that he was interested and would follow up. He did however tell me that in the previous two summers, due to the dry conditions, there was a problem with a rust fungus on the aspen leaves. The late spring this year helped alleviate that problem.

I hope that this problem stays localized(sorry Colorado) and does not spread west. I think that we are going to see a lot of changes in the future due to the changing climate. This adds a sense of importance to what we are doing as landscape photographers. We may be documenting something for the future. I read an article some time back that argued that there were so many pictures of aspens that it was a waste of film to photograph them anymore. I disagree. Everyone contributes something new with every image because we all see the world from a different perspective. So I am off again tomorrow in search of more “Fall Color” in the Eastern Sierra and I am looking forward to many more years of this quest. I am certainly glad that there are so many that enjoy this pursuit as much as I do.

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As I promised earlier I planned on heading north to investigate the situation with the aspen. But along the way I stopped to play my favorite game…..it’s called “I Wonder Where This Road Goes?“. The picture of Mt. Tom was from an area that I had wanted to explore for some time. I had just never found the exit. By chance I found it today and really enjoyed the new view. Everything was still damp from the rains that we got last night. There were signs of some pretty serious runoff. Glad I wasn’t there last night. After exploring for awhile I headed north.

Along the way there were areas of color west of 395 above Tom’s Place. The groves at Crowley are now showing some good signs of color. Still lots of green. I pulled off the highway at the McGee Creek exit and headed up the road…..and wouldn’t you know it…..there was this beautiful sight of the snow blowing off of Red Mountain and Mt. Morgan. The light was very contrasty. I also noticed that there was another dirt road that went up the side of the mountain that looked like it would put me in a perfect spot to look straight across the valley and I would have an award winning photograph.

So if you want to know where a road goes….you just have to drive up that road. Well this road quickly narrowed and steepened, yet it was easy going in 4wd. For a ways that is. Less than 1/4 mile from my imagined award winning destination the road suddenly became one of those “Oh, oh.” situations. It was impassable with my vehicle and there was no place to turn around. Well, what goes up must come down. Hopefully in one piece. I had to back down this narrow steep road for about a 1/2 mile before I got to the switchback where I could turn around. I then proceeded up to the McGee Creek parking lot. There is alot of mixed colors….mostly yellow and green. Some of the willows before the pack station are turning orange/red. I didn’t get out to explore as the wind was blowing steadily at about 45 mph.

As I headed out to 395 I looked back and the snow was still blowing off the mountains and the light was still good. So I stopped put on my pack and head up a ridge that looked like it would offer a good view. As always the first ridge is hidden behind a taller ridge that is hidden behind….on and on. Going up I was protected from the wind. As soon as I crested the ridge I was hit with a blast of wind that almost knocked me down. I set up my tripod and camera and got my shots, packed and headed down the ridge. It was much easier coming down.

Convict Lake was being whipped by high winds. The lake was covered with white caps and as the waves broke against the retaining wall at the boat harbor the spray was going across the road. No float tubes out there today. The colors are better along the creek up to the lake. Couldn’t really tell how the west shore was because of the wind. It was fascinating to watch as gusts of wind would just shear water off the surface of the lake and carry it for hundreds of feet as a heavy spray.

Next was June Lake. Here the colors have really improved, I would say that it is a 50/50 mix of yellow and green. If the aspen survive this cold windy spell that’s going to be followed by warming weather, next week may be good. That’s a big MAYBE.

I then drove to Lee Vining Canyon. Here there is a lot of color, maybe 60/40 yellow to green. The wind has really knocked a lot of the leaves off of the trees. Still it should be nice by the end of the week if the weather holds.

That’s it for this report. In the coming weeks I am going to start reviewing some of my favorite books, software and equipment. I will also be putting up tutorials on Photoshop and digital file processing. So stay tuned.

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With all the hubbub about fall colors I thought it would be interesting to really check out why and how fall colors happen. I hope you enjoy these articles, I did.

1. Buffalo Museum of Science
2. National Forest Service
3. Native American Legend

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Just got back from making the rounds of the Bishop Creek drainage. Starting with North Lake. For all intents and purposes this area is done. There are a few trees with some color, but most are gone. Next we go to the Middle Fork. Same story. Most of this area is either past good color or bare. In some areas just gone to black. From Aspendell past Big Trees, this area is still green with a slight show of yellow. A lot of trees are already dropping their leaves without changing color. On the South Fork from Big Trees to just above Bishop Creek Lodge is also green with the same conditions. Very little color and more trees dropping their leaves. From above this area all the way to South Lake there are little pockets here and there, but for the most part it is done. The area just below Parchers, some of the non-aspen trees have just gone brown and started losing leaves.

I am hoping to go north (McGee Creek, Convict Lake, June Lake, Lee Vining) and check conditions there in the next few days.

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Yesterday was another adventure in Wonderland. I call it “Wonderland” because I wonder why I didn’t move here sooner. I went out exploring with fellow photographer Corey Freeman(Sierra Impressions) in his Jeep. After a slightly bumpy ride, it’s a 4WD road, we parked at the base of the mountains. We then hiked up to Longley Lake. It was a pretty tough hike for me, but worth it.

What I find interesting about the different high mountain lakes is the variety of color. Some are deep blue, others are a cloudy turqoise, and Longley is an almost emerald green. It was fairly cold and ice had formed on the lake. We spent some time exploring and photographing until the sun started setting behind Mt. Humphrey.

Both of the images of the lake are panoramas. The first is two images and the second was a total of nine. I was shooting with a 24mm lens and it was not wide enough to capture what I wanted. So the solution was to shoot multiple images and stitch them together in Photoshop. This makes for some pretty hefty files to work with, but with more data, you get better pictures.

On the way back down we stopped to photograph the waterfalls on McGee Creek(nope, this isn’t the one by Crowley Lake).

The temperature started dropping rapidly as the sun set,so  we made our way back to the Jeep. On the way down I thought to myself “Holy Cow, how did you make it up here. This is really steep”. It really was steep so we were careful descending. We made it back to the Jeep and then home for a cold beer(more than one) and a really hot shower.

It was a fun day. Thanks Correy.

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Just for an adventure I drove up to North Lake yesterday. It was snowing when I got there. I drove around the lake just taking in the sights. It is really peaceful when it snows. The colors and sounds are muted. As I drove back to the south side of the lake the sun broke through for a moment and I was able to get this picture. The lighting was very nice. Even though a lot of the area is past its prime there are still a lot of places that have something to offer.

As I came down from the mountains the storm was really putting on a show. So all in all it was a fun day. Found a few new spots that are still green so I will have to keep an eye on them as the conditions can change quite quickly now that the temperatures are dropping.

Another upbeat note is that we will probably have a second fall color season as there is so much below 8000′ that hasn’t turned color yet. In the Bishop drainage below Aspendell and also just above Bishop Creek Lodge is still green with just a slight show of yellow. I talked with people that had been through Lee Vining and June Lake and they are also late. So we will get a little longer, if not stranger season this year.

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Here is an update that I received from a fellow photographer, Michael Bowes in Mammoth Lakes:

I visited Convict Lake and McGee Canyon yesterday morning (9/30).  At
Convict Lake, the forest of aspens at the far end of the lake was mostly
green with some yellow patches, and yellow in some of the groves on the
south side (shaded side) of the canyon and lake.  Basically, it looked
intact, yet early for full color.

Same thing with McGee, but it was a bit further along (not surprising as
McGee is at a higher elevation than Convict).  The aspens at or below the
trailhead were almost entirely green, but looked intact.  I didn’t hike
too far up the trail, but from about 1/2 a mile in, I could see that the
large grove at the bend in the canyon was about 60% green, 35% yellow
(mainly the small aspens), and about 5% red/orange.  There were some nice
red/orange/yellow aspens on the south side of the canyon near the bend,
but only a patch.

FWIW, some of the aspens in my garden up here in Mammoth have been turning color
very rapidly these last few days.  It’s been below freezing each night
and yesterday got up to almost 50 degrees in the shade (which is like
65 in the sun).  My aspens were totally green just about 4 days ago, but
the cold nights have now caused some of them to go lime green, yellow, and orange.
The winds didn’t damage them because they hadn’t started to turn much
when we had the windy weather.

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Just got back from a very depressing tour of the Bishop Creek area. The front that went through last night did a lot of damage to some areas and had no effect on others. Here is the rundown:

North Lake took a hit last night. A lot of trees either had their leaves knocked off or they got burned due to the cold temperatures. The north shore got hit pretty hard. Lots of bare trees. Still some small areas that are kind of OK. Glad I got my shot last night.

From just below the North Lake road to Lake Sabrina. This area got clobbered. Lake Sabrina looks OK. It seems to have faired better.

South Fork from just above Willow Camp all the way to South Lake  also got hit hard. The area just below Parchers to Willow Creek has yet to turn fully so it faired OK and it might be good by this weekend. Everything else is spotty.

Below Aspendell everything is pretty much still green and just starting to turn so this may be OK by this weekend. It’s questionable.

So the bottom line is this. Every area that I had scouted and planned to get this year will have to wait until next year. I guess I will head north in the next few days and check out McGee Creek and June Lake. I might make it to Lee Vining.

So that’s how it stands as of tonight. My glass is half empty.

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Last evening I drove up to North Lake to see what was going on. When I got there the wind was blowing steadily and there was a light snow falling. The clouds were just a mass of indistinct gray. I stayed long enough to watch the clouds develop into something very interesting. I stayed long enough to get pretty cold. I figured that there was going to be just a small showing of color in the clouds so I decided to leave.

Coming down North Lake road this is what I ran into. I was actually watching a very beautiful cloud formation over the White Mountains. I was tempted to stop and take a few quick shots. As I drove a little further down the road looking for a place to pull over I saw the clouds over the Sabrina Basin and quickly drove to a wide spot in the road and set up my camera. Just seem to be getting lucky lately.

I processed both images in a new way. I’m still experimenting. It involves converting to b&w, working in the LAB color space, mulitple blend modes, adjustment layers and masks. Lot of work, but I like the direction this is going. Once I get it where I am really pleased with it I will post a workflow for those that are interested.

I will be going up to North Lake later this evening to check on the conditions. I don’t think this storm was as bad as predicted.

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I have photographed this spot many times in the last few years. I was never really satisfied with what I got. Either the wind was blowing, the light was flat, the colors were passed prime……just never got what I wanted. This picture I think  turned out fairly well. I was going to the South Fork of Bishop Creek and just before the turn off I decided to just check out the Middle Fork. I wasn’t expecting too much as one of the spots I had hoped to get this year had already burned off and the leaves were almost all gone. There were several photographers at this spot as it is very popular. So I stopped and visited with them and almost decided to leave when the light just “turned” on.

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Well things are really starting to happen around here. If you are coming up for the first weekend in October you shouldn’t have anything to worry about. Colors are developing rapidly. If the front that is scheduled to come in in the next few days doesn’t do too much damage next weekend will be prime. From here until the second weekend in October I won’t be posting many updates as they really aren’t needed. If I happen to find something interesting I will let people know. I will post as things start to decline so that people won’t waste their time coming up here for nothing.

Speaking of interesting, it’s amazing what you find when you just go bushwacking. This is the Lower Falls on the South Fork of Bishop Creek. It’s a 3-shot panorama taken with a 24mm PC lens.

I have a confession to make. All this time I have been refering to the North Fork of Bishop Creek……..it’s really the Middle Fork. Seems like the North Fork is the outlet of North Lake. Which is fed by Lamarck Creek. Go figure. So, my bad. I think I have to go and find a bunch of pictures that are labeled wrong.

Hope those that came up this weekend got some good pictures as there was plenty to see.

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Short and sweet. Went up to North Lake this evening. The sun had just gone down so the colors are a little flat.  Colors are changing fast. Should be fairly good by this weekend.

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Covered alot of ground yesterday. So this is how things look if you are coming up this weekend. June Lake around the town there is scattered color. Silver Lake and Silver Creek are at least another week from really doing anything.

Further south to Convict Lake the colors on the south shore are picking up a bit and the west is showing more color. By this weekend it may be nice.

McGee Creek is really looking good for this weekend as there is a lot going on in the whole basin.

Rock Creek up to just above Rock Creek Lake has a lot of color. Almost all of the smaller aspen have gone yellow and orange. There are some nice spots.

At Lake Sabrina the smaller aspen on the south shore are yellow and the far west shore is starting to some color. The North Fork of Bishop Creek just above Aspendell is starting to come on strong. Maybe by this weekend it will be good. Nothing much below that.

The South Fork of Bishop Creek is coming along nicely about a mile above Bishop Creek Lodge. The large grove just above the lodge is just now starting to show some color. The willows in a lot of places along the South Fork are already losing their leaves. Aside from this the area should be pretty decent for this weekend.

We are still about a week to ten days out from really prime colors. Today I will head up to North Lake for a look.

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I added a couple of new links today. Two very good photographers from this area. You should check out their work.

Yesterday I spent the afternoon hiking up the South Fork of Bishop Creek. I found so many little places that will be gems when the colors get going. Most of these are accessible from the road with a little hiking. Some areas are fairly steep so you would have to be careful. So my recommendation would be, suck it up, do North Lake in the early morning with the swarming hordes. Explore the North Fork in the later morning. Then the gem is hit South Fork in the evening as the sun is going behind Table Mountain. I am so impressed with what I found on the South Fork, it really is special.

This afternoon I checked out North Lake. I met up with Cory Freeman. We both noticed that the large grove that goes up the side of Paiute Peak was almost a brown color in places. We will keep an eye on it. Things are just different this year with the colors. The scrub aspen above the North Fork road on the way to Lake Sabrina is a brilliant red today.

Todays picture is from the South Fork. I had picked up a couple of young hikers at North Lake and gave them a ride to South Lake. They had been in the backcountry for about seven day. Glad I did as I hadn’t planned on going up there today. But the clouds moved in and the light was great….so here’s my picture of the day.

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Just a quick thought on pushing yourself. This picture is a horizontal panorama(two shots) that is cropped to a non standard aspect ratio. I find that I am liking this type of photo more and more. So try something new…..get out of the box…..you will surprise yourself with what you see. This is from the area that I explored yesterday.

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I have probably driven past this site a hundred times…..that’s probably an exagerration…..89 times. You can’t see it from the road and it takes a little bit of a walk following trails that the fishermen have created over the decades. I guess what I am getting at is that you just never know what you will find unless you go looking. Yesterday I made a determined effort to explore as much of the South Fork of Bishop Creek as I could. I found so many fabulous little out of the way spots that when the fall colors really come on they will be fun to shoot. I am going back up today and do some more exploring.

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