Category: Lake Michigan

Expanding Your Creative Mind… Make it a New Year’s Resolution?

December 28, 2013
ExpectationsGreat Lakes ProjectLake MichiganLighthouse BeachPhotographyRichard Mack Photographywinter

This morning I just had to get out and see what the lakefront looked like today. Of course the fact that it is sunny and warm had a lot to do with it, but more importantly I felt I just had to get down and see what kind of images I could make. How creative I could be and how I might be able to do something different than I usually shoot. The urge to photograph pushed me out the door. To see more from my shoot today use this link: https://www.mackphoto.com/BlogImages/LighthouseBeachWinter/

I’ve talked before about creative thinking and making sure you “move outside your box” when shooting. Get lower, higher, tighter, wider, details, entire landscapes with lots of sky – all of it. Yet we tend to shoot the way we shoot. I have had the pleasure of being on location with another photographer a lot lately. One who does not think or see the way I do. It is a pleasure to watch how she moves and sees the same place I do. We come back with very different images. While I like what I shoot, there are many I look at from her and say, wow, wish I had thought of that, you see the world in such a different way. We can discover the same effect by looking at other peoples work online. A lot of people influence us as photographers. We see their way of seeing. Some do this for a living, many do not, yet they seem to have an eye for composition and a way of seeing the world.

Now when I shoot, especially some place like Lighthouse Beach, as I have shot it more times than I can count, I think of how others might approach this place. I am sure if I was shooting with someone else we would certainly come away with very different images, but it is that way of seeing, your way, my way, which sets us apart as storytellers. We take each other’s work into account and adapt it to our own style.

Today I was thinking not so much of the grand openness of the landscape but of the details which would show what the shoreline looked like. How the ice and snow had piled up and looking at the connection between the lake and the ice. That line in the sand if you will. I was also fascinated by how many people were down there looking at the lakefront as well. Many climbing to the edge to peer over and see what the intersection of water and ice looked like.

One interesting observation was the old pier at the north end had been almost completely obliterated by the sand and ice. Is the sand higher because the water level is lower or has the ice just pushed the sand up and over it? Here are two images, one from a few summers ago and one from today.

To see more from my shoot today use this link: https://www.mackphoto.com/BlogImages/LighthouseBeachWinter/

Will any of these make it into my Great Lakes Project? Never know until it is finished. And might I add the working title has changed to Sweetwater Seas from Twenty|Ninety-Five. Go ahead and guess as to the meaning for each of these working titles…go ahead and make a comment below – will be interesting to see everyone’s ideas. It will look at all five Great Lakes and how we as mankind have had an effect on them only in the last 200 years even though we have been living along them for thousands of years.

My other goal for this coming year is to really get back to working on this project and hopefully have it 95% shot by the end of the year. A big task and a lofty goal but if you don’t set your goals high what are you shooting for?

I hope you all have a great 2014! Let’s see our world slightly differently this year and yet put our own style in our storytelling.

Here is to a great 2014!

Happy New Year,

Richard

 

Sunrise, Lighthouse Beach

October 2, 2013
Great Lakes ProjectLake MichiganLake MichiganLighthouse BeachLighthouse Beach PierQuiet Light PublishingTwenty|Ninety-Five

I went to Lighthouse Beach this morning for sunrise. I wasn’t really planning on it but as I was awake at 5:15 I thought get down there! As you may know I have shot this particular area of the beach many, many times over the years as it is only a mile and a half from my home. It will certainly play a part in my book Twenty|Ninety-Five on all five of the Great Lakes.  I often wonder if I can see anything new, shoot a new view or make a more compelling image having been there so many times. But as I tell folks it is all in the way you see things and you must try and change your perspective, view point and work with how the light plays out in front of you to create a compelling image. No two moments will ever look the same. Maybe similar, but certainly not the same.

This morning I wanted to get down low and use a wide angle lens to get in close to the image and let it stretch out in front of the viewer. Then as the sun cracked the horizon I realized a long lens would be a different perspective. In addition the sun was coming up where I have wanted to see the moon rise for many months so I could work it into the image with the pilings. The sun instead of the moon at this moment.

When I arrived there was a gentleman already there who is a member of a camera club and wanted to shoot for a photo contest the club was having. We talked as I set my equipment up and he asked me if he could watch and learn. Of course. He also asked me to tell him my thoughts as I choose where to place the camera. It was an interesting experience which I enjoyed. Kind of like a mini-workshop!

Here is a link to the images from this morning. Only a small amount of adjustments have been made in Lightroom so far. Hope you enjoy the images! Maybe these will become a part of my book on the Great Lakes, Twenty|Ninety-Five which I am currently continuing to work on.

https://www.mackphoto.com/BlogImages/Great_Lakes_Project/LighthouseBeachSunrise/index.html

Peace,

Richard

 

Lake Michigan Waves & Evening Light

October 29, 2012
Great Lakes ProjectLake MichiganLake MichiganLighthouse Beachnature photographyRichard Mack Photographystorms

Took a break from framing for the gallery show with Jill Buckner next week and headed to Lighthouse Beach to see the waves and moonrise if possible. For the last few days the report was we would have those big waves and I knew that tonight was the best night to shoot this month’s full moon rise. So in my head I was thinking maybe I could get a shot of the old pier with huge waves and the moon rising in the background. Would be so cool I thought.

Never saw the moon and didn’t have 20’ waves. Change in my perspective lead me to and enjoy the evening light, clouds and waves and even the extremely strong wind which blew the sand across the beach in a sandpaper kind of feeling on your skin. Plus the winds made it very cold! I’ve been in some very strong winds – like a few years ago in the big snow storm we had – but this one was so strong it wanted to blow over the tripod with my camera and 28-300 heavy lens on it. I hung the camera bag from the bottom of the column of the tripod but then the bag kept being blown around and I had to steady it with my knees. Alas, many of the shots were not sharp at all.

But, because I let go the idea I came down here with I made some images which show the evening light, waves and even the wind in the sand. I could not get to the old pier, but used the board walk and sand to frame the images. Don’t know if I will like these in the future but it certainly was a fun thing to have done! And in the wind you felt the strength of the storm and the feeling of being alive! While I was only there for about 30 minutes, I was also never alone as folks would wander, or really, take that tough walk in the wind, to see the edge of the lake and feel the wind. Then they would turn around with w quick hello and be off. Bet they felt as alive as I – although maybe not as cold!

Glad I could change my thinking and accept what was presented to make some interesting images in the evening light.

Enjoy,

Richard

To see the other four I chose quickly use this link: Evening Light

 

Full Moon Rise – First of 2 this Month

August 2, 2012
Great Lakes ProjectLake MichiganLake MichiganLighthouse BeachLighthouse Beach PierMoonriseRichard Mack
1 Comment

This August we have two full moons we can all shoot. I went on down to my favorite location which is about a mile from my house and shot the full moon coming up. I have been trying to get the perfect shot of the moon rise over this old pier. So far to no avail the way I first envisioned it. And because the rock wall blocks how far away you can get it is not possible to back off and use a long lens the way I want to. So you adjust.

There was another person who has read this blog who showed up and recognized me. I gave her some tips on equipment she might want to purchase. For me a key ingredient is the polarizing filter. And for shots like these more important are the graduated neutral density filters. A most worthy thing to have in your bag. It will bring down the exposure in the sky to make images without a blown out sky. I use the .9 neutral density filter which takes off 3 stops of light. And the later you shoot – and I go way past most folks – you really need it in order to try and keep the moon without having it just burn out. You also have to keep your exposures to less than 1 second or the moon will move during the exposure and therefore not be sharp. Some of the last images from last night were 8 seconds, and I knew the moon would just be a small white circle – well a bit oblong though but also blown out. Acceptable since I wanted the glow on the water.

Now in all honesty I was not really into making images on this night. And there was a cloud layer, as usual, out over the lake, so once I got there I had to wait. A photographer doesn’t like just sitting so I made a few images before the moon popped out of the clouds. I tried to do something a bit different than anything done before. Sometimes you have to reach back and look at things in a very different perspective especially when the location is very familiar.

Not sure how successful these were, I will need to ruminate on them a while longer before deciding whether they might be worthy for inclusion in the book I am currently working on Twenty / Ninety-Five: The Great Lakes Landscapes. It covers all five of the Great Lakes. You can see more about it at Quiet Light Publishing. www.quietlightpublishing.com/GLP.php

You can also see more of the images from this shoot here: Moon Rise

The second full moon is on August 29 – known as the Blue Moon – a semi rare occurrence. And where the phrase “Once in a blue moon” came from. Wonder if I shoot that one as well. And where?

Cheers,

Richard