I don’ t normally shoot wildlife. I’m much more comfortable with landscapes as far as composition and technical considerations are concerned, but this moose on the side of the Hwy 191 was hard to ignore. This buck, a cow, and a calf were all grazing in the scrub on the side of the road just south of Schwabacher’s Landing. I remember shooting this picture and not having any idea that I was including the mountains and the clouds in the shot. I was at the far end of my 100-200mm zoom and focused totally on the moose. It was a pleasant surprise to check out the pictures and find the background in this shot.

I also made a black and white conversion of this shot.

Last weekend the main roads in Yellowstone closed, shutting down most of the northern park as well as the easiest access to Grand Teton from Bozeman. We also got our first serious snowstorm of the season, and as winter moves in for good, I hope to spend a bunch more time in both parks. Winter, in my opinion, is the best time to be in this part of the country.

The sun rose in stages. First, before the sun had even crossed the horizon, the entire sky behind the Teton Range lit up a fiery bright pink color. The peaks of the range were still hanging onto some clouds and the base of the mountains was wrapped in a low fog. Very quickly, this light died out, replaced by a gradual brightening. As the sun began to cross over the horizon, alpenglow blossomed all over the clouds and the snow-capped tips of the mountains. It started towards Mt. Moran in the north and worked its way south down the range. Eventually, the sun came up in earnest and the light died out.

The different stages of the sunset produced several sets of different images and the show lasted long enough that I was able to try out several different lenses and viewpoints. Totally worth the rainy night in the tent and the early morning wakeup.

In the meantime, I’ve processed some shots I took at a turnout on the park road heading south from the dam. I didn’t originally think that these photos would be anything special, but with a careful black and white conversion, I’m extremely happy with them.

This first shot is a ridiculously huge (10″ x 66″) panorama that I stitched together. I used my OM 50mm f/1.8 on my NEX and I’m very impressed with the sharpness of the image.

The next two shots are crops from the original panorama, mainly to show the detail in the full size image.

I took this shot on my NEX with my OM 100-200mm f/3.5. This is a pretty solid zoom. Although it’s not as sharp as the 50, it’s still a lightweight zoom with decent reach on the 1.5x crop sensor of the NEX. I’ve used it quite a bit.

Chimney Sweep from David Howland on Vimeo.

Saturday morning, after recovering from the absolutely frigid (20-25 F) overnight temperatures, we drove up to Hyalite Reservoir and fly-fished for a while. It still amazes me that all these diverse areas are within 20 minutes drive from campus.

Follow the link below to the full-size panorama.

http://www.frigidlight.com/fullsize/HyaliteResorvoirEdit.jpg