Astrophotography

What is Astrophotography? Astrophotography is a special kind of photography that involves making photographs of astronomical objects, such as the moon, sun, planets, galaxies, nebulas, etc...this involves taking photographs through a telescope (special gear is needed).

Tonight we have a full moon but it is unfortunately raining right now where I reside so clouds currently cover up the sky. However, here are some images I got of a Waxing Gibbous moon, several nights ago. I varied the shutter speeds to get a variety of brightness in the moon. Enjoy!

A quick lesson in shutter speeds.

By changing the shutter speed in between shots you can get a wide range of colors, brightnesses, detail, and the overall "mood" of the picture. For an example check out the three images of some Birch Trees (Betula lenta) below.

Some new photos...

Here are some photos that I recently took while I was on a walk near my house.

Sylvan Lake

Sylvan Lake (which is known as the "crown jewel" of Custer State Park) in South Dakota is an amazing place. Its unique rock formations and endless pine forests creat a wonderful landscape...which is great for photography!Some of the amazing rock formations around the Lake. A female Mallard Duck swimming on the Lake. Some more rock formations. A waterfall that has carved itself into the face of one of the countless, truely massive, rock formations that encircle the Lake. A Butterfly resting near the shore. A photograph of how crooked the trail that travels around the Lake can get. For some visitors, this part of their journey makes them quite uneasy!

Fun fact about Sylvan Lake: The Lake was featured in the 2007 film "National Treasure: Book of Secrets". In the movie it was supposedly right behind Mount Rushmore. In reality however, it is 5 miles from the monument.

Some photos taken on a very frosty morning

Here are some photos that I captured a while back on an extremely frosty morning. Thanks for looking!

Just trying out the video option...

This video was taken several years back of one of our horses, "Patches", running around in one of our pastures. I would like to mention that this was not taken by me, but by one of my sisters. I am using this video as a lab rat...and if it works, I'll stick some videos that I have taken of the natural world on here. Enjoy!

The Sun and a frozen lake

These pictures were taken this past April of the lake behind our house during sunset when the ice was just starting to melt off the water. Enjoy!