Many photography books advise you to carefully compose a scene in your mind, and then carry out that vision with your equipment. However, I don't do it that way! When I go out looking for stunning Smoky Mountains photos and hope to find a candidate to add to my...
I take a lot of photographs log cabins for resort rental companies. And I've seen every cute little thing related to bears in these cabins. Many of them are a tacky dis on the proud and mighty black bear. But I like the one pictured above. The cheerful bear holding...
Celebrating a fine Smoky Mountain day with a few thoughts gleaned from poet Wendell Berry: I come into the peace of wild things … for a time I rest in the grace of the world, and am free. We pray, not for new earth or heaven, but to be quiet in heart, and in eye,...
In the middle of a hot summer, I can get restless, and feeling a bit confined within the boundaries of "normal" images. I start to think "outside the camera." For example, a few weeks ago I wrote a post about camera movement during long exposures to create...
"The year's at the spring, And day's at the morn; Morning's at seven; The hill-side's dew-pearled; The lark's on the wing; The snail's on the thorn; God's in his Heaven— All's right with the world!" Robert Browning
I think fog gets a bad name. It's typically about what fog can obscure: living life in a fog, the fog of war, the fog of depression. Well, like our neighbor over in the mountains of western North Carolina, Carl Sandburg, I think fog has delightful qualities. For...
These three Smoky Mtns photos illustrate something about how the process of photography happens for me. All were taken on a high-elevation trail near Clingmans Dome in the Smokies. Walking along the trail, the scene above caused me to stop. Something about the...
The textures in these photos of aged wood are a thing of beauty. The cracks and weathering only add character. All three of these photos are in the Smoky Mtns. The top and bottom pictures were found in Cades Cove, and the one below is from a door in one of the old...
Smoky Mountains photos need not always be in color, as these three vistas illustrate. The photo above is the classic shot from Mortons Overlook near the top of Newfound Gap Rd. Looking down the valley back towards Gatlinburg, with the Chimneys visible in the upper...
I've been neglecting the blog lately. It's the busiest time of year ... something like a marathon run for Sarah and me. This is the month that draws by far the most visitors to the Smokies. For us it means our Gallery is open seven days a week, while we also have a...
Some of the best Smoky Mountains photos of deer and bear that I have seen are those of photographer Brian Shults. I'd been wanting to meet up with Brian to get some tips on wildlife photography, which is a specialty requiring a whole different strategy than what I'm...
Today's photography tip is about impressionism and experimentation. I've tried Impressionism in my Smoky Mountains photography before, as in Smoky Mountains Monet. All of the photos here were taken with the camera hand-held, with no special Photoshop filters added and...