Natural landscapes: the final flash of light
SUNSET ON BELMONT LAKE, NEAR HAVELOCK, ONTARIO
I went fishing in the archives and landed this scene from 2006. Close friends rented a cottage on this peaceful lake and invited my wife and I to stay a few days. I found lots of time to roam around with photography equipment at key times of day. All these years later, I still find the colour palette — especially the hint of purple — to be quite compelling.
Nikon D50, tripod.
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Wildlife: the silhouette of sunrise
SILHOUETTED HERON, TORONTO, ONTARIO
I was having a lot of problems with my camera when this sunrise photo was made in 2012 (I eventually replaced it), so this photo had significant technical issues. But I’m so happy with the lighting and composition that I spent the time needed – over an hour – in Photoshop to fix the issues and present you this very cool scene, photographed along the shore of Lake Ontario.
Nikon D90, tripod.
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Natural landscapes: me and the river shore
MORNING ALONG THE OTTAWA RIVER, DEEP RIVER, ONTARIO
This little Canadian town along the Quebec-Ontario border is named for one of the deepest sections of the mighty Ottawa River. I was there around sunrise and found the combination of warm light, strong colours and my shadow made for a compelling photo. Do you agree?
Nikon D90, tripod, polarizing filter.
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Natural landscapes: reflecting the epic sky
POOL AND PEAKS, NEAR KILLARNEY, IRISH REPUBLIC
A fishing expedition into the archives landed this beauty from my 1993 trip to Ireland. Photographed on slide film with my long-discarded (but much-loved) Pentax medium-format camera. Then I did significant processing with Photshop to emphasize the sky and increase the drama. That drama works better in black-and-white.
Pentax 6×7 camera, tripod, polarizing filter (probably).
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Rural landscapes: the distant, dramatic view
CANOLA AND THREATENING SKY, NEAR CALGARY, ALBERTA
As soon as I find a field of canola, I start looking at the surroundings to see what might work with the glowing yellow to create a compelling photo. In this case, a view across the gentle, distant valley to the tumultuous sky gave me a thrill. 🙂
Dikon D7100, tripod, polarizing filter.
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Natural landscapes: the roaring rapids
PETAWAWA RIVER, PETAWAWA, ONTARIO
The “Emerald Necklace Trail” in this eastern Canadian military town leads to a great lookout over the river. The challenge was to reduce the light coming into the camera enough to allow for a long exposure, which smooths out the visually busy rapids. I recall the sky was a bland-off white that morning; that’s why I made sure to exclude it from the composition.
Nikon D90, tripod, polarizing filter.
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Rural landscapes: hard to keep your eyes on the road?
THE ROAD THROUGH CANOLA COUNTRY, AIRDRIE, ALBERTA
July is canola season in this western Canadian province, a time when I love cruising country roads to find eye-popping scenes like this. I used a telephoto lens to zoom in on the canola & the road and exclude everything else that would distract and reduce their visual impact.
Nikon D7100, tripod, polarizing filter
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Rural landscapes: the yellow and blue view
CANOLA AND OIL PUMP, NEAR AIRDRIE, ALBERTA
Every July I go on a Canola hunt, searching for compelling views of the fluorescent blossoming grain. This composition, with an oil pump, hit the jackpot in terms of showing two ubiquitous parts of the landscape in this western Canadian province. I like how this picture gives you a sense of being able to see forever on the epic Canadian prairies.
Nikon D7100, tripod, polarizing filter.
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Urban landscapes: the downtown, reflected
FIRST LIGHT OF DAWN, CALGARY, ALBERTA
Prince’s Island Park is an oasis in downtown core of this western Canadian city. It’s also a great photo locale, with wildlife, the nearby Bow River and several ponds that beautifully reflect the city skyline. I really like how the warm first first moments of daylight brought this reflection to life.
The challenge, which took a few minutes of tiny adjustments, was to position the reflected towers and dead tree in the most appealing way.
Nikon D7100, tripod.
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Rural landscapes: the silence after dawn
FENCE AND POND WEST OF CALGARY, ALBERTA
I’ve photographed this pond several times over the years; on this occasion I appreciated the strong morning light and the lack of wind that allowed for a glassy surface. Ponds like this are common in the prairies between Calgary and the Canadian Rockies.
Nikon D7100, tripod, polarizing filter, graduated density (darkening) filter on the sky.
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Rural landscapes: The morning mountain view
DECK CHAIRS ALONG THE SHORE OF WATERTON LAKE, ALBERTA
Waterton Lakes National Park is one of the windiest places in Canada. The breeze is almost always blowing strongly along the lake shore, to the point where many trees grow at a sharp angle away from the prevailing direction.
This spot, protected by trees, is relatively calm and that’s where parks staff set up these red chairs for visitors to enjoy the sublime view and capture selfies.
I published a full-colour version elsewhere (you can see it here: http://bit.ly/WatertonChairs) but wanted to try processing the scene like this, with just the chairs in colour. Do you think it works?
Nikon D7100, tripod, polarizing filter, graduated density (darkening) filter on the sky
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Check out my coffeetable book, “Frank King’s Southern Alberta“: http://bit.ly/1oUzd4A
Rural landscapes: the summertime shoreline vista
ONE OF THE THOUSAND ISLANDS, ONTARIO
There are actually more than 1,800 islands in this vacation paradise straddling the Ontario-New York border. My wife & I did a boat tour in 2007 and were blessed with sunshine and amazing skies for photos like this.
Nikon D50, polarizing filter.
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Wander through my coffeetable photography book “Special Places: A Landscape Photographer’s Vision of Southern Ontario”: http://bit.ly/yNU06F
Rural landscapes: the Irish daisies
DAISIES AND FARMER’S FIELD, NEAR HOOK HEAD, COUNTY WEXFORD, IRISH REPUBLIC
Went on an expedition into the archives and found this beautiful evening scene captured during my 1993 trip to Ireland. This was made with a medium-format film camera, then the slide was converted into a jpeg. This procedure inevitably results in the need for a lot of Photoshopping and that was certainly the case here.
Pentax 6×7 camera, tripod, polarizing filter (probably).
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Want to buy this picture? Email me and I’ll make it happen! (fdking@hotmail.com).
Check out my coffeetable book, “IRELAND: Visions of Light”: http://bit.ly/IrelandVisionsOfLight
Natural landscape: the mountain wetland
FOREST POOL, WATERTON LAKES NATIONAL PARK, ALBERTA
It was windy – it’s almost always very windy in the southwest corner of this western Canadian province – but I found a few moments of relative peace to photograph this wetland and aspen trees near the shore of the park’s largest lake. Conditions were overcast, so I went for a high-contrast treatment to add some drama to the scene.
Nikon D7100, tripod, polarizing filter
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Urban landscapes: Entry #6
MALL ENTRANCE, CROSSIRON MILLS, BALZAC, ALBERTA
This giant mall, on the outskirts of Calgary, has interesting – and well-lit – urban art at every entrance. I photographed several during the pre-dawn hours. This one worked best when I twisted the camera for a more interesting perspective.
Nikon D7100, tripod.
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Urban landscapes: the circling lights
CALGARY STAMPEDE MIDWAY RIDE, ALBERTA
Night photography on your average midway usually presents a ridiculous amount of picture possibilities. In the case of the annual Calgary Stampede, the biggest challenge is almost every square inch of space is taken up by people. They often bump into the tripod and get in the way of good compositions. That said, a little persistence and patience pays off with pictures like this.
Nikon D90, tripod.
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Rural landscapes: the summer prairie sky
STORM CLOUDS NEAR NANTON, ALBERTA
I’ve always appreciated the cheeky humour of the farmer who added the smiling mouth to the side of his barn, but was never moved to make a photo. Then, while returning to my home in Calgary after a photo day trip, these crazy clouds made me pull off the road and haul out the photography equipment.
While vehicles roared past barely 10 feet away, I captured several pictures including this one. Even as I made this photo, I knew I would create a black-and-white version to fully highlight the drama of the prairie sky. Here’s the colour version: http://bit.ly/BarnAndSky.
Nikon D7100, tripod, polarizing filter, graduated density (darkening) filter on the sky.
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Want to buy this picture? Email me and I’ll make it happen! (fdking@hotmail.com).
Check out my coffeetable book, “Frank King’s Southern Alberta“: http://bit.ly/1oUzd4A
Urban landscapes: morning light, reflected
PUDDLES AND REFLECTIONS, TORONTO, ONTARIO
It was a dry morning along the waterfront in Canada’s largest city, but someone had sprayed down this area near one of the office buildings and I was intrigued by the pattern of water & pavement and light & dark. I recall it took a bit of moving around before I found a combination that produced an interesting composition.
Nikon D7100, tripod, polarizing filter
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Want to buy this picture? Email me and I’ll make it happen! (fdking@hotmail.com).
Wander through my coffeetable photography book “Special Places: A Landscape Photographer’s Vision of Southern Ontario”: http://bit.ly/yNU06F
Rural landscapes: the long mountain view
RURAL HOMES IN THE FOOTHILLS, SOUTHERN ALBERTA
The great thing about long summer days is I can go on three-hour sunrise photo trips and be back home by the time my wife gets up. This was one of those trips, touring through the Rocky Mountain foothills southwest of my home in Calgary. The light was very direct on this scene and that “flattened” the contrast, so I did a fair bit of work in Photoshop to add contrast and sparkle to the composition.
Nikon D7100k tripod, polarizing filter, graduated density (darkening) filter on the mountains & sky.
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Want to buy this picture? Email me and I’ll make it happen! (fdking@hotmail.com).
Check out my coffeetable book, “Frank King’s Southern Alberta“: http://bit.ly/1oUzd4A
Natural landscapes: the glorious valley view
ATHABASCA RIVER AND PEAKS, JASPER NATIONAL PARK, ALBERTA
I visited this lookout in the Canadian Rocky Mountains the previous afternoon when the light was all wrong, so I returned at sunrise the next day and captured this stunning example of God’s glorious creation. The colour version is good, but I wanted a more classic Ansel Adams-style version to show you.
(Here’s a colour view from same lookout, looking in the opposite direction: https://wp.me/p2ccTX-19a.)
Nikon D7100, tripod, polarizing filter, graduated density (darkening) filter on the peaks and sky.
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Want to buy this picture? Email me and I’ll make it happen! (fdking@hotmail.com).
Check out my coffeetable book, “MOMENTS OF LIGHT: Thirty Years of Photography”: http://bit.ly/JTNnMX
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