My wife and I were visiting Hwange National Park in Zimbabwe. The sun had just dropped below the horizon and we were preparing to return to Little Makalolo, our base camp, when I heard “thrashing” sounds that were unmistakably those of an elephant herd.
We could barely make out the silhouetted movements of the herd on the far side of the river. I knew not to use a...
While we were staying at a beach house in Kapoho, Hawaii, the tide came in and unexpectedly came all the way across the street and under the house. The landscape was totally transformed and we suddenly had fish swimming in the driveway. This picture of a palm tree reflected in the lawn was taken from the porch. While our kids played in the yard, we sat on the porch and...
I had passed this long-abandoned, one-room prairie schoolhouse near Elk City, Kansas, hundreds of times over the years and each time I resolved to stop the next time to photograph it. Except for the chimney and tin roof, there had been no apparent effort to preserve the building, which is now on private property. Finally, on a hot, cloudless July morning, after 25 years of procrastination, I...
I had passed several peacocks that day with tails fanned out, their deeply colored feathers winking at me like brilliant feline eyes. Been there (many times), photographed that, no longer interested. But here, 15 yards away, was a peacock with no color. Normally one of the most colorful birds in the world, every feather on this one was white! From a moving tram in a Kauai...
While on the freeway, I pass over this giant drainage system on the way to my studio each day. And each time, I catch a glimpse of this shopping cart way off in the back. I often wondered about the chances of it still being there in case I wanted to make a shot. Well, after about a week of seeing it every day, the shopping cart was still there. So, I waited until the sun was nice and low...
This photo was taken one late afternoon in Port Ludlow, Washington, on the Olympic Peninsula. The day was overcast, gloomy, and colorless, until the sun finally peeked through leaden skies. The colors of the kayaks looked particularly bright, in contrast to the gray surroundings. It appeared as though the sun was focusing on the only...
While sitting under a shade tree in the backyard, I took a quick shot of some oak leaves against the evening sky (shown upper right). When I processed the images I discovered the pleasing effect of the silhouetted leaves and spent the next few days scouring the yard for interesting shapes. I employed my Third Hand tool, which has a rod with an alligator clip on each end, to hang the subjects so I...
This photo of a drained storage tank with the access cover removed was taken in Livingston, Montana. The photo evokes a different feeling depending on the season. On a sweltering summer day, one gets the feeling that someone opened the valve too far...
I shot this image casually, as a friend and I relaxed in a nearly empty waterfront café after a shoot. I can’t tell you why I shot it, but I can tell you why it gradually has become a sort of personal favorite. Although it contains nothing dramatic, it says something very basic about photography.
We don’t know whose sunglasses these are, how they came to be...
I was looking for an access path to the ocean to shoot the sunrise one brutally cold morning in November at Seabrook Beach, New Hampshire. The temperature was so low my eyes were tearing up so I sat down on this bench to unload my gear and blow on my hands.
When the sun came up a calm rushed over me. I got so caught up in the amazing light of the sunrise that I put my camera...
On a morning walk/shoot through Loch Raven Reservoir in Loch Raven, Maryland, I came upon a gaggle of geese. The morning mist was lifting off of the lake and there were fishermen in the water. Fortunately, the geese didn’t need me to be around them, so I turned to head back to the road for some distance shots and waited for the sun to rise a little more. This is the scene that I was blessed...
I count this image among my best not because of the "aha" I felt as I dashed across a busy Tucson, Arizona, street before the sun could move another inch. It was only after I had several shots stowed safely in my Canon EOS-1Ds Mark II that I realized what I had actually found.
The first aha was seeing those nine "wanderers in the desert" from...
I promised myself while on this cruise I would take more of the local color during stops at the ports. The photos I wanted to take were going to tell a story, not about the scenery but about the people. Trouble is, a week...
I had been wandering through side streets of a rural Chinese village in the farmlands south of Beijing hoping to find interesting subject matter for documenting the contrast between the "old" and "new" China when I came upon what I initially thought was a deserted military compound. On further inspection, I noticed this multicolored wall painting depicting...