November 2022

Snow Angel
Bozeman, Montana
2020

Ragged Line
Bozeman, Montana
2020

This photo is actually from a couple of years ago, but it’s looking a lot like this outside right now, and it’s not even mid-November yet.

Black and White in Color
Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming
2022

Every once in a while I come across a scene that looks for all practical purposes totally to be in black and white even though it’s in a full color environment (i.e. what I see with my eyes, not what I might convert it to after photographing it). That’s what I thought when I saw this portion of Mammoth Hot Springs recently. However, it was only approximately a black and white scene as witnessed by this actual black and white conversion of the same image:

It is interesting to note that although some scenes look more dramatic, more three-dimensional so to speak, when converted to black and white, that is not the case for this one. It comes across to me anyway as having more depth in color than in black and white. I actually played around with split-toning the image, which can add implied depth to an image, just to see if I could come closer to the look of the color version but did not succeed. There are a lot more subtle shades of color at work in this scene than is immediately obvious I think.

Hot Springs Dessert
Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming
2022

Grab a metaphorical spoon and dig into this luscious visual dessert at Mammoth Hot Springs. Guaranteed low calorie and no sugar added.

Colorful Coverage
Bozeman, Montana
2022

The willow trees around our pond have yet to peak in their fall colors, yet many leaves have already fallen, providing a solid blanket on the pond’s surface. The more subtle colors of the willow leaves are accented by contributions from the smaller group of aspens also growing next to the pond.

Woman on the Beach (With Fig Leaf)
Bozeman, Montana
2022

The Woman on the Beach sculpture is courtesy of Paul Harris. The “fig leaf” (actually an aspen or cottonwood leaf from among the many trees of both varieties growing along the walkway), as well as all the rest of the lovely fall colored leaves, are courtesy of Mother Nature.

Blocked Portal
Bighorn Canyon, Montana
2022

I came across this pile of rocks when I was bushwhacking down a canon. It looks man-made, almost like an ancient Irish portal tomb or dolmen, but it was just part of a random pile of big boulders blocking my way in the canyon. It would have been a perfect, easy, stand-up walk through the blockage except for the log that had lodged in the middle of the passage during some high-water flood. So instead I had to either crawl under the log or scramble up and over the boulder pile to get to the other side. I chose the latter.

Two Times Strange
Bighorn Canyon, Montana
2022

I’ve hiked quite a bit in the Bighorn Canyon area at varying elevations and this is the only fossilized evidence I’ve seen of ancient sea/lake beds. Not only that, but searching the general area of this sighting yielded only a few other quite small fragments of a similar nature. So it certainly seemed strange to come across an interesting fossil specimen in the middle of a hiking trail. But it was doubly strange to see be two similar sized segments of rock with such different water patterns stacked one on top of the other. When I see such phenomena, my first thought generally is that I wished I knew more about the geology of the area so I could understand the context of what I am looking at. But on reflection, I think perhaps it’s better not to know the hows and whys as it removes all the mystery about the sighting.

Sunrise Over Suessland
Bighorn Canyon, Montana
2022

These rather unusual blossoms (for want of a better word) on some moss-like but hard ground cover on the rocks at Bighorn Canyon looked like some sort of strange trees on a miniature Dr. Suess story landscape. Very other-worldly looking.

Lost Croc
Bighorn Canyon, Montana
2022

This lost Croc fit right in among the driftwood floating on the water.