Great Smokey NP News

There will be some major roadworks going on in and around the GSNP this spring, I knew Cades Cove would be closed for a few months which means i will miss the turkey rut which was great last year but it goes way beyond just Cades Cove-see here
This means a revision to my spring plans but i am already looking at areas on the NC side of the smokies which sound interesting

Dave

Keep an open mind and an open eye

The last few mornings have seen me sitting under dark starry Tennessee skies waiting for the gates to open at Cades Cove, I used to enjoy star gazing and thought that i would stop looking and try and get a shot, I put the 14-24 on the D3 and fixed it to my tripod and made sue everything was strapped tightly down, i used a remote cord and set the camera to manual exposure and wound the dial down to 'bulb' Then it was a matter of taking a test shot which meant holding the remote down and counting, i started at 20 secs and worked my way through to 45 seconds, I couldn't see anything through the view finder so i set the lens to manual and to infinity,Orion is very visible in the early morning sky so i made sure to get that in, I made sure that there was some tree tops in the image giving some depth to the scene, there have been lots of shooting stars the last few mornings but i never managed to get one in the image, The line on the image is a plane, If nothing else it gave me something to do whilst waiting and gave me a chance to practice with some long exposure times

Dave

Smokey Mountains-wet wet wet 2

Today was an improvement over yesterday, The rain stayed most of the day but I had changed my plans to match, Instead of joining the masses at Cades Cove I had a lie in and after breakfast went to a small lane that runs at the side of the river, here were many rapids and small waterfalls and at the end after a 15 min hike a larger fall, the tree colours here were great, not the deep reds but various shades of yellow/gold, The inclement weather was good for this type of work where low shutter speeds are the name of the game, I would normally fit a polariser filter to saturate the colours and slow the shutter speed down but due to the rain and low light I decided against it, The only reason I would have liked it would be to take the shine off of the rocks, So all was well with the world-not quite, After taking a couple of hundred images in sequences of 5 for HDR the D3 packed up giving me the cd Error again, I had this problem in Colorado in June and the body had been sent back to Nikon for repair, It seems to me that the problem lies with the 2nd card slot and it was the same then, I havent had a chance since to shoot enough to fill the 1st card and spill over to the 2nd until today, Unfortunatly for me I didn’t have any other cards on me and it only happened after I had climbed down to the base of a waterfall and I only managed 3 images which luckily were enough for an HDR image-see below, Tomorrow will see the last of the bad weather with a chance of frost and snow on the higher ground and after that clear skies and sunshine for the rest of the week, Monday will see me back in Cades Cove for the white tails, Once again these images were processed on my uncelebrated laptop

Dave

Smokey Mountains-wet wet wet

Firstly my apologies for any bad English in my previous posts, My time lately has been extremely limited and many posts have been made late at night with the few minutes i have had-so bear with me
Yesterday was another long day-traveling across country,over the NC smokey mountains to Tennessee, I dropped my bags and drove to a place called Cades Cove, Its a very historic place with early settlers dwellings still in place, I came here in April and shot the wild turkeys in their mating plumage, Now i am here for the 'fall' colours and some white tailed deer, late yesterday afternoon i did a quick drive around the 11 mile loop road and was surprised by the lack of wildlife so today up very early and made my way to the gate and in front of me-15 cars and it was still an hour to opening, by the time the gate was opened there were 40+ cars,what a nightmare,The road is very narrow and as soon as somebody sees something they stop instead of pulling over so its a constant traffic jam, The weather was very miserable and raining, I stopped to shoot some close by Bucks but had to shoot as ISO 1600 and 3200 wide open at F4, a guy next to me was shooting with a Canon 300F4 with a 2x on and i guess all his stuff will be in the bin when he views them-mine were, i decided to call it a day early and left to check out some landscape/waterfall areas, i took a few images and did a quick HDR on some,My laptop isn't calibrated so excuse any colour errors, At one of the waterfalls there were some fungi growing out of a tree trunk so used the 14-24 to good use
I am now going to spend a couple of hours driving around looking for some areas to shoot over the next week


Dave

Trip Report-Smokey Mountains-Tennesse 2

I didn't make it into the Smokies yesterday-The weather was very bad with heavy Snow showers and i had a couple od things to sort out, I had looked at the forecast for today and it looked pretty good so i was itching to get out this morning and arrived well before the gates opened,There was still snow on the mountains and a report of 12'' at the top-all in one day,The morning was bright and frosty with a thin layer of snow at the base of the mountains, As per their name the floor had a nice thick layer of mist that quickly burnt off,but not before i shot some landscapes and a couple of deer, The Turkeys were still near the entrance but still distant so i hoped that i would bump into some more further round the park, Little did i know that it would be near te end of the loop that some Turkeys popped out of the woodland but were followed (too) closely by a local photographer who literally herded them along-no point in staying there so i drove off but as i did another single turkey appeared and strutted his stuff right in front of me, I took some full body type shots before grabbing the big gun (600) which had a 1.4x and D300 attached, I had seen an image a long time ago that really impressed me of these strange looking bird, I looked through the view finder and it was full of turkey, the shutter speed was very low 1/40 but i didnt want to up the ISO so a steady hand was called for and i managed plenty of shots to make sure that i had nailed it-brilliant only 2 days in and my target was in the bag, I drove off very pleased with myself and quickly viewed a large woodpecker through the trees-a pilated-it was massive (size of a crow) and only a few feet from the floor, I tried from the car but there was too many branches in the way, I slowly got out of the car and quietly crept through the woodland only for a truck to pull up to see what i was doing and the bird flew, I carried on driving to the camp site to see if any bears had been seen, i grabbed a coffee and waited, A few American robins landed nearby so i grabbed my camera and a young lad came from nowhere and chased them off-looking very pleased with himself-dont you just love em, Once the kid had gone i carried on waiting to see if they returned, they didnt but instead another pilated woodpecker landed in the tree right in front of me, I only had the camera and beanbag so had to handhold the monster lens,after a had some shots in the bag i decided to quickly go to the car and grab the tripod,The bird hung around and as i grabbed another couple of shots it dropped out of the tree and fed around a stump close by-well all my christmas's came at once and it stayed for about 10 mins and in the shade so i didnt have to worry about blowing the bright whites, The Pilated is a bird that was high on my wanted list when i came to the states and to have one so obliging was amazing-what a morning and what a place, I cant wait for the 'fall' as this place is soo picturesque during the winter it will be amazing with the golden folage


Dave

Trip Report-Smokey Mountains-Tennesse

Yesterday i drove from North Carolina over the Great Smokey Mountains to the Tennesse side, I arrived about 2pm and dropped my cases off at the motel,I grabbed my gear and headed towards Cades Cove, I have never been before but had done my homework, Cades Cove is in the Smokies National Park and is a very historic part of the park with ancient buildings dotted around, Its very well known and extremley busy, If cades cove was a NP it would be the busiest in the States-very popular to say the least, The animals and White Tailed Deer in particular are very easy to approach and if you see an image of a WT Deer published chances are it was taken here, I knew i was out of season, the deer have rutted and lost their antlers,For deer shots its best in the 'Fall' and i have a cabin booked especially for that-Then it will be crazy with people, One thing that suprised me is that if you park up you are free to walk off trail and approach the animals, I drove around the 11 mile loop road and viewed lots of deer along with some wild turkey, Then about half way around i saw a black blob near some woodland, I grabbed the bins and it was a bear so i grabbed the gear and headed down towards it,when i got closer i looked behind me and i had about 100 people running down towards me mainly young kids shouting and screaming, The parents egging them on to get closer, Luckily there was a ranger at hand and he did his best to keep the crowd back especially when we realised that there was a young bear with it, I only had the D3 and 600, In my panic i forgot the extenders,It was good to see but because of the crowds the bears kept distant but a good start, Today i was at the entrance at dawn and waited with a couple of other photographers for the gates to open, Instantly there were Wild Turkey going through the courting process and what magnificent creatures they are when strutting their stuff,They were way too distant but i did managed to get close to one later on although he though he was a capercaille and stayed in the woodland, I also bumped into a group of deer and decided to get some shots and 2 of the deer decided to have a fight and stood on their back legs and bitch slapped each other like march hares, The weather today was very cold and late this evening it started snowing-snow is predicted for the next day or 2 and freezing temperatures,not what i expected and it will put paid to any landscapes with sky and to any wildflower photography,One thing that is here in abundance are waterfalls so i have already been having a play in the low light,The D3 and 24-70 are a match made in heaven for this and as well as full waterfall landscapes i have been doing some details stuff at different shutter speeds to get different effects, With the unpredictable weather we will have to see what happens to the wildlife but if i can i will concentrate on the turkeys whilst they are courting, I was lucky today when i found a group of deer and the main male still had a 'rack' but i bet he is the only one


Dave