MorseBlog

Prologue I remember well the smoke rising off the mountain in the late afternoon summer. Silver surplus war bombers circling and banking against the rock of the mountain spewing long tails of gore, their dyed slurry of fire retardant. They remain in my mind small and insignificant against the plume of smoke, the mountain, the sky, and the landscape of my hometown. From our front deck we had the perfect view to watch the Mt Elden fire as it started as a small plume of smoke at the base and then watched in distress as it advanced up the dry rocky face of the mountain. By night fall it had covered most of the visible face of the mountain and Flagstaff was able to watch with uneasy fascination as old conifers a hundred feet or more tall burst into flame and flared like a struck match before dying out as quickly as they flared into the brief consumption of all that was green and needed for life. What we didn’t understand was the worse was out of sight north of the town and along the easte...

Sandpoint is a small town that sits on the shores of Lake Pend d’Oreille in the panhandle of northern Idaho. The town itself hosts some surprising wildlife. In the tall ponderosa pines in the park, across the street from where I live, between the baseball diamond and swing sets nest some Peregrine falcons. Osprey are seen and heard often; one day I watched 5 circle overhead with their soft cries as they communicated high up in the blue sky. Another pair of osprey nest on top of a microwave dish on the telephone exchange in the downtown area. Bald eagles frequently fly overhead in straight lines as they commute from one location to another.  This morning I walked down to the middle of town to have a mooch around the farmer’s market and the art show that is taking place this weekend. I had a nice walk and met a really good photographer who I may write about later. On my home walking the residential streets I turned a corner and didn’t believe my eyes; for lying in someone’s back yar...

I continue on my Northern Idaho Digital series. My apologies to my Analog followers but as I am in the complicated process of moving  andI have opted for the simpler (and cheaper) alternative of shooting digital for now. To recap I have a Fujifilm GFX 50s II and which I try and shoot in an ‘analog manner’. That is I try and do as many things as manually as possible. I also have adapted a small range of medium format Mamiya 645 lenses and also some 35mm lenses such as the Olympus 135mm f2.8. So my focus is manual as are my exposure settings. I live with a single fixed white balance. (I actually think auto white balance wastes more time than it saves. It never seems right and can often take away the color of the natural light.) Some earlier posts described my evolving experience with digital as an analog guy.  Because of my circumstances I don’t have a PC and so rely only on the iPad native photo editing which has a pretty cramped range of exposure and brightness settings....

It’s August first and I’m on the road to Hope from Sandpoint on the banks of Lake Pend d’Oreille this evening. It’s been over a week of extremely hot weather up to 100 degrees Fahrenheit. This evening the weather seemed to break; a wind kicked up driving dust down the street as I sat on my front porch. Taking photos was unheard of for the last week due to the heat and relentless blue sky. Indeed the heat suppressed most outdoor activities.  This dry wind and thickening cloud seemed a portent for more exciting weather, perhaps a thunderstorm.  I am trying to make myself more aware of the conditions in Sandpoint that might be advantageous for photography. This sudden shift in the weather seemed like something might result from it. So I load the camera (Fuji GFX 50s II) and tripod into the truck and head out to highway 200, the road to Hope rather appropriately. I was at this location back in June. I found it a few years ag...