2020 Photographic Favorites (Part 2)

 

Hello again and welcome back to part 2 of my 2020 favorites. If you missed Part 1, you can find it here 2020 Favorites (Part 1). As with part 1, these photos are in no particular order, so lets get to it.

This first image, I had in mind for quite a while, just needed the right sky for it. The right sky just happened to be what we as photographers don't really look for, blue sky and white puffy clouds. Finally the day came where I actually remembered this shot, the sky was nice and blue, the clouds puffy white and to the north. I also knew, I wanted all this to make a nice B&W image. What I like about this image is the semitry and high contrast between the white sand and clouds and the blue sky and deep shadows of the beach pavilions, along with the leading line of the walkway. 

This was my first ever attempt at trying to capture lightning. I knew the basics on how to do it, the opportunity just never presented it's self without pouring rain at the same time. On this particular day, I was keeping an eye on the weather, as a major lightning storm was about to blow in. The skies had been clear all day, so I thought this maybe my chance to give it a go. A short trip to the end of our road and out onto our neighborhood dock gave a clear view of the storm front as it moved in. This front was full of constantly striking lighting and I was happy as a clam for it. The next dock over made for an interesting foreground with lights and flags flying in the wind. A lot of shooting lighting is dumb luck, of course you have to know what your doing, but getting that just right shot takes several attempts, this is the best out of 107 images shot that night.

My photographer friend Walt and I took a trip over to Port St Joe, about 3 hours east of Navarre to check out this beached fishing boat. We were just going to make it a scouting mission to find the boat known as the Donna Kay. Being the middle of the day we weren't really expecting to get any good shots, but could come back when conditions were right. Boy were we wrong, yes it was a blue sky day, bright sun and dark shadows. We worked the scene, shot several different compositions, spending about an hour with the boat. Well, what can I say, after getting home and looking at the shots, this one turned out to be my favorite from the trip and also from the year. All the different colors just seemed to work so good together and I'm glad we went.

If you remember from the last blog entry, we had went out in search of Pitcher Plants in the Blackwater State Forest. We did find them and I love photographing these unique carnivorous plants. They come in several different colors, this bog was mainly these green/yellow topped ones. I found this small grouping which were growing in this V pattern with the sunrise in the background. It was up and out the door extra early that day, a two hour drive and a bit of a hike in, but all well worth it in the end.

These two shots go together as they were shot for the same reason. If you remember during the first days of the Covid crisis, most of the country, including us were placed on lockdown for two weeks to hopefully get a handle on it. Well after a few days of going stir crazy around the house, I needed a photography fix. One thing I'm not, and that is a flower photographer, it is something that just never excited me and was also a bit out of my comfort zone. Well, as you can see, I decided to give it a go. I knew I wanted something more the the standard flower picture, and I wanted these beautiful flowers my wife was growing to really stand out in a shot. After several hours of shooting over the next few days, I got the black background technique down to a science. I picked these two shots for their difference, yes both are flowers but the first one is colorful and sharp, while the second one is more subdued and soft. Funny too, the reason for taking these images and how they ended up being two of my favorites from the year.

Ok, that brings us to the end of Part 2, I hope you enjoyed the read and images from my 2020 favorites collection. Stay tuned for Part 3, and we'll see you back here in a few days.