Silver Drops

by John Williams

In the spring and early summer of 2011, heavy rainfall and snow melt flooded unusual areas in the Columbia River Gorge. Looking back down into the Gorge as I hiked up to one of the Gorge waterfalls I saw this view in one of those flooded areas. When I first saw this scene, and while setting up, the overcast lighting and calm conditions led to a low-contrast, silvery scene. The pristine reflections created a bit of an optical illusion. Hoping to capture the rare beauty, I got out my gear and set up to photograph. Finally happy with my composition and camera settings, I turned to retrieve my shutter release from the bag and felt a rain drop! Horrified that I might be losing the reflections, I whirled back to the camera and took this photograph. Luck was with me; those initial rain drops added a wonderful texture for a brief moment, and immediately after this photograph the reflections became a muddled blur.

Equipment: Nikon D80, Nikkor 70.0-300.0 mm f/4.5-5.6

John Williams

My path to photography began by birdwatching. By profession I am a veterinarian, but enjoy birding as a hobby. Not long after purchasing a spotting scope for birdwatching, I stumbled across Ann Cook's digiscoped images of birds and was immediately hooked. In June of 2002, I purchased my first digital camera (a Nikon Coolpix 880) and began trying to digiscope images of birds by holding the camera up to the scope. Birding is typically best in the early morning and late afternoon, when the light is also often best for landscape photography. While out digiscoping, I began to take photos of the scenery around me. This eventually led to more landscape photography. The beauty of nature has always fascinated and filled me, and I find more and more that attempting to capture photographically what I experience has grown into a full-blown passion.

Website: www.commercialfineart.com/fine-art-shopping-other-artists/john-willi

Silver Drops by John Williams was photo of the day on Thursday, 6th October 2011. It is tagged Shadows, Trees. You can leave a comment below.

17 Comments

Greg Aitkenhead

6th October 2011 at 3:14 am

Beautiful photo. I remember wanting to stop so many times this spring as my gal and I drove to Wyoming–everything was flooding, but we had to make time. This photo makes me wish I had stopped.