The Path Less Traveled
Mount St Francis Retreat in Southern Indiana has miles of hiking paths. On any given path, you are likely to find at least one wooden bridge - this is the longe...
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Mount St Francis Retreat in Southern Indiana has miles of hiking paths. On any given path, you are likely to find at least one wooden bridge - this is the longest one of many.
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Nov, 2015Views
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Behind The Lens
Location
This photo was taken at Mount St. Francis Center for Spirituality, a pastoral location just a few miles away from my home. The grounds consist of a large lake, a smaller pond, and several miles of hiking trails. The trails often contain wooden bridges that span creeks or seasonal streams. This particular walkway/bridge covered several hundred yards on the back side of the large lake.Time
The photo was taken at around 2 PM on an early fall afternoon. There was quite a bit of fall foliage, but the trees were still predominately green. I was captured by the quality of the light and shadow coming through the trees and landing on the wooden path, and when editing the photos, I felt the light/shadow play was best expressed in infrared with a sepia overlay.Lighting
I love natural light and the effect of light and shadow - especially when dancing through trees and leaves! The natural light worked beautifully for this photo, but in taking out the color and expressing the photo in infrared/sepia, it really brought a rather magical air to the light bouncing off the foliage.Equipment
I used my Nikon D40x and my go-to lens, the Nikkor 55-300. Due to the shadows where I composed the shot, I utilized a white diffusor over my built in flash. No tripod, or other special equipment.Inspiration
I was hiking around the large lake and stopped for a drink of water and to adjust my bag, when I looked up I was immediately in love with the way the light filtered down through the trees onto the wooden walkway. I shot several angles, but this one came closest to capturing the light and shadow in just the right way...Editing
I tried several levels of saturation, but none quite captured the feel until I switched to infrared to give it the tiniest bit of flare, then a sepia layer to warm it up a bit. Then a quick crop to focus attention on the pathway.In my camera bag
I have two bags. My large canvas bag contains all of my equipment - camera, four lenses, tripod, sling, diffusors, extra SD cards and spare battery. When I am hiking I just take my smaller bag with my D40x, 55-300 lens, a spare battery and SD card, and lens cleaning pen.Feedback
The time of day is important. Early morning and late afternoon are prime times for shooting outdoors. When attempting to capture light play, particularly through trees, shoot from several different angles. Crop to tighten the focus. But I think what gives this particular photo that little bit extra is the infrared that provides the "glow" and the sepia that warms the photo overall.
