A return to amber waves of grain (in seed)

I returned Tuesday from an eight-day visit to Indiana, where my granddaughter Addison made her First Communion on May 12. During a couple of lulls during the week, I was out exploring things to photograph -- one shoot was of new stuff, two of them revisited previous shoots.

Today's post deals with one of the revisits. In September 2014, I was in rural Henry County roaming a farm owned by members of Lee Ann's family. They refer to the property as The Homeplace. I did a post from that shoot for Photo Potpourri.

On Monday, I was out there again, so I thought I'd do another shoot to compare how things have changed ... or simply to look at things from a new perspective. I didn't spend as much time picture-taking Monday as I did the first time -- mostly because there wasn't to do so. But I did cover a lot of things on the immediate homestead.

Among the dramatic differences this time was that there was no evidence of corn or soybean crops growing or harvested in the field. So technically, there were no "amber waves of grain" in sight, a feature I alluded to in the headline of the post from my 2014 visit (and, hence, the explanation of the headline on this post). Instead, you saw smooth dirt planting areas where the seeds only recently were dropped. Also, the cattle I photographed on the property in 2014 were nowhere to be found this time around.

One scene I don't remember capturing in 2014 is the one shown in the photo leading off the post. This image looks southeast from The Homeplace property. Most homes in country have been around for many, many years, but Lee Ann tells me that the gray house in the upper left corner in this image is relatively new.

As always, to view a larger, sharper version of any photo in this post, simply click on the image. To view a full gallery of the shoot, follow the link in this sentence to the photo gallery at SmugMug.com.

Photo geek stuff: I shot everything in this post with my Canon 6D and Tamron 28-300mm f/3.5-6.3 Di VC PZD lens equipped with a B+W polarizing filter. I bracketed each composition for three exposures to allow for processing each shot in Photomatix high-dynamic range (HDR) software, which I used for everything in this post.

The concrete silo is an obvious target for photos, and I spent some time using it as a subject on both visits. One of those is shown above. The road passing in front of The Homeplace takes 90-degree turns not far from the house in both directions. The one east of the house is shown below.

One of many tractors and other farm implements on the grounds (above), and an angle shot of a roll of hay (below).  

Above: A closeup of the water pump just outside the house on the grounds. 

I captured these storage bins (above) and the three colored cylinders (below) from different angles on the first visit. A shot of the open field and a piece of the farmland appear in the second photo below.

Above and next three below: More implements. 

Above: The 90-degree turn in the main road on the westbound portion of the road. In both instances, a separate road continues in the same direction.

I don't remember the small shed above on the first visit, even though it's not far from the house. I was more intrigued by the bench alongside it (below).

Above: Another slice of the crop-growing section of the property. 

My early photos of the house exterior showed a missing shutter on the left side of this window. The farm's handymen just happened to be around and restored it while I was doing my shoot, and it's reflected in my last shot I took of the house (below). The window is the one on the far right.