A tribute to Garfield Park's tilting timber

A couple days ago, I uploaded one of the pictures you see in this post to my wall on Facebook. In the accompanying note, I half-joked that Garfield Park in Indianapolis would be wise to promote its handful of weirdly shaped trees to draw more visitors, not that the park is lacking patrons.

I'm sure any heavily treed area has its share of odd tree formations. But Garfield Park's niche might be that people, if they had access (online or somewhere in the park) to a brief printed guide and/or map, could find, view, enjoy and photograph a select number of odd-shaped treess, and do so within a relatively contained area and within a short amount of time.

The tree featured prominently in this post was a new "find" for me when I was out shooting Dec. 21. By its size, it's obviously been around a while, so somehow I've either missed it or didn't go near it on the visits I've made there in the past few years.

I add it to my growing list of odd-shaped or otherwise distinguished trees (the others appear at the bottom of this post). For those of you interested in finding and seeing this one, it's on Conservatory Drive, south of Fire Station 29, along the west rim of the curved hill that sledders use after snowfalls.

To view a full gallery of shots from the Dec. 21 shoot in Garfield Park, visit my site at SmugMug.

Next up: Other bridges in Garfield Park.

Above and next several below: The "new" tree (new to me, anyway), beginning above with a perspective shot as it appears to someone southbound on Conservatory Drive. The monochrone version immediately below also entailed erasing/cloning out some branches of the tree adjacent to it and to the left from this view. You see that tree in the other, normal-stature tree in the frame below the monochrome shot. 

Above: The "new" tree, on the west rim of the curved sledding hill, is in the far background -- almost straight ahead -- of this shot, taken from the peak of the Ticklebelly Hill bridge over Pleasant Run on Conservatory Drive. 

OTHER ODD-SHAPED OR 

DISTINGUISHED TREES IN GARFIELD PARK

This photo dates to Jan. 8, 2005, and was taken following one of my most favorite snowfalls in recent memory -- the type where the snow sticks to branches and buildings. This tree is near the bend, or nook, of the "L" shaped Garfield Drive, greeting westbound pedestrians and motorists on the Drive's south leg as the road turns north.  

Above and below: Two additional views of the conifer pictured previously. These two, which look north and slightly east toward the residential area east of the park, were taken Dec. 24, 2004, not long before the other.

Above: The former "V" shaped tree at the north end of the park with the so-called Ticklebelly Hill in the background. This was taken in February 2006; the tree has since fallen or been felled, although a good share of the downed trunk and branches remains at the site. 

Above and below: Two views of unusual ornamentation on a tree in the picnic grove at the south end of the park, not far from Pagoda Drive southwest of the MacAllister Center for the Performing Arts. The one above was taken in February 2011 on the first shoot in which I experimented with high-dynamic range (HDR) imaging; the one below about a year earlier.

Above: This tree might be the most unusual of all in the park. It is situated along the pedestrian path outside the west end of the Sunken Garden and just north of the pedestrian bridge over Bean Creek. This photo was taken in October 2010, and I devoted a post to it at the time. Click here to see other pictures of the tree from different angles. 

Above and next two below: These trees fall into the category I'd call "distinguished trees" in the park. The first (above), a monochrome conversion of a silhouette composition, is the one I dubbed "The Tree" in a post in February 2011. It is situated in a grove at the park's south end, not far from Southern Avenue. The one immediately below, another HDR rendering, is a stately maple that greets visitors to the aquatic center and motorists, cyclists and pedestrians along the Pagoda Drive hill. Unfortunately, this tree has been slowly dying over the past few years. I'm glad I caught photos of its colorful orange and yellow leaves while it was still relatively full and healthy in 2005; it has not been the same since. I include the final tree, a victim of storm damage, because of its interesting post-damage shape and white trunk. 

Perennial outdoor color show, revisited

Inspired by yet another great day Monday, I shrugged off the cold that's been dogging me since Thursday and made another foray into Garfield Park in Indianapolis while the fall colors were still pretty showy.

This time, I took along -- and used -- my polarizing filter, and the hunch paid off handsomely, capturing some gorgeously rich blues in the sky and all but eliminating glare on a fire station window that reflected some brilliant yellows and oranges from nearby trees. My only regret was not bringing along a longer focal-length lens to see what it would have gotten me for the jet stream shots below. Instead, all of these were shot with my Tamron 28-75mm f/2.8 lens.

Above: Intermittent sunlight splashing through a maple

Above: First of three frames following a jet and its thin stream nearing a much-closer-to-the-ground yellow-leafed tree

Above: Past the first branch, heading toward the second

Above: Safely past the second branch, and steering clear of the rest

Above: Different trees, different skyscape, including clouds and (above) a jet stream swath much wider than the one above. Adding a special touch is the little bird perched on a leafless branch in the upper right corner.

Above: Fire Station 29, the bountiful tree's reflection cast on the windows along the side, as seen from the sidewalk flanking East Raymond Street, just west of Pleasant Run Parkway, North Drive

Above: A little closer look at the reflection off the fire station's window panels.

Above: Even closer ...

Above: A stately, but relatively young, tree in Garfield Park's Grove of Remembrance, just west of Fire Station 29, that was dedicated by the community in October 1920 in honor of the 387 Marion County soldiers and sailors who died in World War I (1914-18). Trees in the grove have been planted in intervals and are just west of the Fire Station.

Above: A most unusual conifer that naturally curves at the top.

Above: Another frame of contrasting sunlight through a tree, allowing for some spectacular highlights.

Above: The coda image in this post is actually not from the park; it's from my backyard garden and features the vivid red leaves of a Henry's Garnet (itea virginica).