Gatlinburg trip, Part I: Great Smoky Mountains National Park

A first-ever trip to Gatlinburg, Tenn., from April 28 to May 2, in addition to fun and new sights, scenery and attractions to enjoy, produced something I fully expected based on previous travels -- reams (and more reams!) of photographs to process.

In my slight (feeble?) defense, Lee Ann's 3-year-old grandson, Jaxson, and son-in-law Matt came along, as did Lee Ann's youngest daughter, Lea, so ... getting family in the pictures seemed like the appropriate thing to do!

It's taken me this long to get through all the images, but get through them all, I did. So the dilemma then became ... what to do with them, how to organize and present them here, and in what order?

Ordinarily I tend to go chronologically, but because there was a significant mixture of both iPhone and digital camera photographs, I had to take a little longer to plan. Taking the extra time helped only marginally. So ... I'm going to simply jump in and see where it takes me.

Hence, the images you see here, as it turns out, are from the last full day on the trip, a day we spent several hours (finally) in Great Smoky Mountains National Park, a national treasure for sure. The photo leading off the post is one of the vistas I grabbed during the visit. But we could see the glorious mountains, hills and colors like this (just different vantage points) every day from the place where we were staying. But seeing the Smokies from afar like that wasn't like actually being in the park as we were on May 2. There, we spent a good 15 minutes on paved roads -- en route to the Trillium Gap Trailhead -- that dealt us scenery like what you see below.

Lee Ann had spent the previous day studying our trail exploration options, and we decided on Trillium Gap Trailhead, which ascends Mount Le Conte -- one of the taller mountains east of the Mississippi River. The trail promised us we'd come across several small rapids and falls before landing, approximately at the 1.3-mile mile, a sizable waterfall, Grotto Falls.

For me, Matt and Lea, 1.3 miles -- even climbing a mountain trail -- didn't seem too difficult. But when you're climbing with a 3-year-old and an adult with arthritc knees, it required all of us to pace ourselves properly. But we were troopers on this day, and we made it to Grotto Falls and back with only a dozen mild obstacles.

As always, if you'd like to view a larger, sharper version of a photo, simply click on the image. This is particularly helpful if you access the blog from a mobile device. To see a full gallery of images from the May 2 visit to Great Smoky Mountain National Park, follow the link in this sentence.

Photo geek stuff: Most of the images in this post were taken with my Canon 6D and Tamron 28-300mm f/3.5-6.3 Di VC PZD lens. I made three exposures of each composition, most of which I later melded into one image using Photomatix high-dynamic range (HDR) software. Halfway through processing images on this day's shoot, I upgraded from Photomatix version 5 to version 6.1, which gave me some very striking results in a new processing option called "tone balancer." With version 5, I'd often used the "contrast optimizer" option. But tone balancer tends to better balance lights and darks, offering a more dynamic rendering.

A couple more vistas (above and below) we came across, followed by (second below) a vista that includes a foreground showing remnants of some of the Smoky Mountains wildfires of 2016.

Above and below: While walking the trails, hikers need to pay attention to their footing. There are quite a few sections riddled with snaking tree roots like these. 

Above and next two below: Perspectives of Grotto Falls, our destination, the only waterfall in the entire park where hikers can actually walk behind. 

Above: This is the "wall" behind the falls that appears behind the gentleman standing two photos above. You don't see any cascading water in the photo above because I am standing behind the falls. 

Matt, with Jaxson at his side (above), capturing video of Grotto Falls; a closeup is below. 

Above: This is the stream from the falls, as seen from a boulder in front of the falls. The view looks down the hill we had just climbed, although the actual "trail" (the walkable portion) of that hill is to the left, out of the picture. 

Two other, smaller falls (above and below) that we came across walking toward Grotto Falls, and another falls (second below) we came across while driving out of the park. 

Above and below: There were many old structures scattered throughout the park. We came upon these two on the same site, about 40 yards apart, as we drove out of the park. 

Next up: Ripley's Aquarium

Images from ... Fifteen Miles Out

 

The challenge was to head out in any direction from home and drive 15 miles, stop, and get out and shoot whatever struck me as photogenic right there and then.

I chose to head southeast, and when I hit the 15-mile mark, I was in the extreme northeast corner of Clark Township, Johnson County (Ind.), and two-tenths of a mile north of Pleasant Valley Church. I was southbound on two-lane Acton Road (County Road 700 East) with no shoulder, so I spied the church ahead and decided that would be a safe terminus. The church address is 9990 N. Johnson County Road 700 East, which is at a "T" intersection with East County Road 1000 North (Watson Road), which ends at 700 East.

Moments earlier, as I hit the 13-mile mark while southbound on Acton Road still in Marion County, I grumbled in disappointment. I was passing Acton Cemetery, a small community graveyard that I imagined would have presented a goldmine of photo possibilities. But I stuck to the letter of the challenge and continued driving south, crossing into Johnson County shortly thereafter ... and worrying I'd end up with nothing but open fields. I would have pushed myself to find something photographic even with that, but I held out hope I might get a bit more to work with come the real 15-mile mark.

So when I saw the church, my frustrations about missing out on the cemetery lifted. I pulled into a gravel spillover parking lot at the church, got out of the car and started to find things to shoot. The inventory of what I had to work with at this largely rural spot: On the west side of the highway, there was the church; a modest-sized red-leafed tree next to the church; some interesting shadows from a white picket-like fence along a stairs on the south side of the church; a flag pole; a basketball hoop; a separate, solitary tree virtually bereft of its leaves (featured at the top of this post); a tiny, first-quarter moon in the sky; a septic tank behind the church; five or six tires stacked on their ends that gave me a "window" to the highway when I lay on the ground; a nice-sized farm field north of the church where the seasonal crop had been harvested clean; and a large, brick home north of that field. There also was some playground equipment behind the church, but I decided not to include it in any of the images.

On the east side of the road there was a sign for Broken Wheel Ranch, directing traffic east down County Road 1000 North. Oh ... I also saw some jet streams from aircraft; the polarizing filter I used helped bring out the definition of those streams in the shots.

What you see here is what I came up with from the above. To view a full gallery of images from this shoot, follow the link in this sentence.

Above: Some wild growth amid the remains of the harvested field of corn.

Above: A home north of the church with trees sporting red foliage. 

Above: Pleasant Valley Church tower wrapped by backlight.

 

Above: A backlighted perspective shot of the church, the tree and flagpole.

Above: The flagpole and church tower juxtaposed with one of the jet streams.

Above: The red tree and church.

Above: Lines, shadows and angles near some stairs on the south side of the church.

Above: The basketball hoop and a church sign. An initial thought was to compose so that the pole would be on the right of the sign so the hoop would curve over the sign. Alas, I was in a contrarian mood this day, and chose to compose against convention. That tiny white dot in the sky to the right of the backboard is the first-quarter moon.

Above: Using the burst mechanism to capture a passing motorist through the eye of the tires.

Above: A different angle of the shadows of the stairs on the church facade.

Above and below: I was struck by the bright glare on the side of this holding tank in the original color image above. I turned around to confirm that it was the sun leaving its brand there. To better define the "sphere on sphere," I made a copy of the original color version, converted it to black and white, pulled up the image's illumination sliders on my photo editing software, lowered the image shadows to virtually zero and reduced the mid-tone and highlight levels about 25%, resulting in the image below. You should make out the sun a little easier now.

Above: I applied an antiquing filter to this backlighted image of the red-leafed tree and its shadowed trunk. I used this same antiquing filter on the leafless tree at the top of the post and of the church tower wrapped in backlight.

Above: The sign for the Broken Wheel Ranch.

Above: A closeup of the wheel's "broken" section.

 

Above: The Broken Wheel Ranch sign's arrow, pointing the way.

A short trip to the Downtown canal

A chance trip to Downtown Indianapolis on a rare midweek day off Thursday -- and a whim to bring along my pocket camera when I left the house to head downtown -- resulted in these photographs of various points along the Indianapolis canal.

The several miles of canal on the west side of Downtown is a much-visited and much-photographed landmark in Indianapolis. I've seen images of the canal from so many angles, at night, dawn and dusk, and quite a few images enhanced in post-processing by photographers using Photoshop editing software to produce fine art visuals of the various scenes there.

So I post these images with a significant degree of humility, as these are only slightly tweaked in post-processing and captured in jpeg format (not the usual RAW I take on my digital SLR) on my Pentax Optio Z10 compact camera.

Even though I've been to the Downtown canal before, it had been quite a while since my last visit. Certainly since before I bought my first digital SLR camera, which was in 2004. My visit Thursday helped me better understand the canal's attraction to visitors and sightseers, photographers, noon-hour workers seeking to get away from the hustle and bustle of the office, and joggers, walkers and other recreationalists.

(Above) A look down on one of the fountains, from an elevated overlook.

In the section of the canal that I walked, I came across several fountains that were set back from the pedestrian paths, and I was struck by their size, volume of streams and the streams' ferocity. I took pictures of that, which you see here. I also wanted to get some images of people within the canal landscape. Finally, I noticed an interesting "peek" of the top of the OneAmerica insurance building from one spot along the canal path.

I plan to return to the canal soon -- with my DSLR gear -- to spend more time, seek out more creative images and report back here with my results.

(Above) I snapped this image within 15 seconds after the one of the jogger at the very top of this post. For some reason, this fountain was drawing a lot of attention -- from those with and without cameras!

(Above) A visitor resting on a bench along the east side of the canal path.

(Above) An interesting ivy-adorned building along the west side of the canal path.


(Above) My compact did a nice job capturing the ferocity of the fountain stream.

(Above) An ivy-covered pedestrian bridge over the canal. The light-colored structure in the background is the OneAmerica building.


(Above) Two people sharing a quad-wheeled non-motorized vehicle for two.

(Above) Another angle of the ferocious fountain spray.

(Above) A pedestrian, just as he slides behind some tree foliage.

(Above) The "peek" at the top of the OneAmerica building, which was known for the longest time as the American United Life (AUL).