December 2025 – Ken's Photography and Travel Blog

Impressions of Fall 2025 – Part 4

More fall photos from Indiana in the fall of 2025.

A light breeze rippled the creek surface, giving this image an impressionist painterly appearance.

Fallen leaves, mostly submerged, in an Indiana creek with reflections of the trees around the creek.

I considered titling this ICM image of a fall leaf ‘Maple Leaf Comet’.

At first it was just a pretty leaf lying on a mossy rock that got my attention, but the more I looked at it the more it looked like an elegant female model posing like a naturalist in an outdoor environment. (Maybe I had been wandering alone in that creek bed too long).

Nature makes its own artistic arrangements, no need for human intervention.

Looking for ideas for a title, I found that fallen leaves are refered to as “leaf litter” or “tree litter”. Is it really appropriate to describe such natural beauty as “litter”? Can’t we show some respect for these fallen, natural beauties?

I set out one morning with a National Forest hiking path as a destination. When I arrived, there was a crew working at the limited area parking access. The young ranger in charge said they were just wrapping up setting posts for a kiosk and would be out of my way in a few minutes. So I drove on down the road to kill a few minutes, took a side road, stopped beside a creek and went down into the creek bed to look around. There was not much water in the creek, just a narrow stream with a few shallow puddles. There were many fallen leaves in the creek, which looked like good photographic subjects, so I returned to my vehicle, retrieved my camera and spent some time photographing those leaves.

Next up, More Creek Leaves,

Ken

Impressions of Fall 2025 – Part 3

This is a continuation of fall photography in Indiana in the fall of 2025.

‘Forest Creature’ was chosen for Flickr’s Explore page, but I like ‘Poised to Strike’ better.

The photos above were all made, while hiking through an Indiana fall forest.

These below were all made in an Indiana creek that crosses an Indiana backroad.

Ok, I’ll admit to placing those leaves around the tire sidewall. Firstly, it is a shame that folks discard such items in manners that are detrimental to our environment. Secondly, other than photo documenting this litter, it might as well be dress up a little.

‘Leaf, Rock, Camera’ is an obvious allusion to the game “Rock, Paper, Scissors”.

Stay tuned for more Indiana fall photos,

Ken

Impressions of Fall 2025 – Part 2

More 2025 fall images from Indiana.

Stay tuned for more Indiana fall images,

Ken

Impressions of Fall 2025 – Part 1

Another year and another fall in Indiana. This year was much different than the previous few. Drought and a warm fall resulted in sporadic color change in the local trees and forests.

It was just after mid-October, when we arrived in Indiana, a time when the local forest fall foliage would normally be highly apparent. This year many trees were still fully green, a few had already changed almost completely and other were just exhibiting the seasonal change in color.

The “peak”, if it can be called that this year, came the first week in November and it was muted, compared to a “normal” year. I’m afraid this will become the “normal” in the future as climate change, which is not a “hoax”, continues its rapid advance.

For these ICM (Intentional Camera Movement) abstract images in a forest, one can include the sky or exclude it. I find that I prefer those images with the sky limited or excluded, which usually requires cropping the image in post processing.

The direction of the light is also a factor in these image. Side light produces alternating light and dark patterns across the image, which I tend to prefer.

Stay tuned for more fall impressions,

Ken

Badlands National Park, June 2025 – Part 8 – Rain Everywhere

This is a continuation of rainy day, iPhone photography in Badlands NP, South Dakota in June of 2025.

I made many other iPhone images this rainy day, but these are representative of all the scenes.

I knew I could not return to my favorite camping area, which would be too muddy to get into and out of, so I went to the more popular, and usually crowded, Buffalo Gap Grassland BLM camping area on the north side of the park, thinking it might be more easily ingressed and egressed.

My assessment was partially correct. Going up the slight incline to the camping area along the badlands drop-off was easy, as the roadway was mostly rocky with only a few mud holes. However the roadway, where the campsites are set aside was already rutted by many camper passing through and the road has a slight tilt towards the west and my vehicle was fishtailing as I eased along it in 4 wheel drive. The campsites are just off of the roadway and there was a real danger of vehicles sliding into campers parked along the roadway. Indeed, campers watched carefully, as any vehicle passed by. I always swung as far away from the campers as possible before passing. As soon as I found an empty, flat campsite, I pulled in and breathed a sigh of relief. This site was at the base of a hill and I, too, watched with trepidation as any vehicle came down that hillside.

The next morning, I considered going to other scenic places within a few hours drive from the Badlands, but the wet weather pattern covered a large area of the country. So I decided it best to cut this trip short and head for home.

So far my visits to the Badlands National Park have not worked out in the best way for my photography intent, even though the scenery is fantastic.

That’s it for this photo trip.

Thanks for following,

Ken

Badlands National Park, June 2025 – Part 7 – Rain Everywhere

The weather forecast for my 2nd morning at Badlands National Park was for early morning heavy overcast with rain beginning in the early morning hours. So I did not bother getting up before sunrise, hoping the overcast and rain would dissipate prior to sunset.

Sure enough, I awoke to the sound of light rain falling. I was camped in an area of mostly all clay soil. I knew the rain would be bad news for navigation out of my campsite, so I quickly got dressed and prepared the Sportsmobile for travel. The terrain was already getting muddy and slippery, so I shifted into 4 wheel drive, as I had a couple of low hills to go up on my way out. Those hills sloped sideways as well as upwards and the Sportsmobile was slipping sideways on the hills. Slidding off would not be good. Fortunately, I made it over those two hills, thinking that once I got onto the flat land on my way out of the camping area there would be no problems. Well, even traveling slowly in 4WD, the Sportsmobile still fishtailed in the slippery, wet clay until I got onto the paved roadway.

I drove on into the park, parked in one of the parking areas to have coffee and breakfast as it continued to rain steadily for most of the time.

After breakfast, I contiuned to drive through the park in the light rain. It was apparent that I would not be able to get off of the paved roadway area due to the soggy soil everywhere else. I stopped periodically, walked around in the rain and shot with my iPhone, since it was easier to keep the rain off of the iPhone camera lens than it would have been to do with my big Nikon lenses.

The rain added some mood to the park scenes and the wettness enhanced the color in the geologic features. There were many wildflowers and grasses along the roadway, which I photographed with raindrops covering them and sometimes with the park features in the background, although the depth of field with the iPhone was severely limited in such scenes.

Stay tuned for more rainy day iPhone photography in Badlands NP, South Dakota.

Ken

Badlands National Park, June 2025 – Part 6 – Disappointment

Just before sunset time, I went to my pre-chosen location for sunset photography in Badlands National Park. It was heavily overcast and the prospects for golden hour light on the geological features in the park did not look promising.

Nevertheless, I made a few images prior to sunset time, hoping to maybe duplicate some compositions at golden hour.

At least the sky was dramatic, but the golden hour light never came.

Until next time,

Ken

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Month: December 2025

Impressions of Fall 2025 – Part 4

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Impressions of Fall 2025 – Part 3

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Impressions of Fall 2025 – Part 2

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Impressions of Fall 2025 – Part 1

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Badlands National Park, June 2025 – Part 8 – Rain Everywhere

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Badlands National Park, June 2025 – Part 7 – Rain Everywhere

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Badlands National Park, June 2025 – Part 6 – Disappointment

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