The first image in this post is an HDR made from multiple exposures, since it would be impossible to get a single exposure with detail in the foreground and background here.
Nefertiti Crown, Bisti, June 6, 2021, AM
My son called this the Michelin Tire Hoodoo, but one of my Flickr friends and former work colleague said this looked like Nefertiti’s crown and I like that description. We referred to the flat wing like hoodoo in the background as either a shark or a surf board.
Shark Hoodoo, Bisti, June 6, 2021, AM
The shark hoodoo was difficult to photograph and it was always partially in the shadow of the Nefertiti Crown Hoodoo.
Lumpy Hoodoo, Bisti, June 6, 2021, AM
From a distance, seeing this hoodoo for the first time, I named it Lumpy, but a closer view makes it look more like some big mouth creature and it is actually the same as Nefertiti’s Crown from a different side. The features here can take on very different aspects, depending upon the view point.
Bisti, June 7, 2021, AM
A group of distinct hoodoos in pre-sunrise light (above). The feature on the far right looks like an alien creature and near the middle are those we called the Triplets. We photographed around this location multiple times from various view points at different time of the day.
Bisti, June 7, 2021, AMBisti, June 7, 2021, AM
Another view of the Alien and the Triplets. I like the foreground in this view.
Prior to visiting Indiana in October, 2019, I had never realized that Indiana had so many covered bridges. I have seen numerous covered bridges in the New England states, which seem to get lots of attention, but I had never heard much about covered bridges anywhere else.
Part of the reason for our trip to Indiana was to attend a number of the Covered Bridge Festivals in an area west of Indianapolis. These are very popular events, drawing many locals and others from far away. Local organizers of these festivals provide maps with suggested routes to bridges nearby the festival sites.
I’ve always been intrigued by old covered, wood bridges, most of which were built in the 1800s to early 1900s, so I knew I wanted to try photographing as many as my time would allow. I was not at all sure about how or when to best photograph the local bridges, having never visited any of them and having no idea of the setting, nor the lighting at various times of the day.
So one afternoon, with one of the maps to a few bridges, I headed to the northern most bridge on the map, planning to work my way south from there, visiting as many bridges as possible before dark.
Cornstalk covered bridge, Putnam County, Indiana. Nikon D850, Nikon 14-24mm @ 24mm, f/11, Multiple Exposures, edited in Adobe Lightroom and DxO Nik modules.Cornstalk covered bridge, Putnam County, Indiana. Nikon D850, Nikon 14-24mm @ 24mm, f/11, 1/125s, ISO 500, edited in Adobe Lightroom and DxO Nik modules.
Th first image is an HDR made from multiple exposures, while the second is a single exposure. The exterior is brightly lit by the sunlight, but the interior is in shadow, so no single exposure will capture details in both the interior and exterior. If the vegetation looks a bit blurred in the HDR, it is because it was a very windy day and anything moving between images complicates merging multiple exposures. I’ve tried to minimize this “ghosting” effect, but I’m sure some remains. These image look similar, but note that the interior is brighter in the HDR with more detail visible and the sky is not over exposed as it is in the single image. The colors are also a little different between the images and maybe I should have paid more attention to the HDR color editing. I think the single exposure colors are more accurate.
Shooting the dark interior with bright light coming through the top, side vents and from the opposite end of the bridge, also required resorting to HDR. Even so, the exterior is over exposed.
Cornstalk covered bridge, Putnam County, Indiana. Nikon D850, Nikon 14-24mm @ 15mm, f/11, 1/13s, ISO 500, edited in Adobe Lightroom and DxO Nik modules.
In the second interior image, I minimized the effect of the exterior overexposure problem by shooting at a different angle, which allowed for a more effective use of a graduated neutral density filter; but the shutter speed is slow, so the vegetation seen through the vents and at the end of the bridge is blurry due to motion. An HDR might have been a better choice for this type image, but I wasn’t keen on shooting the interior and I had more ground to cover this afternoon, so I did not take a lot of time inside the bridge.
Cornstalk covered bridge, Putnam County, Indiana. Nikon D850, Nikon 14-24mm @ 14mm, f/11, 1/125s, ISO 2500, edited in Adobe Lightroom and DxO Nik modules.
There was so much motion of the vegetation caused by the wind, that I had to use high ISO to get sufficiently fast shutter speed to freeze the motion. The high ISO resulted in more noise, which I’ve tried to minimize in post processing.
Cornstalk covered bridge, Putnam County, Indiana. Nikon D850, Nikon 14-24mm @ 20mm, f/11, 1/500s, ISO 2000, edited in Adobe Lightroom and DxO Nik modules.
The exterior of Cornstalk was not easy to shoot. I found a way down into the dry portion of the creek channel, but I could not get to a good view point, without wading through water and mud and I was not prepared to do that. So my side shots here are limited to views from the creek shore.
Cornstalk covered bridge, Putnam County, Indiana. Nikon D850, Nikon 14-24mm @ 24mm, f/11, 1/200s, ISO 500, edited in Adobe Lightroom and DxO Nik modules.
The image above is from the opposite end of the bridge from the first image. The lighting on this end was different than on the other end, making the colors darker. Even though it was cloudy, the sky was still bright, so I used a graduated neutral density filter to help balance the exposure across the entire image. There is no distinct line between the sky and the rest of the image, so I put the dark portion of the filter over the entire image, with the darkest portion over the upper part. This increases the color saturation of the entire image.
