Category: Aaron Linsdau

I’ve been self-assigned the duty of creating Photo Wednesdays with the Teton Photography Group. To foster discussion, have a good time and improve communication between photographers in the group, we’re going to do this.

Loren Nelson will be sending out more specifics. Specifically, it’s informal, post your photo you think is interesting, even it’s your house cat. We’ll eventually have themes, but it’s a forum for everyone to post, have fun, and learn something. It’s a supportive environment and I hope to grow this into something fun that people always like to check out every Wednesday.

This will be open to everyone who is a TPG member, more details from Loren forthcoming, but we expect it to be fun and worth the time. Even if your photo is like the above and you’re hoping to get some discussion, it’ll be good. You see the pink area? That’s from light leakage in the Nikon D800. That’s why it has a little hatch on the viewfinder for long exposures. I learned that one. But it does make the photo more colorful, so maybe it worked out.

The Jackson Hole Off Square Theater Company contacted me to photograph their staged reading of The Lion in Winter, a 1966 play by James Goldman about Henry II of England, Eleanor of Aquitaine, and their children (include Richard the Lionheart) during the Christmas of 1183.

The play was made into a movie in 1968 featuring Peter O’Toole and Katherine Hepburn. It was also made into a television show in 2003 with Patrick Stewart and Glenn Close. Though those actors are gone, the actors who played in this rendition directed by Natalia Macker, went well and was quite enjoyable.

Presented in two parts, the play relates the trials and tribulations of the medieval era and illustrates how people have not changed in 1000 years. The intrigues, devious nature, and constant infighting are no different today than they were at any other time in history.

Given the play was presented as a staged reading, I at first thought it wouldn’t be too interesting but I was quite wrong. Even though the actors held their scripts to read from, they did such a good job of interacting with each other and making the reading dramatic that them holding their scripts didn’t take away from the action at all.

One interesting technique that the play used was a narrator at the side of the stage to give audible cues to the audience for actions that would have required more props and action than the play afforded. Whether it be Henry drawing a sword on John or Eleanor cutting herself with a knife, the lack of props didn’t detracted from the play.

One of the best parts of photographing on a stage with the lighting is that I don’t have to add any drama to the image, I just have to capture it at the correct moment. So often lighting in things can be bland, so I work hard to add great lighting to give dimension and emotion to the image.

It’s important for me to deliver dramatic images to my clients to give them the feeling of a moment which would be lost otherwise with boring lighting. It’s not the camera that makes the photographer better but rather a sense of timing and ability to manipulate lighting to make the image striking and exciting. And if you can’t change the lighting, then finding a place that makes the image good and the lighting workable is just as important. When I teach photography, I impart in students that it’s important to work the image. With digital photography, you can see what you’re getting, so you can keep adjusting and get the image just right.

For those more interested in learning some of my lighting techniques, check out my training DVD Flash Photography with Aaron Linsdau at TVL Video.

During my last expedition across Yellowstone National Park in 2012, I had the chance to photograph this stunning sunrise over Duck Lake, on the way to Old Faithful, after leaving West Thumb early in the morning.

As I was taking the shots to create the panorama, wolves began serenading me. At least that’s what I told myself as I made my way up the pass. There were at first a few mournful howls as the sun warmed up the horizon, then they all broke into a symphony for what seemed minutes, then went dead silent as the echo faded across the valley.

One of my more memorable experiences of crossing Yellowstone, the sound of wolves stayed with me for the rest of the trip. I even had one following me over to Old Faithful later that night. There were a few snow coaches that passed and photographed it, then later saw me along the same road. Many of the passengers demanded the driver go back and warn me that a wolf was following me.

None of the drivers turned around because they were all not worried, as they know the wolves are very spooky in the park. I didn’t learn about this until some time later when a ranger related the story to me. I got a good laugh, as I did see the markings and paw prints in the snow from the huge prehistoric dog. He (or she) certainly had followed me and got close enough that I expected to see eyes with the howls. It really wanted to know what I was, the stranger walking through its land in the night. As so few rarely travel through Yellowstone in this fashion, I was a curiosity.

It was frightening and all at once exhilarating to have something that weighs nearly as much as I with speed and teeth following me. For all the times I’ve been through Yellowstone in the summer and winter, I’ve never actually seen a wolf. They’ve walked by my tent, left tracks inspecting me, and even stalked me. Yet they’ve never approached me, somehow knowing what I was.

Perhaps he/she was following me because I had shortbread cookies.

It was a stormy day in the Jackson Hole area, so we decided to go out looking for animals. There were moose reported out past Kelly and that’s what I was hoping to capture. As luck would have it, those moose were as far away as possible. That’s the way animal photography works most of the time.

The first shot on the right ended up being my favorite because of the interplay between light, shadows, shapes, and branches.

As luck would have it, there were several nice images that rendered well in black and white. One even surprised me that I thought it would look good in b&w but actually looked better in color because the green standing out against the plain brown and slate gray of everything else is what caught my eye.

< Posing, making some interesting triangles with his face and horns.

Walking in the landscape as a small animal, this young one has to keep a sharp eye out for trouble. As bighorn sheep seem to have very acute vision, this didn’t seem to be a problem for him. >

< I was quite excited to actually get an “okay” shot of two bighorn sheep head butting. I heard the crack several times but every time I looked, they were just standing around like nothing had happened.

Some of these sheep will come right up to your vehicle on the refuge road. Of course you have to be very careful when you drive around and it’s best not to get out of the vehicle. They like the chemicals and salts falling off vehicles, so they’ll actually come up and lick car tires. I did my boy scout duty today and towed a guy in a Nissan Altima out of the ditch on the side of the road. He tried to be proper and pull off to the side, only to immediately sink into 2 feet of snow, swamping his car. A little tow strap action got him on his way.

These young bighorn sheep look rather cuddly, though I’d not like to have one around once he gets older. He might give me a huge headache.

Kelly was able to get some video of this young ram munching on the refuge road twigs. He was so loud her iPhone actually captured the crunching. That was the funniest thing of the day.

Even though the animals were fun to photograph, I found some arguably more interesting scenes to capture. A few of them turned out fairly well. I haven’t decided what the power line and the crepuscular rays say, so you’ll have to make your own interpretation.

The sastrugi raking off the sage sticking out of the snow reminded me of Antarctica. Of course continent 7 doesn’t have any plants, but the windswept shapes of snow reminded me of Antarctic Tears.

At first I thought this shot would look great in black and white but it was the green against the brown gray of everything that actually caught my eye. Once I toned the image, it had not excitement. So the color version actually ended up working better. Finding shots where there’s a single item that’s out of place with the rest always makes for an interesting shot.

The moose was way out there, sitting, down, and facing away. He was no doubt tired from the photography and video he enjoyed having done on him the past couple days. I was hoping for something more exciting. But I’d be resting, too, if I had to run around all day in winter munching on twigs. The wind cooperated and make a blasting bison shot. I was hoping for some worse wind but this worked okay.

Hunters were along the refuge road looking for their prize elk all day. There have been some big disputes about the hunting here but I’ll leave that to other forums to discuss.

The hunters had to slog through knee deep snow to go after the animals they were looking for, so they had to work for their food.

Flat creek is the perfect place to catch swans, cygnets (baby swans) and mallards One doesn’t even have to drive barely past town to capture these magnificent animals.

Bad weather days are actually very nice to photograph in because there are far fewer people, the light is more interesting, and the drama can be much higher. A plain bison standing in sage in the middle of the summer – boring. A bison laboring to find something to eat while being blasted by 20 knot wind-driven snow – interesting.

Click on any of these photos to see a larger version.

Note – As always, all of these images are copyright and are not in the public domain. Please contact me if you’d like to use them. For most uses, I’ll happily oblige.

Happy shooting as we head into Thanksgiving!