It’s sometimes nice to have slower days when I don’t see a whole lot that I want to get a picture of. That gives me a chance to go back to some of my photos from earlier in the year that I forgot to process such as this one. This was heading back home from Kelly, Wyoming in Grand Teton National Park when all of a sudden, on the other side of the Teton Mountains, the setting sun lit up the clouds above. I happened to be near a patch of fog that was floating above the Gros Ventre River and was able to include that nicely in the shot.

One of the many things about Grand Teton National Park that never gets old is seeing the sunrise on the Teton Mountains. Thousands of people drive through the park all the time and never get to witness something as incredible as seeing the first bit of light of the day slowly creep down the mountains and onto the valley floor. If you’re ever in the area, make it a point to see the sunrise. You won’t be disappointed no matter how early it is.

I’ve apparently been rediscovering my love for black and white prints again lately. With the temperatures reaching unseasonable warmth right now, it’s almost as if the off-season has already started for the residents as well as the local flora and fauna of Jackson Hole. As a result, I’ve been going back to some photos that had always caught my eye but for one reason or another, never did anything with. This was from a particularly cloudy afternoon that was beginning to break up along the Teton Mountains. The Grand Teton at this point was clearly visible while the rest of the mountains were only beginning to come back into view. Once again, this was one of those shots that was just waiting for the black and white conversion.

I was cleaning up some metadata on my images and I’m sometimes surprised that I have some images that I really like that I haven’t posted on my photoblog yet. Ever more so, I’m surprised I completely forget about them! Back in September of 2008, a couple of months before moving to Jackson Hole, I had made a road trip up to Yellowstone and took this shot of these aspen trees during my first visit to the Lamar Valley in Yellowstone National Park. I always liked the way this shot came out for several reasons: the drama of the clouds behind the trees; the isolation of the aspens themselves and as a result, how barren the landscape looks with just that strand of aspen trees sticking out in what looks to be the middle of nowhere. We’ve been getting some warmer-than-usual weather here in Jackson Hole, and while I’m hoping to see some more snow fall and the temperatures drop for the remainder of what’s normally winter, it’s images like these that get me excited that summer’s right around the corner.

A little over six years ago my life changed forever. I retired a two megapixel point-and-shoot camera, took a plunge and bought a brand new 6.4 megapixel Canon Digital Rebel 300D – the very first in the series. I had been using the point-and-shoot mostly for friends and hanging out, but every now and then would look up at the sky and see something inspiring that I wanted to capture. It didn’t take me long to realize that I simply didn’t have the control I wanted in capturing what I was seeing.

The Digital Rebel began opening up all kinds of doors I never knew existed. All of a sudden I had a creative outlet flowing through me that I hadn’t been able to find in taking any other classes while in the Art program in college. I graduated with a Master’s of Fine Arts shortly thereafter, and having never seen farther west than Austin, Texas, embarked on a three-week road trip with a friend originating in East Texas and ending in Sitka, Alaska to deliver a car to his sister. The trip was nothing short of exhilarating on every level imaginable. An entirely new world had completely opened up before me and within a few months, I was packing everything I owned up and moving out to Phoenix, Arizona.

Having been raised to acquire a "real" job, photography remained a passionate, but consistently fueled and growing, hobby. Every free moment I had involved driving out into the remote mountains surrounding Phoenix and learning as much as I could about my camera. Books, internet tutorials and forums became valuable tools in learning to shoot the incredible landscapes Arizona had to offer.

Chasing the Perfect Website

Prior to discovering photography, web design was my number one hobby that was already beginning to pay off quite well in college. Naturally, upon moving out to Phoenix, I landed a good job doing web design that supported me during my time there. My website at the time was more of a conglomeration of other hobbies that I had picked up: showing off other websites I created; hiking logs; miscellaneous things I found of interest and of course, my photography. Then in 2007, everything seemed to shift in a direction that led me to believe that photography shouldn’t just be a hobby, but it should be my way of life. At the beginning of the year I graduated myself from my Digital Rebel and purchased the state-of-the-art Canon 5D. I immediately noticed my photos growing stronger and I was beginning to build a library of work that I actually enjoyed looking at (I had always been my worst critic). At the same time I also noticed that I was spending entirely too much time developing my website to handle the complex tasks I wanted and less time on photography.

Here was the turning point. Do I continue to become a web design guru and do other people’s work for the rest of my life or do I go against everything I was raised to believe and really dive into photography? Obviously, I chose the latter and never looked back. I began looking for solutions that already offered what I was trying to program. I scoured the internet for all kinds of blog services, shopping carts and hosting packages. It didn’t take me long to discover a relatively new service at the time called PhotoShelter. I gave it a little test-drive and at first glance didn’t see its value right away. However once I began getting a library online and developed an entirely new, photography-only website around the service, the advantages began leaping off the screen. I kept my photoblog self-hosted and over time, began incorporating more and more of my website around the entire PhotoShelter service. With my ever-increasing passion for seeing new places growing stronger every day, I began organizing my photos on my website by location. Over time I started to see that if a certain location was lagging in photos on my website, my desire to get back there began to grow. In a sense, my website not only became something of a travel log, but also a tool for new travel ideas.

The Rise of Social Media and Wildlife Photography

In my pursuit to be a better photographer, I’ve made one sacrifice after another, and toward the end of 2007 I made another. I quit my web design job and began working part-time jobs to devote more time to photography. At this point it became more than just a hobby and truly became something that I knew I could never abandon. My skills were improving, I was happier and thanks to PhotoShelter, my website was becoming the website I had always wanted.

In 2008 I made two trips up to the Jackson Hole, Wyoming area, having not visited there before, except briefly driving through on the 2004 trip. It was there that I had my first tastes of real, big-game wildlife photography. Both trips were completely mesmerizing and upon my return to Phoenix the second time, I felt almost as if I had tied a bungee cord between me and that entire area because the tug to get back there was growing stronger every day. I had learned by then that if you don’t go with that tug and shrug it off, you end up wondering "what if" the rest of your life and are never as happy in the long run. Naturally, I did go with it, making bigger sacrifices than I’ve ever had to make, and upon my arrival, began to see my life reaching new heights I never could have imagined.

I began capturing everything I could in continued amazement and within just a month of living in Jackson Hole, already had more images of Grand Teton National Park on my website than all of Arizona. With this new library building, I went back and completely streamlined my galleries I had on PhotoShelter. I made better uses of the Gallery Collections feature, a simple, yet highly important feature to my site. I was able to group my most visited places, Arizona, Utah and now Wyoming and Wildlife into their own Collections, doing wonders for my site’s navigation and overall user experience. In addition to that, PhotoShelter continued to make huge strides in making what was already a great service even better. The amount of customization they offered began to grow and I once again redesigned my site to take full advantage, giving it a much cleaner look with bigger image thumbnails which also aided in easier and simpler navigation.

During this same time I was also getting accustomed to the rising trend of social media, specifically via Twitter and Facebook Fan Pages. To many people, especially those who are simply more casual internet users, jumping onboard to these new platforms seems overwhelming and daunting. However call it just another stride by PhotoShelter in getting everything seamlessly connected from one site to another. Now with just a couple of clicks, I can post a slideshow of an entire gallery onto my Facebook Fan Page, my photoblog or any other number of sites. I even make a new slideshow every season filled with my favorite images that apply to that time of year and display it on my home page as well as anywhere else I can think to post it. Best part is, it’s just a few clicks to get it to scale to any size I need it to, very easily customizable and will always point back to my website.

The Verdict?

Simply stated, my site wouldn’t be anything without PhotoShelter. I’ve seen my sales grow and it’s helped me to spend more time outdoors with wildlife and less time on the computer. The core service itself saves me an enormous amount of time in not having to create thumbnails, watermarks, etc. The social media expansions help tremendously in getting necessary exposure and the efforts they’ve made in assisting with SEO are unparalleled on any other service. Now with coupon codes, I’m able to offer the discounts and promotions I’ve always wanted to. If you’re serious about photography and you’re not signed up, you might want to reconsider. If you’re content with the old website you’ve had because it’s been working well enough, you’re missing out on an enormous amount of potential sales. A current, up-to-date and modern website complete with current technology is essential in not only making sales from buyers, but also in interacting with fans and customers. It’s the new standard and it’s an absolute must if you want to be successful in "today’s economy."

At first glance I wasn’t too happy with the way this turned out. I think I was expecting it to be a bit different for some reason. However the more I kept passing over it the more it intrigued me. It probably had a lot to do with how massive the Grand Teton looks against the bit of Blacktail Butte that I included in it as well as the morning light on it. Either way I was really enjoying the color version before seeing how it would look in black and white. I actually wound up switching back and forth several times before finally going with the black and white conversion fully. Overall I’m actually quite happy with it given how I first started out with it.

I headed out last night for the full moon in search of some new landscapes I hadn’t yet caught at night, especially during the winter. The idea popped into my head to head up to the Snake River Overlook in Grand Teton National Park to get a shot that not only had I not gotten before, but that I don’t even remember seeing anywhere before. Did I feel like driving up all that way just for a few photos? Absolutely! Despite some clouds blocking a bit of the light, the Snow Moon still lit up the landscape quite well and made for some stunning scenery! This is one of those images where the hi-res version would be worth seeing as well. Subtle star trails are up in the sky and the Snake River is completely smoothed out over the 111 second exposure. I kept the ISO low to minimize noise and to get some movement in the clouds.

Did you get any shots of the full moon last night? Let’s see ‘em!

Despite a huge admiration and appreciation I have for them, I don’t do very many black and whites. That’s something I might try to change the near future, but thus far, just haven’t seen too many that I thought would come out well. However I kept coming back to this image from a couple of weeks ago and never could figure out what it was missing. I overworked it, underworked it and did all I could to try to get it to look "finished." However tonight I gave it the black and white treatment and all of a sudden it popped out, in my eyes. Sometimes an image or a piece of artwork just screams out to you, "You’re going in the right direction!" After a series of tweaks and spending quite a while getting the crop just right, this is what I came out with. The scene is taken just north of Kelly, Wyoming in Grand Teton National Park looking back west toward Blacktail Butte and the Teton Mountains while a winter storm was breaking up over the Tetons.

While not out shooting, I’ve been making my way out to the Snow King Ski Resort here in Jackson, Wyoming. I officially started snowboarding this season and can say that Snow King is an excellent place to learn. It’s one of the steepest mountains in the country so if you stick with it, you’re gonna learn. The bunny slope is a little less steep but still provides a good challenge, especially for beginners. Most nights of the week they even turn on high-powered lights for Night-Riding, as shown here. I had just finished up for the night when I noticed the moon overhead and thought it’d make for a nice shot.

Last night my original plan was to get outside and take advantage of one of the few clear, night skies we’ve had here recently. Unfortunately, I came down with an odd bit of nausea and dizziness that kept me indoors. It was gone later that night but by then I was ready for bed. While resting up, I began looking back through some old photos I have of Canyonlands National Park to help me get inspired for an upcoming trip I have in the southwest in a couple of months. After going through these photos and looking up some information, I’m halfway tempted to spend an entire week just in Canyonlands. However I’ve already decided to spend one week getting to Phoenix, Arizona and one week coming back. The route in between will only be decided when each day comes. I stressed myself out way too much getting from one place to another for specific times on the last road trip and intend to take this one much slower and get much more out of it. If you’ve never traveled this way, I highly recommend you start. If Google Maps says it takes something like 16 hours to drive from where you are to your next destination, give yourself at least four days to get there and see how much more fun you have getting there and you’ll see where the expression "Getting there is half the fun" actually comes from.

This image itself is an aerial view of the Green River as it winds through Canyonlands National Park outside of Moab, Utah. I got this shot on an aerial tour of Canyonlands back in the fall of 2007. In looking back at all the aerial shots I have I don’t even think a month would suffice to cover all the ground I want to see in Canyonlands. I’ll just have to get back there more often!