Skyscape - David Mathre Photography

Sunday (20-March-2011) — New Jersey to California

Gone to See California. Day 1: Flight from New Jersey to San Francisco.

Aerial Photography — Somewhere over the middle of the country at 30,000 feet. I don’t know where we were, but it looks like a small town and farm land. This is the last day of winter. A lot of brown, not much green yet. I didn’t have a window seat, so only had this one chance to take an image while the person sitting next to the window was in the restroom. The flight was totally booked, and I was in the very last row. Sitting in the back row has many problems. I couldn’t lean the seat back and I now have a backache. They ran out of food, and I now have a bad headache, and I was right next to the very busy restroom. I prefer driving, even if it is all the way across the United States.

Middle America from 30k Feet. Image taken with a Leica X1 (ISO 100, 24 mm, f/5.6, 1/800 sec). (David J Mathre) — Middle America from 30k Feet. Image taken with a Leica X1 (ISO 100, 24 mm, f/5.6, 1/800 sec).

One-Year Ago (26-February-2010) — California

Photography Workshop “Yosemite in Winter: A Season of Contrast” with Michael Mariant. Day 2: Yosemite National Park.

The following image is a combination of two NIK tools, HDR Pro and Silver Efex 2. The images were taken with a Nikon D3s camera and 14-24 mm f/2.8 lens (ISO 200, 16 mm, f/11, various shutter speeds) during a photography workshop one-year ago in Yosemite National Park.

Three-Years Ago (25-February-2008) — Colorado

Elderhostel “Photography in the Southwest” Workshop Day 1. Star Trails.

The following image is a composite of five 30 minute night sky exposures taken during a Elderhostel/Road Scholar photography workshop at Kelly Place outside of Cortez, Colorado in 2008. It was really dark other than the Christmas lights at the main building, and you could see a lot of stars in the sky. I moved the tripod as far away from the lights as possible and decided to do this series with a fisheye lens that would give a 180° field of view. The five images were combined using Startrails. This program is old (only works with jpg or 8-bit tif files) but works better than when I try to merge the images as layers in Photoshop.

Winter night sky looking north at Kelley's Place near Cortez, Colorado. Composite of four images taken with a Nikon D3 camera and 16 mm f/2.8 fisheye lens (ISO 200, 16 mm, f/2.8, 30 min). (David J Mathre) — Winter night sky looking north at Kelley’s Place near Cortez, Colorado. Composite of four images taken with a Nikon D3 camera and 16 mm f/2.8 fisheye lens (ISO 200, 16 mm, f/2.8, 30 min). (David J Mathre)

Individual images in this slide show can be viewed here.

Monday (10-January-2011) — Chile

Gone to See Patagonia 2010/2011. Photography Workshop with Thom Hogan. Day 15: Hosteria Lago Grey.

Early Morning Rainbow from Hosteria Lago Grey, Torres del Paine National Park, Chile. Composite of two images from a Nikon D3x and 24-120 mm f/4 lens (ISO 100, 24 mm, f/5.6, 1/80 sec) combined using AutoPano Giga Pro. (David J Mathre)

Wednesday (05-January-2011) — Argentina

Gone to See Patagonia 2010/2011. Photography Workshop with Thom Hogan. Day 10: Los Notros Resort, Boat ride and Hike on Perito Moreno Glacier.

This morning we took a boat across to the Perito Moreno Glacier. There after some history of the glacier by the local guides we hiked to the glacier where we were fitted with ice crampons. These were a relatively old style crampon that fit any boots. The guide then took us for an 1.5 hour hike on the glacier. This was a great photo opportunity to see the deep blue ice and all of the features on the glacier up close. At the end of the hike, we had a drink with glacial ice. Even though I only took one DLSR and one lens, I got many great images on this hike. During the afternoon, I started working on some images from the early part of the trip.

Glacier Calving. Perito Moreno Glacier, Los Glaciares National Park. Image taken with a Nikon D3s and 50 f/1.4 mm lens (ISO 200, f/9, 1/320 sec). (David J Mathre)

Thom Hogan climbing Perito Moreno Glacier without any ropes. Image taken with a Nikon D3s camera and 50 mm f/1.4 lens (ISO 200, 50 mm, f/7, 1/200 sec). (David J Mathre)