Active by Nature

 November Photo Blogging Challenge: INSTASNAP

True confession:  I found this the hardest challenge of the photo blogging project yet!  Why?  Since acquiring my iPhone12 Pro a year ago, I use it to take 90% of my photos.  I took SO many photos in November, I really, really wanted to share 50, not 5!!!

I deliberated long and hard before chosing my paltry five 😱!

Here we go:

1.  SKI BUMS

As members of this challenge may have realized by now, I am very active in the outdoors:  skiing (both downhill and x-country), biking, hiking, snowshoeing, Nordic walking and paddling are all passions of mine.  It is SO much easier to pack my tiny, light iPhone in a pocket rather than lug around my bulky and heavy Canon SLR and heavy lenses.  I love taking photos skiing and I have a very old (about 30 years old) fanny pack-type camera case that ties around my waist.  When downhill skiing, this always requires a hasty adjustment to swing the camera around from resting on my back to resting on my tummy.  It is cumbersome to say the least. The compactness and ease of pulling out my iPhone to capture a candid moment like above is just too great.  This is my son, Mark and my granddaughter, Emily (3.5 years) going up the magic carpet at Norquay.  Mark suggested Emily look at Grandy (me) by looking between her legs.  She obliged and I was quickly able to snap this picture of my two beloved "ski bums" and then stash my camera quickly and easily back in my breast pocket.  Oh the joy!   

I also use Snapseed now to edit all my photos.  I love how it easily and significantly improves photos.  I try not to overdo it by adding to much saturation as a lot of people seem prone to do, on Instagram, anyways.   I do use the POP feature a lot, which really makes detail standout although I am not sure exactly how it does that.  I mainly use Tune Image.  I find it especially helpful in reducing the shadow effect of photos taken with a lot of snow in them.  In this example, the green trees were closer to a black colour before I reduced the shadows.  I also love the crop feature on Snapseed, to crop a photo while accurately maintaining the proportions.  It also makes it easy to edit a photo to post a square photo on my Instagram account (activebynaturecanmore).  

After I bought my iPhone, I enrolled in the iPhone Photography Course offered by Emile, through Facebook.  I learned SO much!  That is where I found out about Snapseed.   Oh... final note.... I did try using the attachment Mrs. Geoks kindly gave me, which clips my camera on to my backpack, but haven't had much success with it. 

2. WILDLIFE PHOTOGRAPHY

If there is a good chance I will see wildlife on my outing, or if wildlife photography is in fact the objective of my outing, that is about the one time I will still schlep my fore mentioned Canon Rebel and the HEAVY 300mm telephoto lens I have.  But often when out and about a wildlife encounter pops up when I do not have my Canon with me as it did this day, with this cow elk located on the side of the road.  

When I am taking wildlife photos with my iPhone, I do not attempt to get a closeup of the animal as that would entail either getting too close, or cropping so severely the end resort is distorted.  Below is an example where I am showcasing the elk and its setting, with Ha Ling peak prominently in the background.  I think often these shots are much more interesting than the close ups with wildlife that people seem to gravitate towards, with potentially dire consequences for both the wildlife and the human(s) involved when they get WAY too close to the wildlife.  

In this shot, I did use the pretty good 2 x zoom on my iPhone and then I did use Snapseed to crop the photo and lighten the overly dark trees.

I am happy to report that my wildlife photography with my Canon has improved considerably lately, as I have finally, finally permanently graduated from always using it in auto mode.  That has been a long time coming and has been the result of more time to practise in recent months.  I have a wonderful photo of a pine marten that has been a regular visitor in my back yard recently.  But it didn't fit with how I chose to interpret last month's "Potpourri" theme.  I will post it on the Photo Challenge Facebook page, as I would love to share it with the group.  

3.  SELFIES

Of course, the use of the smart phone has tremendously increased the popularity of the selfie.  I am not a big fan of them and I don't do a good job of taking them.  I guess with practice I will improve.  But here is a different kind of iPhone selfie with a bit of a story to it.  I would like to improve my astro-photography.  Once again, I have recently discovered that I get better results using my iPhone than I do with my Canon.  I also recently had the good fortune of bumping into legendary photographer, Paul Zizka, while out hiking one day.  I used this rare opportunity to ask him about my poor results trying to photograph the Aurora  with my Canon.  The pictures of late have always turned out too grainy and my understanding is that you need to use the highest ISO setting to get good photos of the Aurora.  When he asked me what camera I was using and I said a Canon Rebel, he said it likely was not a good enough camera to handle an ISO setting that high and to try knocking it down a bit.  A new camera and lens are not in the budget right now, but I did invest in a better tripod with an attachment to allow me to mount my iPhone on it.  Low and behold, I got some good Aurora photos with my iPhone and I have been practising taking my tripod out with me for sunrise photography too and also using it to shoot some sunrise time-lapse videos.  So here am I in this photo, out to shoot the sunrise.  It fizzled that morning, but the consolation prize was nice early morning light on the mountains and the opportunity to take a tripod selfie.

4. PANO PICTURES

Stitching multiple photos together to create panoramic shots using photo editing skills and software I do not have is not of interest to me at the present time.  Perhaps down the road.  But the beautiful panoramic photos you can take with a smart phone.... well, that is another thing!

Have you tried the pano selfie using a smart phone?  One person starts taking the pano shot, then when the subject is out of the shot, that person runs behind the photographer and takes the phone from them.  Now the roles are reversed with the subject being the photographer and the photographer running into place to become the subject.  With a little practise, you and BOTH be in the photo twice!  Or you can be in the photo twice yourself and create a photo where it looks like you have an identical twin.  I forgot to take a pano selfie this month for the challenge.  But again, I will post one on the Facebook page for the group, just for fun.   Here is my favourite pano photo of the month, of a friend atop Jumpingpound Ridge in Kananaskis County, with a background of the front ranges the Rocky Mountains.

5. The Mountains, The Mountains!

As sunrise is much later in the day in November than it is for the rest of the year (except for December which is also COLDER), I have been out on several early morning photo expeditions.  On this particular morning, I got several photos of Banff National Park's Mount Rundle that I am really happy with.  I also got some breathtaking mountain reflection photos at nearby Lake Minewanka, but alas, I have reached my five photo limit, so I will leave you with this one.  Once again, the sky didn't light up but the results were still dramatic, especially with the reflection in partially frozen Two Jack Lake.

What I did not practise too much this month was using my iPhone on Night Mode.  But hey, look at that.... the theme for December is "Tis The Season" which will be perfect for taking pictures on night mode.  Downtown Canmore is very festive at night this month and in just a few short days, on December 10th, we will once again be partaking in a favourite family tradition, attending "In Search of the Spirit of Christmas" at the Park Administration Grounds in Banff.  Stay tuned!  All the best for the holiday season!