August 2012 Competition Winners

Subject
Plains Zebra

Location
Serengeti National Park, Tanzania

Subject
Black Crowned Night Heron

Location
"Ding" Darling National Wildlife ReFuge, Florida

Description
Heron was fishing, the only light was from the front with little light reaching background.

Subject
Mountain Goats - Nanny and Kid

Location
Mt Evans, Idaho Springs, Colorado

Description
A one week old baby mountain goat (kid) gets an affectionate kiss and nuzzle from mother mountain goat (nanny)

Location
Chatfield State Park, Colorado, USA

Location
Iceland

Subject
Reeds near a local pond

Location
Freedom Park, Edwards, CO

Description
I wanted to catch the first rays of light as they shown down on the reeds at the reflecting pond at Freedom Park in Edwards, CO. I also want to get there before the wind picked up (as it always does) to catch the pond when it was smooth

Subject
Sunrise at Muddy Pass Lake

Location
CO SH 40 & 14

Description
Muddy Pass Lake is on CO SH 40 just north of the turnoff for CO SH 14 to Walden. Steve said, "This is going to be a fishing trip." I said, "Yes!" I get some of my best shots when we go fishing. After catching the sunrise we headed into Steamboat Springs for breakfast. It was a perfect morning.

Subject
A wind blown bristlecone pine.

Location
Windy Ridge above Alma, CO

Subject
Night sky

Location
Colorado Highway 103 near Echo Lake

Description
15 second exposures with 24 mm f/1.4 lens at f/2, iso1600 on stationary tripod, 6-frame mosaic, crop of lower half.

Subject
Rainbow

Location
Beartooth All American Road Montana

Description
Light Beams and Rainbow photographed from the top of Beartooth Pass during an early morning rain.

Subject
Garden of the Gods and night sky

Location
Garden of the Gods, Colorado

Description
4x5 image of the Gods in late afternoon light on Fujichrome Velvia ISO 50 combined with a 15 second exposure of the constellation Cygnus make at ISO 1600, 24 mm lens at f/2.

Subject
Prickly Pear Cactus Flower

Location
Tuscon, Arizona

Description
With the use of the saturation tool, I enhance the beautiful colors of this spring cactus flower.

Description
Flower was Cloned in

Subject
Swainson's Hawk

Location
Pawnee Grasslands

Description
Captured this shot as this adult was hunting grasshoppers in a field.

Subject
Swift fox (Vulpes velox) vixen and kit

Location
Pawnee National Grassland, Colorado

Description
The kit nuzzled up against its mother, in an interaction that can only be described as adoring.

Subject
Mtn Goats

Location
Mt Evans June 2012

Location
Mt. Evans, Colorado, USA

Description
I made this image in late June. Rim lighting on mountain goats can be quite nice, especially with a dark background.

Location
San Juan National Forest, Colorado, USA

Description
I made this image in mid July in the high country near Silverton. I set up by these Sulphur Paintbrush to capture the pre-sunrise color on the clouds and used my 17mm Tilt/Shift lens to capture a large number of paintbrush and the tarns. The tilt motion let me have the paintbrush in the foreground and the mountains in the distance in focus. I kept the same composition for the actual sunrise, and as soon as the paintbrush started to glow at first light, I knew I had a winner. The image was created by combining seven exposures by hand in Photoshop to balance the bright sun and dark midground.

Subject
Redfish Lake and the Sawtooth Range

Location
Sawtooth National Recreation Area, Idaho

Subject
Yucca

Location
White Sand National Monument, New Mexico

Subject
Peacock

Location
Denver Zoo

Description
color adjustments in photoshop

Subject
Moose and Squirrel

Location
RMNP and Arapahoe NWR

Description
Two shots combined to make my favorite cartoon characters.