Western Adventure

[Kyle]

I just got back from a trip out to Alberta (and a bit of B.C.) and down through the States to Yellowstone and Mt. Rushmore. I've got a ton of photos to go through and edit, everything from Bears (Grizzlies and Black) to Moose, Bald Eagles, Elk, Wolves, glaciers, waterfalls and of course mountains.

Here are two of my favourite mountain shots.

1. A view of Mt. Kerkeslin from the Athabasca Falls


2. Mt. Kerkeslin again from a spot further down the Athabasca River


A couple of wildlife shots.

1. I would title this one "Cautious". I was taking pictures in a field when I looked over and saw this family had stopped. A wolf was just wondering around in front of them. It left them alone and didn't seem to care about them. (This one is a little blurry, my camera wasn't set up for it.)


2. The next morning two wolves were playing in a small field by our campsite, right in the middle of a bunch of sites. They eventually spotted us sitting in the car taking shots of them and just wondered off.


3.




C&C is welcome.

[Shadowman]

Nice efforts, a bit hot in the highlights on most.

[nikon66]

Beautiful scenery, beautiful display of it.

[IzzieK]

I like #1 and #2 best Kyle...And I am glad you did not go the way others do their water....too milky. These ones are just shot well. I like the sceneries. I can almost hear the rustle of the water as it travel down...(or I should go back to bed until my imagination goes back to human standards...) LOL

'Can't wait to see more of your shots....
Later.

[deetheturk]

Very nice Kyle, well done bud!

[Geoff F]

My first thought was 'How nice to see some real moving water' then read Izzie's similar comment.

[bnnrcn]

Nice series Kyle

[dje]

Nice shots Kyle. I'm envious, you've been in such a beautiful part of the world.

Dave

[Kyle]

Nice efforts, a bit hot in the highlights on most.

Thanks for the comment. I find that I often make photos too dark so I tried not to do that here, might have went too much in the other direction though.

[Kyle]

Thanks for the comments everyone.
After posting some other water shots I was given advice on shooting fast vs slow moving water so I decided to keep the water more natural here. They seem a bit more dramatic this way.

It was really beautiful out West (The mountains are from Jasper, Alberta and the Wolves from Yellowstone, Wyoming). I'll end up moving that way some day, it's just a matter of when.

Does it look like the right wolf in the picture with 2 wolves has something in its mouth? That was as close as I dared to get and my 250mm couldn't zoom any better.

[Kyle]

Things have gotten a little busy for me lately and unfortunately my photography has not gotten as much attention as I'd like to give it. My pc with lightroom is out of commission so I can't edit photos until I've fixed it and since getting back from my trip I've been having trouble finding inspiration around here.

Here are a few more photos from the trip that I did get to edit.

These are from the top of Whistlers' (in Jasper) which we took the Gondola up to.

1. A couple sitting on a bench probably contemplating the vast beauty of the mountains.

2. The gondola station at the top of the mountain. It was a bit of a hike from there to the summit

3. The town of Jasper, Alberta.

A Brown Black Bear looking for some food. He nearly shut down the highway with everyone that was pulled over and getting out of their cars. Eventually people just stopped in both lanes of the road to look rather than pulling over. We drove past twice and he was there for quite awhile.

4.

5.

A Bald Eagle - This isn't a great photo but it was taken at night in the dark while holding the camera without a tripod. The shutter speed was 1/30 and the ISO was bumped right up. I'm quite happy with how it came out considering...

[Wavelength]

truly wonderful images...second set touches sky!!!

[Kaye Leggett]

I missed the first photos as I too was away - but love them all and the way you tell the story. The second set are all inspiring for your use of people in the first three and the bear, all beautifully captured

[Dave Humphries]

Kyle,

If the rest are anything like these, please - be inspired to show us some more when the LR PC functional again.

Thanks, Dave

[BrianA61]

All really nice shots. The second set is awesome with the use of people to give a feeling of the massive scale. Very good composition. Not to nitpick or anything, but, are you sure those are wolves in those shots? To me, they look like coyotes. Seem too small to be wolves but I could be wrong, though. That looks like a very LARGE brown bear. I wouldn't be brave enough to get out of my car. That's what zoom lenses are for.

[Kyle]

Thank you for the comments everyone, I really appreciate it.

All really nice shots. The second set is awesome with the use of people to give a feeling of the massive scale. Very good composition. Not to nitpick or anything, but, are you sure those are wolves in those shots? To me, they look like coyotes. Seem too small to be wolves but I could be wrong, though. That looks like a very LARGE brown bear. I wouldn't be brave enough to get out of my car. That's what zoom lenses are for.

I'm pretty sure that they are Grey Wolves. They look much smaller in the photos. We had quite a long and good look at them and even picked up a book on wolves later to compare (wolves are my brothers favourite animal so he was quite excited). Later that night the entire pack was howling at the moon and I'm pretty sure one of their young ones got lost near our tents. It was really neat to hear.
It could be possible that they have some coyote and some wolf in them. Up by me the wolves are apparently mating with coyotes which is creating a hybrid that is aggressive like a coyote but larger like a wolf.

The brown bear was huge. We had seen several black bears before this one and they were smaller. Since neither my brother or I had really seen a Grizzly before we thought this was one. We kept our distance from this guy. I was using my zoom lens and we only got out of the car when he was father away. Once he started towards the road we got back in the car. All the other tourists did not seem concerned at all that there was a large bear, who was clearly hungry, wondering towards them.

[Kyle]

A couple more from Jasper. Once I get my pc up and running again I'll hopefully finish the Jasper photos and be able to start on Jasper and Yellowstone.

By far my most favourite place of the entire trip. Mount Edith Cavell. This is from the base of the mountain. The drive up there was a long, winding, very narrow road full of switch-backs. It was quite the adventure just to get there and it was the only place we went to twice. My brother, friend and I all agreed that this was the highlight of the trip.
The ice at the top of the photo is called Angel Glacier. Due to the bowl shape in the rock that melting ice makes the glacier looks like it has wings. Ghost Glacier was to the left, just outside the photo but in 2012 it actually fell. 1000 ton pieces of rock dropped into the Cavell Glacier Pond (the pond and glacier on the bottom of the photo). The ice falling displaced the water with such force that it destroyed everything downhill from here. You can kind of see it on the right side of the photo. You use to be able to walk right up to the pond but it's no longer safe. The parking lot was destroyed as well. Luckily it happened around 1am so no one was there.

1.

Closeup of the pond and glacier. I really like the texture of the ice and the colour of the water.
2.

This is a view of the top of the mountain. At the bottom of it you and see the top of Angel glacier. To the left of the mountain is where Ghost glacier was.
3.

A Marmot on lookout while his friend wandered down by us.
4.

This is the other Marmot's friend. He came over to check us out.
5.

A Pika in the rocks looking for an afternoon snack.
5.

Some bighorn sheep settling and argument.
6.

Medicine Lake
7.

A slightly different view of the Athabasca Falls:
8.


I've got a couple more that I edited but these are the best of them. All C&C is welcome.

[bnnrcn]

They are all beautiful images Kyle,thanks for sharing

[BrianA61]

The one of Medicine Lake will be spectacular if you can coax a some more detail out of the shadows. Maybe brighten them up a bit and add some vibrance and/or saturation to bring out more color. Bring out a deeper color in the sky and you will have yourself a very nice photo. All the others are great too. I may have to put that location on my "bucket list". Nice work.

[IzzieK]

I love your adventure shots...particularly like #3 of the second set, the town in Jasper, Alberta....love the narration too. Love to see some more...