Dgwphotos

While the town of Franklin was abandoned in the early 1920's, several mines at Franklin operated into the 1960's, including two mines down the hill and across the river. (a third mine across the river was operated until the town was abandoned) Because the town was situated above the Green River Gorge, there is a considerable climb down to the river from the access to the town site, and an incline was used to access the mine operations across the river. Recently, my friend Peter and I went down the northern most of the three paths down to the river (first path from the trailhead), which was the access to the last mine in the area, which was closed as an explosives test during the 1960's, as I had heard about an abandoned mine cart in the river that's most visible in the summer when the water is at its lowest. I brought my digital IR equipment (D70 + R72 IR only filter), the D200, set to black and white, and the Lomo Fisheye down with me. The abandoned mine cart ...

This is the setup I used to take the snow berry photos: This set up consists of a Nikon D200, Nikon 105mm F4 Macro lens with the dedicated 52.5mm extension tube mounted on a macro focusing rail, all mounted on a Bogen/Manfrotto 390 tripod. Not pictured is an electronic release, that I use to avoid introducing additional motion when releasing the shutter into the camera system which may result in a blurry photo. This specific lens, and the 55mm lens I have as well, will by itself (without the extension tube) do a 1:2 reproduction ratio, or 1/2 life size. The extension tube allows the 105mm to focus to a 1:1 reproduction ratio, or life size. However, the extension tube "costs" some light for the exposure, however, the built in meter will compensate for that. It also will not allow the lens to focus to infinity, so with the extension tube on, the lens will not focus to normal ranges. It also includes a tripod collar, similar to that found on longer telephotos/telephoto zoom...

The park behind my house has these berry bushes (possibly snow berries) all over the park, and they are handy subjects for some macro work. We had a white Christmas for the first time in 9 years and I was inspired to take these first two photos while wandering the park: This photo was taken about a year earlier: Thanks for looking, and as always, feel free to comment!

First of all, I'd like to apologize for the lack of posts, I've been pretty uninspired, my Darkroom is out of order, and I've been more focused on building an IT career. One of my off and on interests has been military history and military aviation. A few years ago, the Commemorative Air Force's B-29 bomber Fifi, one of only two flight worthy B-29's, visited the Seattle area, for the first time since the 1980's. Fifi was built at Boeing's Renton Factory, which now produces 737 airliners. My dad and I were able to visit her while she was at Boeing Field and the Museum of Flight.   The B-29 was innovative as one of the first pressurized bombers, for increased comfort for the crew, and to enable her to function as a very high altitude bomber aircraft. The pilots, navigator, and flight engineer all share the nose of the aircraft with the bombardier, unlike in previous bombers such as the B-17 and B-24. The navigator's position, situated behind the...

Sorry, I haven't been too active with my photography over the past two or so years, so there hasn't been much to post about, but I do plan on getting back out into the field soon with some fresh work. In the mean time, I will explain about one of the ways that I find about many of these sites. While I first heard about Franklin from a newspaper article several years ago, after I got into Geocaching in 2005, I discovered that there was a geocache there, which my dad and I visited in 2007, and that site visit sparked the idea to use IR film to photograph the site later that year. Many of the other sites that I have posted about, I first learned about through Geocaching, including remnants of the Pacific Coast Railroad line to Black Diamond and Franklin, the Newcastle operations, and others as well. This abandoned mail truck is a good example. I will be posting more photos of it to come, along with other new sites, and I do intend to finish the Roslyn project as well. I recen...

A few of my other IR images. A goal post at a nearby elementary school A picnic table at the same school An old tree at a nearby park.

I've been experimenting with digital IR methods, using a R72 filter on my D70, a filter which passes only IR. (though if you hold it up to a light, you can see a dim image through it) It requires the use of a tripod, as long exposures are the norm, do to the limited IR sensitivity. I prefer the film look, though the digital camera adds color to the IR, which produces some interesting effects. My first successful digital IR image, featuring myself (I was finally able to figure out how to get a good white balance.) A cluster of ferns growing on a tree in the park behind my house, not uncommon in the Pacific Northwest forest. The outlet of a large pond in the park, known as Spring Creek Pond. I chose to leave the color, as I thought the color was rather interesting. (The color in the other images didn't really add anything.) A tree growing on the pond bank. Thanks for looking, and as always, feel free to comment!