I have always admired the beauty of this local old Church but the way the steeple is mounted almost hanging off the front has always baffled me. There has to be some logical reason why it wasn’t mounted ten feet back but other than it having ornate woodwork in the front, it is a mystery to me. The patch of purple iris shown here was almost too close to the church for a good shot including the church but I am satisfied with this result. An interesting observation I made is no matter where I moved the steeple on that roof it did not look as good as at the edge!
This little patch of tulips makes an appearance every spring and it always pulls me in to get a shot. It is literally 3 feet beside a highway of super busy traffic on an Amish property.
This was captured on Memorial day evening and features a nice red barn and house and the properties small pond located just below. The bottom photo caught my eye a week or so ago and I stopped to see if I could try to capture the sea of yellow. The owner was very friendly and said sure so I asked if I could return to try a pond shot sometime and he said sure whenever, even if we are not home which I appreciated. That brings us to Monday night when possible storms were forecast so I decided why not head out here. I was thinking maybe lightning reflected in the pond or whatever possibilities might develop! I arrived with a dark sky behind the barn and the occasional rumble but really no lightning to speak of. I set my tripod as low as it goes at the edge of the pond with my camera and then added a big golf umbrella I velcro fast to the tripod. I then add a small bag with about 30-40 pounds of weights in it to the tripod and umbrella to keep it from taking off!
After I have my composition locked and focused, I go back to my truck for added safety and remotely operate the camera. It was looking more and more like a flop with the storm just languishing in the distance and the chance for a good shot becoming less with each passing minute. I was a couple minutes from throwing in the hat when I noticed a beam of light below the storm where it was starting to light up. Well the light got better and better till the point I shot this frame and just like that my phone lit up with an emergency Tornado Warning and I could see the rain coming in so I made a beeline to grab my camera before everything let loose. It got pretty windy with heavy rain for a few minutes but thankfully no Tornado developed. All in all I was very happy with the result of this evening of opportunities.
once upon a time there were three brothers who started a hauling business. They ran into trouble when they assigned mechanic duties to the youngest brother and scheduling to the middle brother! The mechanic had trouble keeping his suspenders on so he was worthless on the mechanical jobs and the middle brother liked to take naps most of the day. This frustrated the elder brother who has an expression of disgust.
By looking at these photos you would never guess the front door is about twenty feet from a heavily traveled road. There is a small bookstore across the street that I had stopped in when I noticed the pretty spring color around the house. My mind immediately started imagining what the possibilities could be and how fleeting the shot might be because spring blooms can fade fast depending on the weather. I waited a day because I saw rain was forecast and I pre-visualized the image I was going to try for!
There is a small pizza shop to the left and anyone getting pizza must have thought what a nut job I was shooting in the rain with an umbrella mounted to the tripod. The owners could not have been more welcoming in allowing me to do this series, and they were more than happy to turn on every light on the property if thats what I needed done to get a great shot.
The closed bookstore parking lot provided a great rainy reflection of the home in all its illuminated glory and I am very happy with the result, but one lone parking lot light that was seemingly as bright as the sun came on at exactly the time it was really getting balanced but I was fairly certain I had it in the bag already. The second image is the side yard and the owners have created a beautiful place to relax with friends and family. The third photo features the opposite side of the house where the driveway comes in between the house and the stunning barn that was added fairly recently. The bottom image is the backyard view and includes a beautiful pink dogwood that provided the perfect compliment to the cozy backyard space. I got a small tour inside and the front doors were just beautiful as was the entire space.
The parking lot in the top image did have white parking space lines, a couple orange cones and 2 concrete blocks that I gladly cloned out!
I shot this same location several years ago but I don’t remember the pink dogwood blooming at the same time as the beautiful purple Iris . As usual I requested some light inside and the owner happily obliged. This spot is not as relaxing as it may at first seem because about a foot to my right is a busy road with cars whizzing by. My one tripod leg is literally in the gravel just off the blacktop. I chose to put a few led road flares on my tripod and along the edge of the road so hopefully my camera was not going to get obliterated by someone not watching the road. I fired my camera using my tablet from both across the road in my truck and from the yard when adding flash.
I was driving the back roads when I glanced between houses and noticed this lavender/purple flowering plant growing in a large patch amongst the trees. They went very high up and I found them quite appealing. The top image is taken from the road and that was as wide a shot as I could get without including houses on each side. The Azalea was much bigger on the left but I needed to crop off the bricks of the house showing through. The second image was looking up the stream towards the neighbors property where you can just see the bridge shown in the bottom photo looking the opposite direction. I had to talk to three separate homeowners to get access to shoot but all were very gracious. I am leaning toward it being Grape Hyacinth but I may be wrong.
I have been photographing Lancaster County scenes for 40 years and have many great memories of capturing the local Amish and Mennonite communities. Their traditional simple attire always made for great images of a way of life not everyone has the opportunity to experience. A few years ago someone somehow associated with Penn State and its various community off shoots came up with the brilliant Idea to provide these obnoxious orange vests to all one room school kids. The obvious goal was to increase visibility and safety, which no one can argue with, but after seeing a group [the Amish] that tries to downplay attention, it just amazed me they accepted this to the degree they did? Personally I was never aware that any problem existed and quite honestly it would not matter what color you were wearing if someone is looking at their phone while driving. So now you know my stance on obnoxious orange vests and this photo is a rarity for me to shoot but they did coordinate with the vibrant azalea!
This small town Church and the Dogwood trees framing the view beckoned me for a shot. What you don’t see are the ridiculous amount of power lines I had to remove to end up with this undistracting result. While it can be a tedious effort to remove them, I decided it was better done on the computer than with a chain saw! The property where the dogwood is located required me to step into the yard a few feet. A lady was walking out a connected driveway there and I asked is this your home? She said no but followed it up with what did you want? I said just permission to step in the yard to photograph the dogwood and Church and instantly she says go ahead? She says to me ” isn’t that beautiful”, I respond except for the obnoxious wires, and she says you can do it if you want it bad enough. She gave me the kick in the pants I needed to indeed make it happen. By the way I think she lived there!
Donald Reese Photography 