This past weekend we got a little over 13 inches of snow plus another inch or two of sleet. Temperatures are staying put right now hovering anywhere from almost zero to a balmy twenty. This storm was not the prettiest because it was very fluffy and did not cling to anything. This covered bridge was taken in the early morning when it was around 15 degrees and as you can see parts of the stream are already frozen. A possible 2nd nor’easter this coming weekend seems to be heavily favored at this point. Looks like its time for more bread and milk. We had one day where travel was iffy but to watch people stock up you would think we were going to be hunkered down for weeks!
This was another one of the bitter cold mornings we had last week. I saw the mist rising from the warm creek and the fence added a little bit of interest. For an image like this I will compose the shot while using a branch to block the sun and then ever so slowly lean in until I just barely catch the edge of the sun peeking through. Getting the full sun usually will just result in lens flare that degrades the contrast. Also, shooting on manual to get the overall exposure looking like you want it is critical.
I took this image last weekend as I was heading to do another shot. The farther I drove on the back roads, the more this low level fog seemed to be building in the small valleys in the farm fields. I had to make a snap decision which house I was going to ask to shoot from their yard and I picked a good one willing to let me have at it. This was like a half mile away and there was a lot of atmosphere between my camera and the farm. The intense backlit color was actually better when the sun was higher but that created so much flare I had to wait for the sun to subdue lower on the horizon. It is surprising how fast the sun goes down almost seemingly on fast forward. Tomorrow night we are set to see the arrival of 12-18 inches or more and I am hopeful to get out and get some shots. I am hoping to get my winch back on my jeep tomorrow which offers a bit of reassurance if I need to pull myself out or help someone stranded somewhere. the last time we got that much snow, a snow emergency was declared and I went out anyway and got some good shots that had deep pristine snow. It can be a little unnerving out on your own when the conditions are a bit dicey but I carry a shovel, drinks, hand warmers, blankets etc, just in case.
Where is an old sleigh when you need one? That’s what was going through my mind as I was shooting this over the weekend. This local chapel has always been something I wanted to shoot in winter but it has been elusive. This was a disaster trying to capture this scene as I could only park on a side street up hill where the bright street light is. That meant I had to carry my tripod with camera attached, my tablet, my umbrella and the pole the umbrella mounts in down the hill basically walking on the road and getting over every 5 seconds for cars going up the hill. I finally got set up and of course my wifi box decided it was not going to communicate with my tablet, which means every frame had to be fired from the camera button which oft times will add the possibility of the tripod moving ever so little. I am happy with the shot but If I had been able to use my tablet to fire the camera and flash, I could have gone across the street to add light. I really wanted to have light glowing out from the windows, which I would have accomplished by putting my flash on full power on the opposite side and sending light through the windows across the interior and out the windows you can see. The other thing that helped was it was fairly cold and flurries were flying all day which helped keep the road a little snowy instead of bare blacktop.
This old Inn is located right beside Railroad tracks which you can just make out under the snow. I shot this tonight after we had a couple inches of snow cover the area last night. I arrived here later than I wanted because there were heavy patches of fog in the valleys which sidetracked me a bit, so I may revisit it sometime in the future.
This is a former train station in a nearby town and I shot this a couple weeks ago on a quiet snowy Sunday Morning. I had been shooting in a light snow for about an hour when it suddenly stopped and you could just make out a hint of blue as sunrise drew closer. This right here is about the perfect time to shoot when the sky has gotten just bright enough that everything looks perfect. There are parking spaces all along that curb and usually you will see people park their cars here overnight. I hit the luck trifecta as 1, there were zero cars, 2, no plows had come through, and 3, there was no wind blowing to ruin the tree.
The building shown here was once an elementary school and my mother actually attended here as a child. It has been used for businesses for quite some time and my very first job was here almost 50 plus years ago. I mowed the lawn, chopped firewood and just about whatever I was told to do. Back when I was working here Legionnaires disease was a huge cause for concern across the country because people were dying and no one knew what caused it? There were all kinds of possible causes tossed about but one of them had my mother in a tizzy. At one point Pigeons in large numbers nesting in attics and stirring up dust were rumored as the cause because there was one confirmed situation where this did happen. So this old school had an attic that was like a welcome center for pigeons and when you were upstairs you could easily hear them in the attic above. So my boss wanted to do some cleanup up there and when I told the family medical expert,{my mother} she about lost her mind and told me I am not to go up there! Well that directive went in one ear and out the other and the next time I worked, the boss ushered me up to the ladder which came down from the ceiling and had to be at least twenty foot long. I was somewhat nervous as I climbed step by step because the pigeons were flying around making their trademark cooing sound. When I got to the top and poked my head up to look around, there was a full size Wolf standing there looking at me. Obviously it was stuffed but it scared the daylights out of me at 12 years old! I never did return to the attic but the boss had a good laugh at my reaction.
Another image from the Christmas decorating event I participated in this year. This display was done by a local doll club. Their is a little Dog in front of the fireplace that has been in their scenes for over ten years and it’s like seeing an old friend each time. He has managed to maintain his youthful physique all these years though.
This is a private retirement home in a nearby town. I have been here for work a few times and it always feels like a home away from home. This snow just seemed to compliment the whole vibe you get here.
Believe it or not what you are basically looking at is a parking lot covered by an overnight Winter storm that dropped 4-6 inches and coated everything in fluffy powder. The park entrance comes in to the left straight in front of me and everything behind the big tree is parking lot. I was blessed with a quiet Sunday morning, very little wind and next to no one to interrupt me! That is until about twenty minutes after shooting this when a crew came through and quite literally stopped their big old pickup dead center between the two trees. They got out, noticed me shooting that direction and kind of chuckled as if to say “sorry dude,we got snow to clear”. I knew they had every right to park where they did to do their job and the one guy asked should we move the truck? I said no need. I had gotten several decent shots before their arrival so I was already quite satisfied with the morning. The park itself was named in honor of a gentleman named Tom Grater who was very active in the local recreation center for years and who I personally interacted with as a young boy. He had a very down to earth way of communicating with kids and was always trying to steer them in the right direction.
This is another image taken during the recent snowstorm that wrapped up on a Sunday morning. Thanks to the timing of that storm I found myself basically alone to shoot several scenes of this local downtown decked out for the holidays. I always like having time to do what I want, when I want without complications and that might possibly come from being an only child! When I was young my parents would have fights and the talk of divorce was spoken out loud frequently and became a very real fear that occupied a lot of my mind. Those days of my youth were indelibly burned into my mind,not knowing where I would end up or what might unfold and that is still etched in my memory almost 50 plus years later. To their credit they somehow managed to reconcile their issues, but whenever I see a child who has to deal with the finality of divorce, I remember vividly how it affected me even though my parents stayed together, so I have much empathy for those kids. Now back on track, My wife loves to come up with things to do when I take vacation but those ideas are usually not well received. For some reason I count the days till going back to work and when someone suggests using a day for whatever unplanned idea they have, it usually ends up with me getting irritated and dwelling on the vacation getting shorter? These moments out in the elements and the gift of being able to see and capture the beauty is something I need to express my gratitude for the blessings I have been given more often! Any psychoanalysts out there who have a hypothesis for my strange vacation reasoning?
I recently mentioned that we were participating in what is known as The Ironmaster’s Christmas event where the mansion gets decorated with trees done by a variety of individuals and groups. Last year I wanted to photograph this wagon so I offered to help decorate it. This year it seems I was somehow voted on to do it again. This is what me and my wife came up with and to my delight it snowed while it was decorated. The Gruber Wagon Works is a National Historical Landmark located at the Berks County Heritage Center. This thing is solid and well made.
Christmas Eve we had a family get together at my brother in laws house and while I wish this was his home, it unfortunately is not! My wife suggested we take her parents along because her fathers night vision is not so hot and when he does drive I am praying he stays in the slow lane because there is usually someone road raging a few feet off his bumper in the passing lane. Anyway I digress back to the Christmas Eve get together and the evening was winding up, so as we go to leave I say anyone up for Christmas lights? The in-laws said sure and I proceeded to head to a beautiful neighborhood I had driven through in the past and the combination of Gorgeous homes and Classy decor made for a lovely evening drive. This particular home was one my mother in law really had high praise for and I was impressed as well so I went back Christmas night and captured it. The four lanterns at the entrance was an element I wanted to emphasize so the wide angle allowed them to show prominently in the composition. There are more lights than shown here but the lanterns added that extra touch. The owner did swing by to ask what’s up and I said just capturing Christmas scenes and he was understanding and it all worked out. The more I looked at this place, it suddenly dawned on me that I had shot this place 15-20 years ago but trying to find that shot is not going to happen. That might be going back to the days of film? Snow would have been the added piece de resistance but someday maybe!
I passed this scene in a local town during the day and decided to make a return trip that evening. I shot both these images the same evening and the bottom image was no problem but when I crossed the road to get the wider shot, I knew it was going to be a challenge. This Church is along a major highway with heavy traffic a good part of the day. Add to that there is a second road coming out on the right. So to offer a glimpse into my setup, first my tripod gets setup across the street with my camera and my Camranger wifi box attached to it and also the flash signal sender. I am across the street moving around the Church with my flash and my tablet which controls all my camera settings. I can set shutter speed, white balance, f-stop, bracketing etc. So I set everything on my tablet which sends a wifi signal telling my camera what I want things set at. Now I simply aim the flash where I want extra light, hit the fire button on my tablet which fires the shutter which in turn fires the flash trigger on my camera and my flash fires at the exact moment the camera fires. I lit the steeple, the tree, the front and side, all while trying to aim the flash properly, and also glance at my camera to make sure there is an opening so a car is not directly in front of the camera as it fires. It may sound complicated but it is not and it expands what you are able to do by being at your subject and not your camera.
Merry Christmas to all that follow or visit my site, I appreciate your interest!
This series of images capture a downtown business as it is decked out in a fresh blanket of snow. When I say the perfect storm, what I mean is to be able to get these shots, it took the right combination of circumstances to come together. The snow began falling on a Saturday afternoon and was supposed to continue all night into early Sunday so I had a destination in mind and left the house at 5am. As I was driving to my chosen spot which was actually yesterdays photo location, I came into the square of this town and just couldn’t pass up the shots I saw there. The snow was still coming down so out came the golf umbrella and I hit the ground running. The second key to success was it being Sunday morning and the whole world was snoozing peacefully in their warm beds while I kept thinking this is awesome being out here all by myself. No walkers, no snowblowers or snow removal crews as far as the eye could see! At one point the wind picked up and Snow blew in my lens, which I quickly wiped off but without realizing it I left a fine smudge which caused some of the street lights to flare. At one point I was shooting in the middle of the normally busy street with my tripod because it was so quiet! I played around for an hour and a half in the pristine landscape thinking how everything came together in this unique moment. You could see this repeat itself in two weeks or not for the next 50 years and that is part of what makes the photographic journey worthwhile!
This is an old Iron Furnace production site that has been transformed into a community park. It is called Poole Forge and this old home was in bad shape until a serious effort at restoring it was made. This bridge is a recent addition and it was all decked out in Christmas lights for the semi annual Christmas at the Ironmasters event which I also had a display at this year! We were blessed to have a decent snowstorm drop 4-6 inches during the show which was awesome! This image was actually taken a little later than I would have liked because the light was really fading which meant the balance was off and contrast was rearing its ugly head. The lights on the bridge were flaring due to the longer exposure which would have been avoided had I attempted this shot a half hour earlier. There is a point when shooting subjects like this that the ambient light balances with the Christmas lights but it doesn’t last long. To see for yourself, set up a tripod before dusk and shoot a series of bracketed exposures every few minutes. You will start out barely noticing the Lights, then slowly but surely the ambient light will start to dim and as it does the bulbs effectively become brighter to the point where the exposure for them and the exposure for the available light is balanced!
This red barn caught my eye from a Ridge I was driving on because the sun was shining on it. The only problem was the sun completely disappeared before I made it there. I knocked and got permission to get a shot and this was the best I could muster! The way the trees and bushes were positioned prevented me from finding a view that included the whole barn with any nice views of the snow.
This Winter storm seemed to slip in under my radar but thank goodness my internal clock was at peak performance so I didn’t miss it. I usually ask my wife to set her phone alarm when I am going out on these early morning adventures but for whatever reason her phone is not playing by the rules! I don’t know how other people operate but I rarely get let down by my built in clock, and the last two times I requested a wake up call, the phone never went off! I asked for a 5 am alarm and the first time I woke up at 4:58 and most recently at 5:03 so that’s pretty good in my book!
This particular storm only dropped around 5 inches but it was very clingy and it fell overnight leading into a Sunday morning. I was actually headed to another location but as I drove up main street in this local town I was struck by how pristine and quiet everything was. It’s a little rare to find untouched sidewalks, next to zero cars driving by and the parking spots empty. I roamed around for 2 hours only seeing the occasional walker go by and captured what I could while it lasted! It was still snowing for the first hour so I had to use an umbrella to keep the lens clean but it finally stopped which allowed much quicker composing and what not. This scene captures the local downtown bank which serves as the location of the town Christmas tree. You only see a part of the front which was designed by the talented C.Emlen Urban, an architect from Lancaster county who designed over 100 buildings from the 1890s to the 1920s.
As usual I have no info on this new addition to downtown Lititz but whoever completed this has done an excellent job. Jolly old St Nick was not around this evening so I blasted my flash through the side window to get some interior illumination!
Well I am taking you back to fall again with this local barn I noticed one slightly foggy morning. Thankfully the owner was very friendly and gave me the okay to get these two images. Even the little red barn for the cattle had appeal so I shot it before the frost disappeared. The friendly family dog followed me everywhere I was walking and enjoyed every minute getting attention from me.
This is the parlor at the local Historical society all decked out for Christmas! There is an antique Stereo Viewer and photos resting on the chair in the foreground, and some children’s toys from the era.
I have been a fan of this old farmhouse and barn for decades. When I was around 10 years old my grandpa took me here to cut firewood and I have no clue how he knew the owners but it was a great experience. So as far back as I can remember being a photographer, I remember having an appreciation for the place. The current owners are very friendly and allow me to capture the occasional photo that catches my eye. this was a week ago after the Ginkgo dropped most of it’s leaves. The road you see cuts right through the middle and gets very busy at times but the walls are so thick I don’t think you hear a thing. I would love to see this road when it was just a dirt path going through. You have to be very alert crossing from the house to the barn.
Last week I left work and the sky was starting to get very colorful, so I headed down the back roads looking for a nice farm or subject to include with the gorgeous sky that was unfolding. Well the further I drove the more it faded out until I finally conceded defeat. I headed home and out of feeling like I needed to still shoot something, I stopped here. There is a bridge literally right to my left and the road on the left has a stop sign just out of sight and the road going to the right has no restrictions. So I am off the road behind a guard rail that is right in front of me trying to capture this scene that is getting foggier by the minute. The problem is this is all happening as folks are headed home from work and about every three seconds a car rounds the bend in front of me and ruins the shot. It was interesting to see how fast and close drivers came to the guard rail as they took the curve off the bridge. I could have literally high five’d any passengers going by. Try doing 10 second exposures when the entire world is eager to get home after work!
Donald Reese Photography 