Stillwater Gulls

I was recently down in Stillwater walking along the river and snapped a few shots of the gulls. They were so close I decided to get a few head shots. I liked these two, although they turned out a little darker than I would have liked.

South Dakota Sunset

Well, it was a great trip and I've had a lot of fun going through the photos, editing, organizing, and of course sharing them with all of you. Here is the last shot from the trip that I'll be posting and I thought it quite a fitting shot for a conclusion to the trip.

Sunset on the grasses of the Badlands:

Black Hills Landscapes

A friend of mine has an Infrared converted Canon D60 and she was kind enough to let me borrow it for the trip. Thanks MG! I didn't take a lot of photos with it mainly because I didn't always have it with me when hiking so most of the shots were taken with in walking distance of the vehicle. Here are the two best shots of the bunch with processing done in Lightroom for conversion to full grayscale and the addition of just a bit of Sepia in Shadows.





If you're interested in learning more about infrared conversions, here is the company that converted her camera and a page of sample images. Life Pixel

South Dakota Mountain Goat

The day we arrived, we pretty much went straight to Mt. Rushmore. I had seen it as a young child, but my memory of it was not that great. It really is a spectacular monument both to the people portrayed and to those who carved it. What a collosal effort. Just outside of the park on the road was this Moutain Goat. The only one we saw the whole trip. It was a bit dark and overcast but I think the picture turned out all right. I had never seen one before!

Custer State Park Pronghorn

Well, I can't leave out the Pronghorn! They were much more abundant than I would have expected. We saw them all over, but this shot with the wild flowers just seemed to be the right one to post.

Custer State Park Buffalo

I think that this was probably the most representative shot of the day. It was a great day that we truly enjoyed.

Custer State Park Buffalo

Here is another shot of a Buffalo (Bison) converted to Black and White. The original shot in color was pretty mediocre. It was the middle of the day with full sun so the color shot appears washed out. With a bit of work though, the contrast between the dark color of the animal and bright grass and sky seems to really work out well.

The Black Hills

So I am continuing, although quite slowly, to work through my photographs from South Dakota. The next few shots are some black and white (converted in Lightroom) that I was quite happy with. Below is a shot of the Black Hills in Custer State Park near Sylvan Lake. What a spectacular place to visit!



By the way, this one might be worth seeing in full size over on my Flickr account, just click the image to get there.