Salute To The Hudson River

I’ve just returned from 5 days camping at Buck Pond Campground in the northern Adirondacks, where I enjoyed some great weather, lots of canoe time, and great photographic opportunities. I’ll have some images to share in the next day or so, but in the meantime, I just wanted to highlight two images that are part of a local show.

This image titled “River Palettes”  was made during a fairly recent outing to Esopus Meadows, and I was fortunate to find this amazing sky reflected in the calm waters of the Hudson. The strong lines of the clouds really dictated the composition to me, and I immediately thought of the brush strokes of a painter sweeping across the sky.  It is certainly one of those images that is better appreciated as a print rather than on a computer monitor, something which is often over looked by many photographers. I’m never really 100% sure if an image is successful until I print it, and only then will I make the final adjustments if any to the master file. In this case not many were needed, and I printed directly from Lightroom.

I’ve been working more on my panoramas recently, and “Little Stony Point” is one that I’m quite pleased with. I love venturing out at the tail end of storms when the weather is very active, and conditions are very dynamic and exciting. When I arrived at this spot on the Hudson just 4 miles south of where I live, there was heavy cloud cover and a strong wind. But withing 30 minutes, the scene had changed dramatically, and I knew I had the potential for expressing how I felt about the view before me. The cool refreshing breeze, the calming water at low tide, and setting sun behind the sweeping and dark shapes all combined to create a very calming and lyrical atmosphere. I wished the conditions never to change, but all too quickly the soothing light was gone and I walked back to my car in darkness. This photograph was composed of 3 images stitched together in Photoshop, then cropped and processed in Lightroom.  While the print in the show is 36″ wide, I am making a 90″ wide canvas version for the lobby of a corporate clients office – I’ll have the full details in a future post.

Both of these images, as well as five others are part of a new exhibition at the Riverwinds Gallery in Beacon, NY titled “Salute to the Hudson River Through a Photographers Eye“, which opened this past Saturday and runs for one month. There are 4 other photographers in the show all showing their personal views of the Hudson, and I was very excited to be invited to participate. You can read more about the show at the Hudson Valley Press website.