Photographic Thoughts — 10/05/2025 to 10/11/2025

“Taking an image, freezing a moment, reveals how rich reality truly is.” — Anonymous

Thank you for all the new views and likes from last week, it helps keep me inspired.

Little words this week. I have been tired and my creativity this week is low.

Sunday, 10/05/2025: Posted photo — Bolton Pond.

Bolton Pond off the Bolton Pond Trail on Wachusett Mountain. This is a trail that I hike on once every year or two since it is one that I find not very interesting to hike. The trail is relatively flat and hard to follow sometimes. I was a little surprised to see that the Commonwealth has done trail work and it is easier to follow.

This trail had a turn that was very wide and, if you did not know the trail, you would have wandered into the woods. The Commonwealth made a barrier at this corner to force people to stay on the trail.

Monday, 10/06/2025: Posted photo — More Progress.

Here is my weekly progress photo of the lift installation. The lift structures are almost all installed. The chairs themselves have not been installed and are still in the ski area parking lot.

Tuesday, 10/07/2025: Posted photo — Lakeside.

We went to the cottage to take out the dock on this fine fall day. The foliage is just starting and should be a peak soon.

This is the view from our cottage looking over Winnekeag Lake.

Wednesday, 10/08/2025: Posted photo — Texture of Pine.

I am testing a plant ID app that I have been using to identify trees. The app is called Seek. I used it to identify the bark of this pine tree.

Thursday, 10/09/2025: Posted photo — Slope Aspect Navigation.

When you are lost in the woods, you are taught to triangulate. The problem is, when you are lost you do not have any objects to triangulate on.

One way of locating yourself is by slope aspect or finding your location off the contour of the land. This is something I have been practicing for a while and hope to never use. If you want to know more about this technique, please leave a comment.

This is the slope that one of the lifts is at were one of the hiking trails cross the ski area.

Friday, 10/10/2025: Post photo — Day after Full.

This is a photo of the Hunter (or Harvest) moon the day after it was officially full. I took this photo two nights ago and just processed it today.

This photo was extracted from a 15 second video of the moon. I have a photo stacking program that will extract all the frames from a video and stack them into one photo. I have not used this photo much, so I wanted to give it a try again.

I have not been very happy with my moon shots lately. I do not know if it is my eyes or the lens. When I take moon photos, I zoom in as much as possible and manually focus my lens. My “moon” lens is all manual. The zoom is set at 1050 mm and placed on my tripod. With the length of the lens, any breeze or wind will make it shake. I use live view to focus, and it looks focused on the camera. I may have to take my lens apart and give it a cleaning.

Saturday, 10/11/2025: Post photo — Covered Bridge.

This covered bridge is located at the Foster Country Club in Foster RI. This was the site of one of my cousin’s daughter’s wedding yesterday afternoon. Here daughter likes my nature photography and asked me to photograph her wedding.

The photos from the wedding came out great. The photos from the reception were not so great because of the lighting. It is very difficult to take photos inside when they keep the reception hall dark. You need a very fast lens to take photos. I had a fast lens, but with the darkness and the colored lights from the DJ’s booth, I am not happy with the RAW photos.

It is now time to go through all my photos, edit them, and make them presentable to bride and groom.

Congratulations Mr. and Mrs. Grasso!

That is all for now. Until next week, be safe.

“Quod scripsi, scripsi. Ingeniarius sum, non scriptor.”

“Sumens imagines consolatur et inspirat me. Pulchritudinem mundi video per cameram meam.”

Photographic Thoughts — 09/25/2022 to 10/01/2022

“Photograph: a picture painted by the sun without instruction in art.” — Ambrose Bierce

Thank you for all the new views and likes from last week, it helps keep me inspired.

Here are some random photos from my first photo book. My second photo book is in process. I am looking for someone to print and sell my books are a reasonable price point.

Sunday, 09/25/2022: Posted photo — Dunefield.

A dune field located in Great Sand Dunes National Park, Colorado. Being on the dunes was like being in the middle of a desert. What impressed me is how far away from the park you can see the dunes.

Monday, 09/26/2022: Posted photo — Frozen Watch Tower.

This is a photo of the old watch tower on Wachusett Mountain. You can clearly see the wind blow ice on the tower.

Tuesday, 09/27/2022: Posted photo — The Golden Rule.

My niece got married this past weekend. She married one of my son’s friends, a great guy. He asked my son if he could date his cousin. I found a verse in the Bible, took off my wedding ring to take this photo. This is a photo that I have wanted to take for a while.

Wednesday, 09/28/2022: Posted photo — Balance Rock.

Balance Rock in Arches National Park. This is not the traditional view of Balance Rock, but I like it.

Thursday, 09/29/2022: Posted photo — Footbridge of the Virgin River.

I saw this bridge at Zion National Park and took this photo. I liked the way the bridge was situated with the view of the cliffs and the water.

Friday, 09/30/2022: Post photo — Star Trail.

Every once and awhile I have an urge to take a star trail photo. I set up my camera, point north to the stars, set my timer on 20 seconds and unlimited shots, go to bed and let either drain my camera battery of fill my SD card. I have a stacking program that I use to create my star trail.

Saturday, 10/01/2022: Post photo — Reflection Lakes.

One of my favorite photos and the cover photo of my first photo book. Just loved the stillness of the water and the reflection of Mount Rainier.

That is all for now. Until next week, be safe.

For more photo of other projects I have work, visit my website: https://photobyjosephciras.weebly.com or visit me on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/PhotobyJosephCiras/.

Photographic Thoughts — 08/22/2021 to 08/28/2021

“What I like about photographs is that they capture a moment that’s gone forever, impossible to reproduce.” — Karl Lagerfeld

Thank you for all the new views and likes from last week, it helps keep me inspired.

Sunday, 08/22/2021: Posted photo — Stained Glass.

Settings: Canon EOS 60D, ISO 400, f/5.6, 1/80 s, 32 mm.

This stained glass shows the initial for Ava Maria. Ava Maria is a prayer to the Virgin Mary used in Catholic worship. The first line is adapted from Luke 1:28. Ave Maria is also called Hail Mary.

Ave Maria in stained glass

“Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum. Benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus fructus ventris tui, Iesus. Sancta Maria, Mater Dei, ora pro nobis peccatoribus, nunc, et in hora mortis nostrae. Amen.”

Why did I take this photo — I took this photo because last week I took a photo of some stained glass windows with my cell phone and I wanted to take a better photo. I took my DSLR with me into church this morning, saw the glimmer of light amongst the rain, and took this photo.

Monday, 08/23/2021: Posted photo — Wet Leaf.

Settings: Canon EOS 60D, ISO 100, f/5.6, 1/40 s, 135 mm.

Tropical Storm Henri just paid a visit to the area. Yesterday there were some gusts of wind and a little rain in this area. Some other areas around me received more wind damage and rain.

Today I was walking around and say the water beading off this leaf, so I took a photo of it. Always keep your eyes open to the wonders of nature.

Water drops on a leaf

Later in the day, I took my normal Monday night hike up Wachusett Mountain. There was only two of us this week because of the heavy rain that came in this afternoon. It was wet and rainy on the way to the summit, and it was very wet and heavy rain on the way down. When I hike, I just keep wiping the water from my eyes and just follow the tail. You need to take all your steps very carefully. Hiking is still fun in the rain.

Tuesday, 08/24/2021: Posted photo — Web.

Settings: Canon EOS 60D, ISO 1600, f/5.6, 1/20 s, 135 mm.

Is it just me, or are there many more spiders this year that there have been in the past? I keep seeing webs and the light shining off the webs. Today I stopped and attempted to take a photo of a web in the sunlight.

Spider web

Looking at the photo, it looks like my ISO was set too high since the web looks blown out to me.

Wednesday, 08/25/2021: Posted photo — Moon.

Settings: Canon EOS 60D, ISO 400, f/16, 1/125 s, 300 mm.

Look, Joe took another moon photo!

Just another moon shot

This morning, as the moon does many times, I was just called to take a photo of the moon.

Thursday, 08/26/2021: Posted photo — Hike.

Settings: N/A.

This is not a photo. I took many photos today and did not like any of them good enough to post.

Thursday night hike

This is a photo of the trail I took tonight on Wachusett Mountain in the heat. The hike was 3.5 miles long, it started in the light, and ended in the dark. The air was very moist and heavy. When you hike in situation similar to this, you must drink plenty of water.

Friday, 08/27/2021: Post photo — Aialik Glacier.

Settings: N/A.

Aialik Glacier is the largest glacier in Aialik Bay, located in Kenai Fjords National Park. While stable, the glacier calves most actively in May and June. We say the glacier in June and saw the calves.

We went to Alaska in 2016 for our 25th wedding anniversary with my son and niece. Alaska is a great place to visit. If you have an opportunity to visit, please do so.

Poster created from my photo of the Aialik Glacier

About the photo. I took some of my travel photos and made posters of them to remember were the photo was taken. It was a fun process to learn a new photo editing technique. I made a photo script to help me do this for my photos. The script will resize the photos and add the text and boarder.

Saturday, 08/28/2021: Post photo — Mr. and Ms.

Settings: Canon EOS 60D, ISO 200, f/7.1, 1/125 s, 24 mm.

I would like to thank Doug and Vicky for allowing me to photograph there special day. This was my first official wedding that I photographed. They had faith in me do this knowing that I am primarily a landscape photographer.

Mr. and Ms. Chase-Dame

I have worked with Doug’s father for many years. He asked me if I was comfortable enough to take photos as his son’s wedding, I said I would love to do so. As you can see from the photo, they are a fun couple. When I was told that there were wearing Hawaiian shirts for the wedding, I thought that just Doug was going to wear one. When I went to their house and saw that everyone in the family had one on, I went home to put my shirt from Hawaii on to fit in with the crowd. My house was on the way from the morning photoshoot to the wedding.

Thank you again for having faith and my abilities. Now I need to go through the photo and pick some out.

That is all for now. Until next week, be safe.

For more photo of other project I have work, visit my website: https://photobyjosephciras.weebly.com/ or visit me on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/PhotobyJosephCiras/.

COVID is real! Be safe out there, keep your social distance, and remember to always wear your mask and wash your hands. Get your vaccine!