Woodsy Tales

Nikon D700, 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6 VR lens @ 28mm, f/9, 1/160s, ISO 200.

There's a story you should read, if you haven't already. See, when I was a kid, my elementary school didn't have a gymnasium. We spent every day outside doing calisthenics while Coach Johnson sang "Daisy Daisy", then playing tetherball and tag on the playground, falling off monkey bars, rolling in tires, and getting bit by fire ants. Good times.

But, when it rained (this is Florida, ya know?) we had to stay inside. Sometimes P.E. was held in the cafeteria where we sat at tables and played BINGO; northern Florida in the '80's, what can I say? Other times we convened in the library where we watched film strips.

My favorite was the Lorax. I often helped load the tapes and the film strip and synchronize the two. The film perfectly followed the book by Dr. Seuss, plus some music. Remember the Grinch film? Just like that one, but you should have seen the brown barbaloots dancing about in their barbaloot suits! Good times.

Maybe that's why I've always enjoyed the woods...

Nikon D700, 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6 VR lens @ 28mm, f/8, 1/250s, ISO 400.

And we were enjoying the woods a little while ago. This Autumn has been very lovely. Now with the first snows sitting heavy on the hills, it's a good thing we got some time for these fun images.

Nikon D700, 28-300mm f.3.5-5.6 VR lens @ 180mm, f/5.6, 1/200s, ISO 200.

I say 'we'. That's cause my friends C., L., and L. were good enough to let 11 photographers from the Cache Valley Photographers come along and work with them making pictures throughout a very chilly morning. Cafe Ibis cocoa kept us warm, though.

Nikon D700, 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6 VR lens @ 28mm, f/8, 1/250s, ISO 400.

Oh, back to that story you should read. I recommend the Lorax, but that's not what got me thinking. It was picturing L. in a wedding dress one of the club members brought along. You've heard of The Bride of Frankenstein, right? Creepy looking bride with hair sticking straight back with stripes and plenty of diodes attached to her reanimated flesh? Well, the woods and the leaves and the vines and the dress got my mind stewing on another film we watched during rainy days on the playground.

Nikon D700, 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6 VR lens @ 56mm, f/5.6, 1/250s, ISO 320.

It was a claymation rendition of Washington Irving's Rip Van Winkle. Pretty awesome little film. I remember Rip testing the wind for a kite by licking his claymation finger and holding it in the breeze, and playing nine-pins with gnomes in the Catskills. At the end...well, I don't want to ruin it for you.

Suffice it to say, L. in her dress was a perfect Bride of Rip Van Winkle with vines and leaves of a hundred years grown about her. Bride of Rip Van Winkle: look for it in a theater near you.

Nikon D700, 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6 VR lens @ 90mm, f/7.1, 1/160s, ISO 320.

There was one other film we watched, too, and it also happen's to be based on one of Irving's stories, though I believe it was produced by Walt Disney: The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. I'll let you know as soon as I figure out how to get L. on a horse and a pumpkin on her head.

Nikon D700, 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6 VR lens @ 300mm, f/9, 1/250s, ISO 500.