Wildlife, landscape and weather photography
Well this was kind of fun! I was almost home from work when a Tornado Warning was issued. That got my attention but, unfortunately, I didn’t have my camera with me (I know, sacrilege!).
I raced home, grabbed my gear and headed to the local fairgrounds. While I never saw any rotation, the storm cell did look pretty darned cool.
Going back to the end of August for this pic. I and some photo friends had spent the evening photographing the sunflowers east of Denver, Colorado with a few thunderstorms rolling through.
Even after the sun had dropped below the horizon, some of us hung around, enjoying the light and sound show Mother Nature was putting on in the sky above. I’d intermittently snap a few pics, hoping to catch a bolt or two and as luck would have it, I managed to grab this capture of a series of bolts – I love the ‘curley Q’ in the big one.
I used a long, 30 second exposure to maximize my chances of getting something. That indeed worked although with the wind the flowers ended up being blurred. Nevertheless, I think it is kind of a cool capture.
A little bit of lightning fun on the plains of Colorado.
I was a bit late getting to this spot yesterday evening and missed much of the show. Thankfully, I did get there in time to get a few cool captures.
The thunderstorms were quite strong and very electrified sending many bolts to the ground. Throw in the orange glow of the setting sun and the flowers and it was pretty neat.
I don’t have a lightning trigger so just have to keep snapping pics repeatedly hoping lightning pops at the right time.
I am back from some much needed R & R in San Isabel National Forest overlooking Buena Vista, Colorado. I didn’t take many pics as family and relaxation were higher priorities but the skies in many of the evenings demanded attention.
This one from this past Friday. Mount Princeton is front and center. If I am not mistaken, Mount Yale is the tallest peak to the right then moving back left of Princeton, Mount Antero and Mount Shavano are the two most prominent on that side.
No matter their names, the view was awesome! Oh, and believe it or not, the next night we had snow!
June means severe weather season here in Colorado and that can make for some fun afternoons. Today, we had a nice thunderstorm move through and, thankfully, no big hail.
After the storm passed, the clouds to the east looked awesome with bits of mammatus mixed in with the formations.
I tried my best to get some lightning shots but failed. It seemed no matter which way I pointed my camera, the bolts were the opposite way. 😉
A throwback image taken in June 2012. Yesterday we got our first taste of severe weather for the year and while it didn’t deliver much more than heavy rain and small hail, it certainly got my adrenaline pumping.
I haven’t been able to do much storm chasing at all in recent years. I go to work very early in the morning and coming home at midnight after a chase to the Colorado / Kansas border and then functioning at work the next day just isn’t possible.
I do need to try to head out on those ‘backyard’ chases close to home as oftentimes you don’t have to go far to at least get some nice storm structures.
This particular chase was near Simla, Colorado in an area near the Palmer Divide that is famous for seeing gorgeous storms. The storm did generate an EF-2 tornado which we only saw briefly as it was heavily wrapped in rain. While I didn’t get any salvageable images of that, the structure of the storm was impressive.
Oh what a night! June 11, 2015 found me in far southeastern Colorado chasing storms. We chased this beast for a long ways and while it never did drop a tornado, it did give us some nice looks.
This image is taken after dark and those clouds are being lit up the intra-cloud lightning. It was an absolute non-stop light show.
If you look close, you can see a small town almost directly under the stormcell. It dropped baseball size hail and the straight-line winds downed powerlines.
Going back into the archives for this one to June 2012. On a tornado chase near Simla, Colorado. The chase did yield one funnel cloud directly overhead and then a very rain-wrapped, obscured twister on the ground. Unfortunately, we were too far away to get ourselves in position to get a good look at the tornado. This was taken not long after when we stopped to watch the impressive thunderstorm as it wound down and obscured the setting sun.
Work and life’s commitments don’t allow me to storm chase near as often as I would like. However, every now and then, I get lucky and Mother Nature brings a storm right to me. Such was the case this past Friday as I went for a photo drive after work.
A nice little thunderstorm popped up and while the storm itself wasn’t anything extraordinary, it did make for a very pretty scene. This same storm cell would go on to intensify and drop hail up to an inch in diameter only about 10 miles from where this picture was taken.
On my recent trip to the northern Rockies, our first overnight stop was in northern Wyoming in the town of Kaycee. Soon after arriving as sunset grew close, thunderstorms started to build just to our east. This particular cell was quite beautiful as it was lit by the direct sunlight to the west and the shades or orange of the soon-to-come sunset. For a time it was severe warned as it was dropping golf ball sized hail – thankfully not until it was past us.
