Favorite Photos of 2014

Had lot of fun with my photography last year. Of course, the highlight was the Alaskan trip to photograph brown bear. Loved Alaska. At least in the summer. It reminded me of West Virginia on steroids. The mountains bigger, the wilderness wilder, the rivers larger, the wild life more abundant and larger. Also, Alaska like West Virginia is rich in natural resources. They struggle to keep the wilderness from being overrun with the economic development.

Also, last year, photographed some in Grand Cayman's, photographed a wedding in Nags Head, photographed a body building model, photographed wolves inside the pen at West Virginia Wildlife Center, photographed West Virginia State scenes, and did some pixel paintography post production images.

Following are some my favorite photos with my thoughts about the image.

Had an opportunity to teach a young man photography. We spent a weekend in Dolly Sods shooting photographs during the day and then discussing photography during the evening. My plan was to go to Bear Rocks in Dolly Sods to shoot the sunrise but weather turned bad and started raining so I switched to shooting waterfalls. It was a great weekend of shooting and with all the rain the small streams turned into big streams which made the waterfalls so much more impressive. We discovered new waterfalls that I did not know even existed. The young man I trained turned out to be CEO of Brightline Interactive a cutting edge company that creates, promotes, and installs fun, easy-to-use games, activities, and visualizations that connect people to brands. Check out his company. It is impressive. Of course, once I showed him the basic about the digital camera he took it from there and started creating his own images.

click on picture to see additional waterfall photos.

I seem to shoot the Purple Fiddle every year. I told the owner, John Bright, he needed to restore some of old lighting because it helped my photos. Used to be string of lantern lights that ran across the ceiling. He agreed but said looking for another solution because the lantern lights were so much trouble burning out too often. It is one my favorite places and blue grass music just makes my knee start moving up and down........

Click on image to view other Purple Fiddle photos with the lantern lights.

Loved photographing these horses on a friend's farm The first time I photographed them in the field and I was scared to death of them. The big one kept chasing me around the field. I'd hide behind a tree until he got tired and would start feeding. I'd come out from behind the tree to start shooting photos and he come right after me and I'd have to go behind the tree again. The owner said he was just like a puppy dog and just wanted attention and patted. So this last year I didn't run behind the tree and stayed out in the field. This gigantic horse comes running up to me, stops about a couple feet away, and waits. I reach out and pat him on the nose. The owner was right. He just wanted me to pat him and talk to him. We became buddies.

click on image to see more horse pictures