Alex Mody Photography

Maine

Maine Day 1: Sunset Layers, Cadillac Mountain, Acadia National Park, Maine

06.03.09 | Permalink | 5 Comments

Hey everybody,

I’ve just completed my first full day of shooting in Maine. It went pretty well, by my standards at least. I went out looking for birds this morning and during a brief cloudy stint this afternoon. The highlight was certainly an extremely cooperative Black-throated Green Warbler. I found tons of spots with tons of different birds for me to go back to. I’m really making an effort to get some songbirds out here, especially with all of the cloudy skies the Maine coast so graciously has to offer.

Anyway, I got caught up with the birds, and lost track of time. I had been planning a hike for sunset. I hurried from where I was birding to the summit of Cadillac Mountain, and caught the last 15 minutes of a pretty nice light show. I have some wide angle shots as well, but they require a blend, which I’m not equipped to do on my laptop. So, here’s a telephoto shot. Once again, please excuse the laptop processing.

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

West Virginia

Misty Spring sunrise on Bear Rocks, Dolly Sods, West Virginia

06.02.09 | Permalink | 1 Comment

Wow, it has been a whole week since I updated this. Geez. I’ve been super busy. This past weekend, I assisted on one of Joe Rossbach’s photo workshops. It was a great time, and great learning experience for me. I drove from there straight to Maine, where I’ll be photographing for the next week and a half. I’m going to have to wait another week or so for the lupines to be at their best here, so until then I’m focusing on sunrise/sunsets on the rocky coast, and breeding songbirds! I’m trying to get the most out of this spring, if that wasn’t obvious :-)

Here’s one from the morning after the workshop. Myself, Joe, and a workshop participant, Reza, camped up on Dolly Sods overnight to catch sunrise at Bear Rocks. It was some nice light! Please excuse any errors that may be present in the processing, because this was done on my uncalibrated laptop monitor.

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

Ontario

Blue Jay in snow

05.25.09 | Permalink | 3 Comments

Here’s one from this past winter. I was up in Algonquin Provincial Park, Ontario, with my friend Greg Schneider. We came across an area with feeders that had over 100 blue jays, so we did what any bird photographers would do; we brought out the giant bag of peanuts and stayed for a few hours.

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

West Virginia

Cathedral Falls, West Virginia

05.20.09 | Permalink | Post a Comment

Chris Kayler and I explored the New River Gorge area of West Virginia a week ago. We found a lot; including but not limited to three wrong turns, very little sleep, a 4×4 track in the woods leading to the top of a runaway truck ramp on the highway, and some nice waterfalls. Cathedral Falls was by far the nicest.

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

Virginia

male Common Yellowthroat

05.18.09 | Permalink | 3 Comments

Hey everybody,

I’ve been shooting a lot this spring, but it has been almost exclusively landscapes. I haven’t been giving bird and wildlife subjects too much time lately. So, I took a visit to Huntley Meadows in Alexandria, Virginia, where I photographed this striking male Common Yellowthroat. I have very little experience shooting songbirds and warblers, so I’m really looking forward to seeing what I can do over the next few weeks.

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Virginia

Thoroughfare Dawn

05.14.09 | Permalink | Post a Comment

Here’s an old favorite from Shenandoah National Park last spring. I have yet to see any natural light show top this.

The Thoroughfare Gap overlook is a favorite spot of mine to photograph sunrise from in Shenandoah National Park. I had gone to the park that day to photograph White-tailed Deer fawns in Big Meadows, but when I saw this cloud formation with the clear patch of horizon on the east, I had to change my plan!

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

Virginia

(D/F)ogwood

05.12.09 | Permalink | 2 Comments

Nothing too fancy. I was down on the good ‘ol Blue Ridge Parkway near Buena Vista, Virginia. Delighted with the foggy conditions, I set out to photograph dogwood trees and fresh green foliage! Here’s one I came up with.

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

Virginia

Clearing Piedmont

05.11.09 | Permalink | Post a Comment

I took this photograph a few days ago, on the seventh. Chris Kayler and I took a morning trip to Shenandoah National Park hoping to photograph a waterfall or two. Much to our dismay, the clouds began to break up hours before they were forecasted to. We decided to roll with the punches, something every nature photographer knows all to0 well. Instead of hiking Overall Run, we drove Skyline Drive looking for interesting things to photograph along the way. We came across these foothills just as the clouds were clearing out of the Piedmont. Seeing gently lit foothills in contrast with fairly thick ground-level clouds, we had no choice but to stop for a while!

Here’s my best take from that morning.

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

Virginia

Whew!

05.10.09 | Permalink | 4 Comments

It’s been a whole week since I last posted on here. Wow. I’ve been ridiculously busy photographing springtime scenes throughout Virginia over the past seven days. I photographed many different things in Shenandoah National Park and the Blue Ridge Parkway, some waterfalls down by Covington and Blacksburg, VA, and lots more. Over the next few days I’ll be sharing some recent shots from all over Virginia’s mountains.

I’ll start with yesterday morning. I photographed sunrise atop Shenandoah National Park’s Blackrock Summit. There were two main layers of clouds; very thick, puffy, rain clouds at approximately my elevation, and a lighter, thinner cloud base a few thousand feet above. I figured my odds were pretty slim on getting a good sunrise, but I stuck with it anyways. I hit the trail in the pouring rain, with the full expectation of returning to my car with nothing more than waterlogged shoes. Just as I had hoped, the lower level of rain clouds broke for about ten minutes right at sunrise! It’s hard to say this when you have 20 duds in a row, but sometimes it’s really worth it to brave harsh or uncomfortable conditions on the off chance of some amazing light!

Here are two images I made within a few minutes of each other. Not long after the second was taken the clouds came back and drenched me yet again, so as to say “you had your chance, now get the hell out of here!” I complied.

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

Virginia

Spring is here!

05.03.09 | Permalink | 3 Comments

..and I’m loving it. We’re in the middle of an entire week of rainy days, and I’ve been shooting as much as possible! Shenandoah National Park is an excellent spot for me, since it’s filled with beautiful mountain streams and is under two hours away from home. I’ve made it out there twice this week with friends, hiking and photographing.

Here are two shots I took yesterday up in White Oak Canyon.

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.