So far I’ve posted about people, and places. Now it’s time for ‘things’.

I’m using a pretty broad definition of things here, as many of the shots could fall into other categories. Flowers are one thing that could probably have their own category, but I’ll just include them here.

Mmm. Wild burro tounge. This thing is one of our best memories of the year. Our van got swarmed by a pack of wild burros during our trip to South Dakota. They loved licking the road salt off of the windows. Much laughing and shrieking by the van’s occupants ensued.

I happened to have my camera in the car when I noticed a nice sunrise coming on after dropping my kids off at school. I scrambled to find a foreground subject and spotted some crosses that had been set up for Easter.

My one and only (so far) product shot. My favorite trail shoe of 2013, the Pearl Izumi E-Motion Trail N1. Well, it’s probably a tie with the N2. Super pleased with how I was able to visualize this in my mind and then pull it off.

Our sweet little Katie. We adopted her when she was three years old, and she definitely came with some baggage. Not knowing what the first 3 years of her life was like really made things challenging for a while. She is all settled in now and showing her true colors.

No one likes these shots but me, but whatever. I found an elk skull near Leadville and put it on a branch coming off a log, then threw my hoodie and glasses on it.

I went up to Roxborough State Park looking for some wildlife, but not a creature was stirring. I ended up sitting in this patch of wildflowers in front of a maintenance shed (it looked like they had just sprinkled some seed around). I experimented shooting them with my flash after the sun went down, and was very happy with the results.

Some wildflowers with 14,003′ Huron Peak in the background.

I’ll finish up with some Columbine. Probably one of the most photographed flowers of all. I like to look for unique angles and lighting to set the shot apart from all the rest. Took this with the zoom from across a small creek on the back side if Mt. Timpanogos in Utah.

A more traditional Columbine shot. I have never seen a larger concentration of the flowers than I did at this spot near the base of Mt. Sherman above Leadville. There were huge patches of them everywhere!

The classic state flower shot of Colorado. Blue for the sky, White for the snow, and Yellow for the gold. I like this shot because it is somewhat rare to get just a single flower on a plant like this (they grow in more of a bushy style with several flowers per plant).

Here are some of my favorite ‘place’ shots of 2013.

We made a trip up to South Dakota in February and had great weather for a weekend of seeing the sights. Really loved the Black Hills area.

This is Frisco, CO. I made a detour on one of my trips up to Leadville and spent a cold evening getting some photos of the town.

This is Sharptail trail. It starts 3 miles from my house and always offers up some great views. You know it’s a good day when the sun is only coming up after you’ve hit your high point for the day and you are on the way back home.

I did a ton of driving with my oldest daughter earlier in the year as she worked on getting the 50 hours of required time behind the wheel before getting her license. Of course I always brought the camera, and often came back with a great shot of something. The double-rainbow from Lookout Mountain will be hard to top.

Roxborough State Park. Close to home, and one of my favorite places of all.

I grabbed my gear and took off driving when I heard the news about the Black Forest fire. It took me a while to find it, but I’ll never forget the feeling I had coming over a hill on a country dirt road and seeing this sight at sunset. It was beautiful and terrifying all at once. The fire would go on to become the most destructive in Colorado history.

Roxborough State Park again. I saw this flower while driving out of the park after sunset and used my car’s headlights to light it up for the shot. I took this while sitting in the dirt with my back against the car bumper.

I love a good sunrise. Especially one where I am already out on a trail and get to see it develop over time. This was taken on day two of our 14er trip, on the way up Missouri Gulch. Man, that trail is steep!

This is a Bristlecone Pine estimated to be over 1,000 years old, overlooking the town of Alma, CO. I have long wanted to get up there and see them, and finally made it happen this year. It was well worth the trip!

And one of my favorite places of all, I just can’t get enough of the Moab canyon country.

I’ve enjoyed looking through my 2013 photos and thought I would post some from a few different categories.  My shooting has dropped off dramatically in the last half of this year, so I had been thinking there would be slim pickings when it came time to go looking for something to post.  I was pleasantly surprised to have a bigger supply than I had imagined.

One thing became very obvious when looking through an entire year’s worth of shots.  Wildlife photography is my strong suit, and what I spend most of my time doing with the camera.  I enjoy different kinds of shooting, but definitely feel most comfortable wandering the woods and hillsides looking for wildlife.

I’m kicking the series off with ‘People’.  That’s kind of misleading, because it’s mostly just my kids.  While I have a pretty good supply of people shots from portrait shoots and other gatherings, I’m not always comfortable with posting pics of others.  Animals are easy because I don’t have to worry about permission issues…

Jesica

Natalie

Lindsey

Malcolm

My back-flipping niece.

Kids at the amusement park. This ride was going around at about 10,000 mph, so I was happy to get a shot with all of them in the same frame.

A self portrait in Red Rocks park.

My favorite timer pic of 2013. Malcolm and I on 14,155′ Tabeguache Peak during our four day 14er binge in the summer.

Sadly, I only shot one race all year – and only part of that one.

Malcolm got me a pair of remote flash triggers for Christmas, so we took a hike up Green Mountain the other night and tried them out. They open up the door to a lot of creative possibility, because I no longer need to have the flash attached to the camera.