Summer's Here!

Well with the thawing of snow, and the increasing daylight everything has gotten better. My knee is finally healed enough to hike and bike and the photographing has increased due to the new mobility. Last month I joined S.A.G.A. guides on their training trip to Chicagof Island for a 10 day kayak trip. The trip was amazing and a full trip description will be coming soon as I get around to editing photos.

The tourism has started up once again and I have been working long hard hours taking people whale watching and teaching photography. Last week it was really sunny and got these photographs on the Trail of Time.

The first one is of a backlit. Cow Parsnip plant in front of a dark wooden wall. Whenever you approach this plant be careful! There is an oil on the plant that is similar to poison ivy or poison oak, but this oil is photosensitive and can create burns on your skin as well as spread over the body. Not everyone is allergic to this plant, but you don't really want to find out.



This photograph was taken right after the Cow Parsnip shot on the Trail of Time. Whenever the sun comes out, the forest changes completely and dapple lighting is everywhere. I've found that it can be difficult to photograph inside a forest with direct sunlight coming in, just because the shadows are so dark and the highlights are too bright. You can always try some HDR or bring some lights, but I've always liked exposing for the highlights, using some of that sunshine we never see, and letting the light isolate my subject from the dark backgrounds.

Sale on All Photographs

For the month of March there is a 30% off sale on all photographs at Checote Photography. To activate the coupon, type in "March" at the bottom of the shipping page and receive 30% off anything in the store. If there are photographs not listed, feel free to contact me at kenneth.checote@gmail.com and I will add them.

Injured Knees and Night Photography

Last Thursday was an awesome day to ski. No one on the mountain, good fresh snow, and I made friends with a guy named Arden who showed me a lot of secret untouched spots.

Everything was going awesome until the run before lunch. I was cruising down steeps and trees and having a blast connecting all the tight turns with steep drops. I got the the bottom of the run and stopped so that the other guys could catch up and take a breath. Arden took the lead again and we came out of the trees. I took off in pursuit, hit a jump stomped it, and then started cruising fast again when my bindings popped and I ate it hard.

I always know something is going to hurt when my perception of time starts to move as slow as molasses. When that sarts to happen my mind goes into survival mode so that I can minimize damage. For this particular incident, my right leg started moving out to the right. I tried to turn around backwards so that I wouldn't catch an edge, but the ski popped while almost in 180 and then caught an inside edge tweaking the hell out of my knee and sending me to the ground. I think skiing season is officially over for me, but I can still hop around and photograph.

Since then, I've been cooped up inside. My room mate Nate was nice enough to take me on a mini road trip around Juneau to photograph some stuff and change the scenery. This shot below is lit by the headlights of the truck and the camera was resting on a guardrail post. The red flare looking stuff on the left is actually my hands and fingertips moving in the light. I noticed this on a shot and tried to imitate flames.

A Foggy Night with Stars Above

The night has always been one of my favorite times of the day. I can be tired all day long and then as soon as the sun sets, the night brings me energy and with that new energy I start to imagine what I can create in the dark natural studio of black sky.

I've been planning a photograph around this building for a while, but the shot I've been planning involves a model clam digging. Unfortunately, you cannot dig clams in this area because of the high levels of mercury content left over form the Treadwell Mine. This building is the old water pump house resting on the old mine tailings. The pump house never worked properly and the mine as well as the town of Treadwell burned to the ground and this is one of the few reminders that there was ever a town.

This photograph was taken with a half moon rising camera left pretty far behind me. The mountains in the background are covered by a lowering fog that almost compromised the photograph and almost socked in the sky. The purplish light coming form the left side of the image is light pollution from Douglas and Juneau.



As always, more images are available on my website

In the Belly of a Glacier

Today Libby and I went on a hike on the East Glacier Trail and went searching for some old mine ruins. I showed her a tunnel that had been dug through the side of a mountain. We followed the tunnel until it stopped and then took some photographs and in the process she tried to light my leg on fire.

Here is a photo from today.




Last Wednesday, Libby and I went to the Mendenhall Glacier Ice caves. As with most of our adventures we had cameras in hand trying to capture the moment and I realized that it was near impossible to capture the majestic beauty that surrounded us as we stood underneath the belly of the mighty Mendenhall Glacier, but why not?

Here are some photos from last week.

Skiing on Islands

Well, when you ski on an island in Alaska you get the great advantage of seeing other islands and the Pacific Ocean in between and Pittman's Ridge at Eagle Crest ski area is the perfect place to see this.

The Eagle Crest ski area is closed during the week so my friend Libby and I decided that it was a perfect time to make the hike up to The Ridge. There are not many crowds in Juneau, and if you ever have to wait in line at a lift, even for a few moments then that is considered busy, but on this day there were very few people out and about. Mostly little specs on other mountains enjoying the same view as us.

Once at the top of Pittman's Ridge you can get a clear view of Admiralty Island, which is where this photograph was taken. Admiralty is most know for its dense population of brown bears and has very steep mountains.

New Whale Photo