Flowers, a bee and thirteen years
I was up in Vistancia (far northwest Phoenix) on Friday late afternoon on a little commercial shoot and as we wandered around a desert trail, these flowers demanded some attention from my camera. Last year was huge for wildflowers in Arizona…they were all over the place. On the sides of freeways, on the slopes of hills and mountains…everywhere. This year, not so much. But this little area by a pond was filled with them and it kind of reminded me of the stunning beauty of flowers in the desert. There is a bee in there too if you can find [...]
Just another Arizona sunset
At first glance I would expect most people to see this photo and NOT choose Phoenix, Arizona as the location it was taken. You have some farm fields, tall trees, wildflowers and some hay protected by the sun. Definitely not something people naturally picture when it comes to Arizona and our deserts. Ah, but it is. I photographed this last night about 1.5 miles from my house down in Chandler, which is basically on the southeastern corner of the metropolitan Phoenix area. We’re moving soon to downtown Phoenix and I’m going to miss sights like these on a few miles [...]
The Flatiron cliffs in black and white
Nothing but Flatiron all week, although I hope you enjoyed the interlude with the alleyway yesterday. There is a slight chance there will be nothing but Flatiron and the Lost Dutchman area next week as I may go hike it again on Saturday *grin* I loved all the color at Flatiron last week, as you can see from all the photos I’ve posted about it. The flowers were incredible, the yellow tones and hues were rich and everywhere. But I also went out there because the sky had some cool clouds going on from a cold front moving through and [...]
More from the Flatiron Cliffs
Hopefully no one is getting bored with photos from the Flatiron Cliffs in the Lost Dutchman State Park. I for one can’t get enough of looking at the mountains and the color of the flowers flooding the desert floor. It’s up there with some of the most favorite things I’ve photographed in my young little career. Yesterday I posted a shot that was sort of a square, which made up the shot above and a pan to the left. But from the start I’ve always loved this single shot, with the stairs on the right, the little valley leading up [...]
More wildflowers from Flatiron at Lost Dutchman
On Friday I posted an HDR version of what I saw out at Flatiron on Thursday late afternoon. The HDR is cool, brings out a lot of textures and gives it a really deep feel, but I also love standard photography as well. The colors were so amazing, you really didn’t need to try hard to get a good shot. If you live in the Phoenix area or close to the Lost Dutchman State Park, I highly suggest you head out there sometime soon before the flowers are gone. They are stunning…simply stunning. I’m almost embarrassed to admit that I’ve [...]
The Flatiron cliffs of Lost Dutchman
I almost wanted to title this, “Hey Dutchman, I found the gold!” A somewhat stormy day here in Arizona, awesome clouds everywhere, so I grabbed up my daughter from the babysitter and headed out to the Superstition Mountains and Lost Dutchman state park to take some photos. I’ve been around there a few times, but never have gotten a shot that I really liked. And then I saw Flatiron and the fields of gold wildflowers surrounding the base of the cliffs. They were everywhere. It was amazing to see. Contrast it with sunlight breaking through stormy cumulus clouds and it [...]
Highway 60 to Superior
Not too long ago I posted photos from our little visit to the area west of Superior, Arizona in search of the wildflowers. Along the way, as I was running back and forth across Highway 60 to snap some shots, I stopped in the middle and looked east…immensely enjoying the road curving off in the distance and the mountain on the horizon. I am in love with road photos…there is just something that connects me with seeing the way a line of striped pavement runs off into the horizon or bends to disappear around a hill. You can see a slideshow [...]
The Spring Wildflowers of the Arizona Desert
A good friend of ours named Ryann had been traveling along the US 60 through Superior in the last week and made sure to point out to me all the wildflowers blooming along the highways and mountains. Plus I’d been keeping up with DesertUSA.com and all their reader wildflower reports. They mentioned how the flowers had been going nuts on Silver King Mine road just west of Superior, so I packed the wife and kid in the car Sunday afternoon and we took off. The first thing we noticed was the highway. From when you leave the Apache Junction area [...]
Mike is a Phoenix Wedding Photographer based in Arizona and can be contacted via all the normal methods and then some.