Cat and Creek and Merry Christmas!

Red leaves stopping by

Here’s one of my favorite pictures from the November 3rd trek to the creek this year. I love that this creek is complicated and messy, full of old tree trunks and branches that are fallen, or reaching. Stories that began way before I arrived on these banks.

Imagine what might be up there

I used different camera setting here than I used in the post just prior to this one. We always go to the creek on sunny days, so both posts were done in strong sunlight; the exact afternoon times for each picture do vary. On November 3rd I put the light-dark setting farther towards dark, and bumped the vivid setting more towards neutral in most of the pictures. I believe the focus is better and the colors appear richer. The over-glare look is slightly, (not completely though) tamped down. But many of the pictures are too dark – where is my sunny day?

Franklin the smoothie says ho-hum to editing

Franklin is not very interested in editing at this point. He’s a teenager, he likes to run thunderpaws all through the house. When he gives out of steam and settles on a blankie, that’s when I get a photo.

Streaming across

Some shadows in this picture are too dark, it could have a sunnier look.

The theatrics of shadow and reflection:

Epic creekside jam session

Along the way

Your everyday reflecting creek

Leaf matter

Leaves on a spree

The forest:

Slow autumn

Merry Christmas!

There’s a pine tree across the creek and that’s our Christmas tree this year, right where it is. At least Franklin can’t climb this one since he doesn’t go outside! All this color is gone now, leaves knocked off trees by the rain; everything’s bleak and gray. Experimental photo editing went wild here, and I’m not completely satisfied with it.

Franklin as panther

Franklin has the panther-slouch-over-a-tree-branch down. You know he’d climb any Christmas tree he got his paws on!

A fern moment

The forest floor has perks, too.

Upstream – super shadowy version

Here’s what I mean about too dark . . . I like it actually, in a way, but . . .

Lightened up version

For the first time ever, I used some ‘fill light’ in Picasa to brighten a picture.

Edgy but pleasant

A little added fill light helped this one, I think, though I’m not totally happy.

A chat at green’s threshold

This spot close to where the above pictures were taken needed no added light.

Downstream

I believe this creek has been quarried somewhere in this general area, although I don’t know for sure. If you look closely in the middle foreground, you’ll see a stone that has a straight edge and while it’s not easy to see in the picture, the adjoining edge is at a right angle and also straight, which makes me think the rock was being cut into squares. And I know there was a building nearby that had features built of stone from this creek.

Y’all, I have too many pictures for one post! These are just a couple from the November 18th creek visit. I’ll have to make another post soon! Maybe before Christmas, maybe not.

We’ll stop here for a spell

Late afternoon gold

As usual I’ll try to get back and answer comments and greetings as fast as I can but I can’t guarantee it will be soon.

Meanwhile, Merry Christmas!! Happy Holidays to all who have celebrations this time of year!