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February, 2007 Table of Contents
As the new year progresses the tempo just seems to keep increasing. Normally this slow time of the year allows me to catch up on unfinished projects, learn a new technique, or just relax and simply catch up on my sleep. My sleep bank is still in deficit, and there is no promise of any major deposits forthcoming. My commercial work is continuing to produce new projects, some of which have been quite fun. In December I photographed Wayne Torke's Christmas ornament collection, a thirty year collection displayed on 6 Christmas trees throughout his house. It was a lot of fun and reminded me of my childhood as many of the ornaments were vintage from the 50's and 60's.
Here is a brief update of several projects that we have going on:
Waterfront Gallery, our new gallery is coming along nicely. We will take occupancy March 1, and begin the process of finishing the gallery and workshop space. We expect an official Grand Opening on Memorial Day Weekend. Watch our newsletters for more information. The gallery website is: www.waterfrontgalleryonline.com.
The Twin Cities Area of Camera Clubs Spring Break, is scheduled March 30-April 1. We are planning to have a booth at this event. Randy and Val will be manning the booth on Saturday March 31. ColdSnap has donated one free workshop admission for our new "Fall Color on the North Shore" workshop in September. For more information about the Spring Break event go to: http://www.cameracouncil.org
Listening to your requests we have decided to retool our fall workshop. We are replacing our previously scheduled 8-day workshop "Digital Color on the South Shore of Lake Superior" with the 4-day "North Shore Fall Color". We had offered variations of this 4-day workshop for over ten years, but four years ago we decided to give the workshop a rest. With our new workshop facility opening this summer on the shores of Lake Superior we think this is a perfect opportunity to reinstate this extremely popular Fall Color workshop. As of the writing of this newsletter this new workshop has not yet been posted on the website, the website changes should be updated sometime in the next week or so. For more information watch the workshop listings at: www.coldsnap.com.
In February I have been asked by the Paramount Visual Arts Center, in St. Cloud Minnesota, to present my recent work and lead a critique of submitted photography. For more information about this event go to: http://www.paramountarts.org/vac.html#special. For directions you can go to:http://www.paramountarts.org/directions.html. I hope to see you there!
The Garden Writers of America have asked me back for a second year to be one of their annual photographic judges. On March 9-11 I will fly to WashingtonDC to meet with other leading photographers, writers, and editors to review book and magazine publications from across the country. This opportunity is a chance to review what others have accomplished in this diverse genre. I especially look forward to meeting Ian Adams, last year's winner in the photography and book categories, for his book "The Art of Garden Photography" published by Timber Press. This book is without a doubt the best "how to" book on photography that I have read, bar none. While I am in DC Randy will join me for a few days while we scout for next year's Cherry Blossom's in DC workshop. Watch for our workshops announcement next fall.
The Newfoundland workshop is nearing full. At the writing of this newsletter there are only a couple of spots available. Our schedule for this workshop includes: three days with Dr. Peter Beemish in Trinity Newfoundland, two days exploring the Twillingate region of Newfoundland while staying at the Hillside B&B and Crewes Hertitage B&B, our final days will be spent exploring the southern reaches of the Avalon peninsula including Cape St. Mary's Ecological Sanctuary.
First off, I'm not an early morning guy. Used to be. Twenty years ago. But that was twenty years ago. However, I happen to have a hobby that can have great rewards before 6:00.
Read any book about nature photography and you'll be told the best light is from right before sunrise, through just after. And those books are correct. This means that if you're not in position 30 minutes before sunrise, you are going to miss it. This means that if you're on a ColdSnap photo workshop in June, and your hotel is thirty miles from your morning shoot position, and once you drive that thirty miles you've got a one mile hike, well it's going to be very dark and very early when you wake up. Let's say about 4:15 a.m. because the van leaves at 4:30.
Now, if this is too early for you, remember-the sun rises a lot later in January. It might be a little cold, but that's a different essay.
It's 4:30 and the first thing you do when you walk out of the hotel is look up. One of the first things to expect at this time of the morning on a workshop is anticipation. What's the sunrise going to be like? is it cloudy? solid overcast? high wispy clouds? high and wispy is good. You look up and try to figure it out. The anticipation is what can start my blood moving that time of the morning.
That and coffee, bad hotel coffee, sometimes I bring my own to brew.
By the time you start hiking, the cobwebs are clearing, the sky is starting to lighten just a little, and the woods aren't so totally black you trip over every third root. It's 5:25, sunrise is at 5:58, you take a deep breath, wow, that Lake Superior air is clean. You set up and wait while the warblers start their morning concerto.
It's 5:56 and here it comes. You have already taken a few images, some dark, silhouetted images, but here it comes. At 5:58 the sun cracks over the shoreline, the high wispy clouds glow, and while you shoot the color hits you with a "Hallelujah and Good Morning." Life don't get much better.
Gary Miner
We have added a new feature to our newsletter. In this section we will share with you our favorite destinations for photography. These destinations are timed for the time of the year that they are published in the newsletter.
Ice on Lake Superior can be a very tricky subject to catch. First the season must have the right conditions (it must get very cold.) This year is shaping up to be a pretty good year for ice on the Lake. The other tricky thing about catching the ice has to do with the direction of the wind and water currents. If the wind and water currents are coming from the southeast then conditions are right for ice to stack up along the North Shore. When I left home two days ago there a fair amount of ice stacking up along the lake shore near Duluth. Probably the best location to photograph this phenomenon is at "Gitchee Gammi" Park located on the near north side of Duluth just where the scenic North Shore Drive forks to the right from Hwy 61. For lake and ice conditions just drop me an email (john@coldsnap.com) and I will get back to you with my latest observations.
Last fall John and I headed north to scout out photographic opportunities for the Lake Superior Shores Workshop. The first day we drove approx. 8 hrs from Two Harbors to the delightful little lakeshore town of Dorian Canada. It was late when we arrived and visual inspection of the hotel/restaurant was hasty at best. We hurriedly checked in to the hotel (this takes place at the gas station/convenient store/hotel registration counter) as we were tired and hungry. The mumbling fast talking station attendant/cashier/clerk proceeded to fill us in on all of the amenities that weren't quite working and how to use them if they did work. We informed him we understood (yada-yada-yada ) and quickly exited to get some food at the attached restaurant.
When we sat down to order our Canadian fare and noticed that we were out of dress code. Camo and blaze orange seemed to be the clothing of the day. After ordering our hot dish special, we sat back to discuss the day's scouted locations. All at once the building began to shake! Lo and behold we had booked our nights stay in-between the highway and the railroad track. Needless to say we didn't get much sleep that night and ruled it out as a workshop hotel stay. In spite of all of this we did go on to find many wonderful spots to photograph and stay.
We will begin our trip in the quaint little town of Grand Marais Minnesota. While in Minnesota we will explore some of the hidden and spectacular locations that we have discovered over the past 15 years of leading photographic workshops to this region. In Canada we've booked rooms at the historic Red Rock Inn and Rossport Inn. We have chartered a boat for an evening of Lake Superior island exploration and photography among the many islands of the Rossport region. We will be visiting a historic fishing dock outside the town of Hurkett. At the east end of the lake we will be photographing the spectacular Neys Provincial Park, and Pukaskwa National Park.
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