Fall Colors

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This Fall, we have been seeing the colors through the viewfinder of our Fujifilm X100S point-n-shoot camera and we have to say, it has been spectacular! The Fall colors starts up in New Hampshire in early October and makes it way down to Boston by early November. We think it also moves from Western MA eastward…not really sure why. Maybe there are just more trees out that way so it “feels” like the colors were moving east.

Anyway, the photo above was taken in mid-October at Northampton around the same time as the ones below at the Boston Public Garden. Clearly the colors at the BPG has not yet peaked while those at Northampton were quite a bit further along.

Another great spot we often head to to enjoy the Fall colors is Jamaica Pond. It is close to the office and is quite spectacular on a sunny day. We took a walk around it the last week of October and snapped a few pics.

A view of the Boston skyline from Peters Hill at the Arnold Arboretum. We took a quick hike up there to check out the colors on the last day of October…looks like things have peaked.

This time of the year is fantastic for shooting colors and textures. While the leaves and dead plants in the RainyDayGarden may be screaming “cleanup time!!!” to the organized side of the brain, the creative side is whispering…”but just look at all the possibilities.” We are happy to say that as we get older, the creative side tends to win more and more of those “discussions.” The images below were taken over the course of the first few weeks of November.

Some of the sunflowers were still hanging around at the beginning of November, but they faded pretty quickly once the night time temps went below zero. We found a caterpillar trying to warm up by sunning itself on the railing. It was moving VERY VERY slowly, while it gave us plenty of time to grab some shots, we fear that it will be easy prey for the Blue Jays.

The colors on the leaves of the Norwegian and Japanese maples change daily. Every time we look out we see something different, especially with the sunlight dancing in and out because of the shifting clouds.

There are a lot of photographic opportunities, from the colors on the trees to what is already fallen on the ground. The reds and yellows were particularly rich one day and we took the opportunity to venture out into the RainyDayGarden for a “see-n-shoot” session. In a “see-n-shoot” session we just look, frame, and press the shutter. The goal is to train ourselves to not to over-think a shot. Also, when those “perfect shot” situations occurs, we work from reflex and muscle memory for manipulating the dials and buttons, leaving our brain to think about framing and composition.

Of course, let’s not fool ourselves…regardless of the photographic possibilities, the interns WILL clean up things up this weekend!!! Still, for the time being, it is nice to be able to step outside and sharpen those “color and texture” skills without having to work all that hard searching for potential subjects. Winter is coming!!!

NOTE: All images were taken with the Fujifilm X100S point-n-shoot camera. While we love our Nikon DSLR and still use it for a lot of our studio work, when we go out for a walk or take that impromptu drive, we always grab the X100S on our way out the door.