"Living in the Wind River Canyon is like being able to have a home in a National Park."  This was told to me many years ago, by a wise old man from California, that has a cabin within walking distance from ours.  It truly is a magical place at times....the way the morning Sun turns the   Black-chinned Hummingbird, female, Wind River Canyon, Wyoming - 1st Place 2014 Cody Art ShowBlack-chinned Hummingbird, Wind River Canyon, Wyoming-Winner of 1st Place Award 2014 Cody Art Show! massive cliffs into gold and Bald Eagles fly by our living room window.  Hummingbirds fly a very long way just to have babies in this Wind River Canyon.  Yet, because we are surrounded by the Wind River Indian Reservation, this amazing Canyon will never be developed much more than it is now....I hope.

     Periodically I'm asked why I don't have more landscapes of the Wind River Canyon on my website, HogbatsPhotography.com.  The answer to this question is fairly simple I guess; it's a slow genre of photography....which is a nice way of saying that it bores the crap out of me.  But it's quite challenging to get a landscape photo to really move people.  I prefer to take pictures of wild animals and birds because I enjoy a constant learning curve; or maybe I just enjoy being slowly ground down to dust.  I've read it before by a well known writer/photographer that bird photography is the most difficult of all photographic genres; but I've always enjoyed a really good challenge, so this week's blog is going to include a new landscape of the Wind River Canyon, Wyoming.

     This Spring my wife and I were hiking with our Siberian Husky up in the higher reaches of the Wyoming, Wind River Canyon, Landscape with TrainThe Wind River Canyon of Wyoming. Canyon. I had brought along a camera, because you never know when that alien spaceship will land; as I always write in this blog, "Don't forget your camera!"  Anyway, we heard the train coming, so it was good luck to have the camera along.  I ran into an advantageous position to make the most of the view, and shot to my little hearts' content.  I uploaded the digital files later in the day, but never really worked on them, till the other day, when I was doing some computer refiling.

     I liked this particular frame the best of more than twenty, and ran it through Canon Digital Photo Professional and Adobe Lightroom 5.6.  I don't particularly like the plain blue sky, and could have added computer generated clouds, but to my way of thinking this is going too far.  You will see many beautiful landscapes on the internet where it seems anything goes, and CGI (Hollywood lingo for computer generated images) doctored photographs are everywhere, but not here.  I want to make you "fall in love with Nature", not wonder were this place could possibly exist, and on what planet.

     Camera ~ a refurbished Canon 7D that I purchased cheap from Adorama; a respected New York City dealer. 

     Lens ~ a Canon 70-200 f/4L IS USM  ----  a lens that is so outstanding in sharpness, clarity and color that it's legendary; which was purchased @ Amazon.

     What was once known as the "Boysen Peak Elk Herd" is once again making their rounds around the high reaches of the Wind River Canyon here in Wyoming.  Thursday evening we watched from our front porch, through a low-priced spotting scope @ 40 power, an Elk herd so large that we both couldn't make accurate counts; we couldn't make accurate counts because we both stopped at 100!!  There were so many yearling Elk that they seemed to be everywhere....a very good year indeed.

written by Michael John Balog ~ "just mike"