I planned my passage through southern Arizona when the giant saguaros would be in bloom. I always enjoy shooting flowers, but these blooms posed a new problem for me - they were all twenty to thirty feet above ground. As I hiked around exposing film on all sorts of life, I not only came across a good steep hill, but it had a large healthy cactus growing right next to it. Thanking mother nature for making this possible, I set up on the side of the hill and maxed out my largest zoom lens to capture these blooms.

The sloping sides of Bryce Canyon have a very unique variegated effect as the many layers of coloured sandstone errode away. I couldn't pass up such an opportunity to capture a good texture shot and grabbed a 600mm lens to grab the distant details.

Whenever I'm in the mood to photograph butterflies, I try to seek out large clusters of small deep-throated flowers. They seem designed just for the mouths of butterflies and during the right season, it can make for some great photos. Typically, I setup near these flowers with all my readings made in advance and hope for something like this beautiful Clipper butterfly of the Philippines to land in front of me.

This beautiful sunset brought a wonderful end to a long day. I was returning from a day long shoot at a local club. Everything that could have gone wrong that day, did, and then some. It was blistering hot and I was well sun burnt. That evening, on the way back to the Studio, I decided to stop by the beach to relieve the day's tension. I often take my camera out for a walk and this was as good time as any. Barefoot in the sand, I stroll up the shore trying to forget my day. I came across a rather nice sand castle that some kids built. Stooping down trying to see what kind of silhouette shot I could get with the sun setting behind it, I squeezed off a few shots for fun. I had noticed that at certain angles, the water reflected the blues and purples in the sky and the sand castle suddenly became much less interesting. The colours were so rich I immediately took some light readings and captured the waves while the colour was at its prime.

distant wall of sandstone in warm evening light (Utah wilderness)

resident of Indiana wetlands

Southern Arizona wilderness

cluster of apple blossoms during mid-spring