Canada's North Woods

The road through northern Quebec and Labrador goes through some really pretty boreal forests with bogs, ponds, and streams. As a photographer on a road trip, I found myself frustrated because I was seeing pretty landscapes, but under dull gray skies and unfavorable lighting. We weren't in our camper and there were not many places to stay even if we had had time to linger in this wilderness. But I found myself wanting to capture this subtle beauty with my camera.

I took this first shot more as a memory photo. I suspect it was handheld (if you look close, it slightly motion blurred). The setting was pretty, but the lighting not favorable. But I wanted memory photos if nothing else. I actually think this is at Gagnon, a town that ceased to exist. All that is left are some paved roads, an island dividing the road into four lanes, curbs, sidwalks, and parking lots. The buildings are long gone. Considering that the road is gravel before and after Gagnon, it really makes you wonder what happened. When we got back to Texas, we googled Gagnon and discovered that when the nearby mine shut down, the town was dismantled. In retrospect, I should have taken more pictures around Gagnon, lighting or no lighting, because it was interesting and poignant.



As we neared Churchill Falls late in the afternoon, the sky cleared and I knew I had a chance to get some photographs. We got our accomodations taken care of and headed back along the road where I had seen some ponds that might make good reflecting pools for the sunset.

I could tell that the scene was going to difficult to capture the beauty I was seeing. Straight photography would make me choose between the delicately colored sky and the details in the forest and the pool.



So i carefully shot for HDR - shooting sequences of three or more exposures to capture the beautiful delicate colors in the sky and the beauty of the pond. In post processing I needed to go beyond the Photomatics and Photoshop's high dynamic range mreges, because there was a breeze and the combined images had blurred tamarack trees. By choosing an exposure that was close, I could go in, select trees that were not motion blurred and place them where they belonged in the composition, giving me a scene that was true to what I had seen, but what straight photography couldn't produce.



Finding another possibility in this group of ponds, ordinary photography with one exposure produced this:



Shooting multiple exposures, combining them, some artistic filters from Topaz produced an image much more like what my eye enjoyed.




I was so pleased when we woke up to sunny skies. I finally had an opportunity to capture the feel of northern Canada with this shot at Ozzie's Brook, east of Churchill Falls.