John's BW Photo Contest Entry

I'm new to Steemit so I figured I'd take the Black and White photo contest as an opportunity to introduce myself and share a few of my photos with you at the same time. Unfortunately I believe I've found the contest a bit too late and it looks like this submission will be invalid due to missing the deadline, roughly 6 hours ago. It's ok, I'll submit a few for fun anyways. :)

Yosemite, California - 25 March 2017

Now, if you can believe it, this photo is not actually a black and white, nor was it taken black and white. The natural contrast in Yosemite on this particular day was incredible. The rocks themselves are already deep black in color and of course the soft white clouds offer opposing contrast. The tones are almost completely washed out in the light leaving a near perfect black and white scene, naturally.

Yosemite, CA - 25 March 2017

I know. It's another from the same day as my previous entry. I can't possibly explain how amazing this trip was though. I had spent the night there in one of those amazing cabin tents and woke up earlier that morning to capture the sunrise and it was all up from there. Simply amazing. I sat at this spot watching and listening to the falls for well over an hour and it was likely one of the most relaxing points of the day. The clouds danced on the face of the falls slowly hiding and revealing bits and pieces of it as the wind gently blew through the valley.

Montaña de Oro, CA - 15 April 2015 - Published title: Double Yellow

Since I've already missed the submission deadline, I may as well take a liberty with one of these and show a selective color photo. Truthfully though, this photo is once again fairly close to raw and once again is not actually a black and white photo as you may think. The scene around me was very very dark and yet the clouds had split directly above allowing a sliver of light to break through, highlighting the middle of the road just enough to almost make it glow. While I took liberty with the yellow lines and enhanced them slightly to bring out the contrast a bit, the glow was very apparent as I drove through the trees. As a side note, this portion of Montaña de Oro has always creeped me out for some reason. I could barely focus on taking the photo as I felt like something, or someone, was watching me just behind the treeline. Was an awesome experience. :)

To offer you a bit about me, well, my name is John and I am a military veteran living in California. I spent 10 years in the U.S. Army and took some major blows to my health after being away from home for a bit over 4 of those years. I decided I needed to step away from real life for a while and dropped everything practically overnight. I've been working as a landscape photographer ever since and I have to say, it's been a grind, but so worth it. If I could find a way to support my family with my photography, I'd jump at that opportunity in a heartbeat. Until then it remains a dream.

The photos within this post were taken with a Nikon D810 which was a gift from a sponsor a few years ago and I treasure it. The Nikon camera system is without a doubt one of the best I've ever used and makes photography fun and challenging at the same time. I love it.

Thank you for taking the time to read and view my work, welcome your feedback and constructive criticism with open arms!