April Theme: Man & Nature

This month we'll be revisiting a popular theme on the forum: Man & Nature.

Post your photos of people pictured in or interacting with a natural scene. Also this month, images depicting the way humans have altered nature, from structures built to co-exist harmoniously (or not) with the landscape to examples of how human action has impacted the environment, will be fair game. Enjoy this broad-ranging subject for April's theme!

Here's one of my favorites from a secret spot in Colorado. This will be on the cover of an upcoming issue of Colorado Life Magazine.

This'll be a fun topic and I've got lots of stuff to contribute. Looking forward to seeing what everyone else posts, too. Here's one of Melissa jumping for joy upon finding Delicate Arch deserted at sunset a couple years ago. Not another soul around!

This is a shot I took just a few days ago of the northern lights and the moon over Alaska. It's a full 360 degree pano. The "man" part of the photo is tougher to see at the small web size. The bridge over the icy river is part of the Dalton Highway, made famous by the Ice Road Truckers show. You can see the oil pipeline beyond the road in the full-res version.

Here is one from a backpacking trip in Wyoming a few years ago. This was the most magnificent sunset I've ever seen.

Wow! Four images posted and already the competition gets good.

This is the eclipse from last December which really fizzled out down here in AZ. The sun was just about to rise when I got this image, and within 5 or 6 minutes the moon sunk into the morning valley dust haze and faded as the sun rose. Pretty uneventful. But being I was on the south side of Camelback Mtn which has houses built right in the rock, this somewhat sedated (borderline boring) image does qualify for M&N. I'll see what else I can pull out of the hat this month...

This one comes from a trip to Tuhare Lakes. My backpacking companions and I always wear earth toned clothes so this is something of a "Where's Waldo?" image. Once you find him, I think the human adds a sense of scale to the landscape.This was hand held and suffers a lack of critical sharpness as a result. Some day I'll try printing it on canvas.

Johua...if you want people to post their images, you gotta stop putting up incredible lead-in images! Here's my contribution to the thread, taken near the end of February at the Monument Valley balloon festival at the North Window. Being in one of those would be such a cool way to see the park!

Awesome Guy! I've always been a sucker for HA ballons, but I think they do the best justice to a SW landscape due to spot color. Great image.

Here's one more, this one from a hike along the Highline Trail in Glacier National Park back in 2005.

I took this a LONG time ago...one of my first attempts at a pano. An embarrassment of technical things wrong with this but I've always liked it. The man part is a guy walking a section of Zabriskie Point in Death Valley, lower left corner. All the other submissions are extraordinary!
Congrats on your awesome cover shot Josh!

Going out on a limb here... don't often do B&W, but at least it's a different shot of the Mittens. At least part of one anyway.

One more, taken from Camelback Mtn in Phoenix, looking SE during a December sun rise. The man part are some houses scattered about and some sort of water tank rammed right in the center of the small "mountains" (they seem small to me but I guess they're considered mountains). The bigger version looks better, you can actually recognise the "pepper" on the right side as being birds in flight, lol. I don't think a bigger version can be uploaded from a reply.

This was shot the day safter Xmas 2010. My wife agreed to stand still for about 6 seconds if I asked really, really nicely and called that my Christmas present. Ours was the only car in the parking lot that morning making for a very nice morning having the whole Windows area to ourselves.

Shot quite a few years ago in a little restored ghost town NW of Buena Vista.

Well, this may not be a real serious image, but it was amusing to me. Taken in Medicine Bow, WY, a few years ago, apparently the owner of this establishment has a habit of feeding the deer.

We have some wonderful submissions already! I have to admit that I'm a bit surprised that there aren't more.

I'll add one of my personal favorites...photographer at Toroweap.

One of my personal favorites, too, Adam.
Joe Rogers

Frying Pan River at Basalt.

Some outstanding and fun work as usual on the monthly contest! And, Adam is right, not many so far, so I'll put an oldie in from Glacier.

"Blue Hour at Lake MacDonald"

My friend Jaime enjoying the mid day sun in early September last year at Betty Lake in the Indian Peaks.

As Todd would say - a very secret location ...

Dune Walker

"Climbing Mount Shasta".

Jeff, nice work. I hope you at least got dinner as well...

Adam, great shot illustrating the immensity of Toroweap.

Great stuff everyone! I really love both shooting and viewing these kinds of images: some landscapes just come alive with a human element. Here's one from Idaho, underneath Veil Falls in the Frank Church Wilderness.

Done Studying, Illinois River, Oregon

And an old favorite from the Grand Canyon.

View downstream from the Nankoweap ruins - late afternoon, Colorado River

Our two rafts and camp are on the point bar, river right.

Great sense of scale with the photog included, Bill. Beautiful view of what I now see as a truly immense place.

Nice collection of people in the landscape, Jackson.

Sweet shots so far! Here's some climbers hiking up the west ridge of Snowmass Mountain last summer.

I felt quite proud when I managed, on my second try, to get from my camera to this spot in under 10 seconds using my self-timer. Then, I felt quite stupid when I realized I could have just put it on continuous shooting mood, locked in my cable release, and let it click away.

This was my first visit to Glacier National Park back in 2010 and I couldn't stop shooting Lake McDonald! Actually it turned out to be a slight problem because we didn't get to explore much of the park because we were at Lake McDonald. Oops! Going back this summer though.

Greater Sage-grouse hen with her new telemetry collar. GSG's are endangered and presently listed as "warranted but precluded" from ESA protection, which isn't necessarily a bad thing because it means we're supposed to be nice and work together to recover the species. The project is led by Dr. Matt Holloran on the Pinedale Anticline, studying the impacts of gas drilling on grouse populations. The hens are captured, collared and quickly released at night during lekking season when they're easier to locate. This image was made around 2:00 a.m.

Moonwatchers.
Some very nice images including people in the compositions. Usually I try not to include people, so only have a few in the files. This image of the moon rising over Sedona indicates to me how small an individual man is with respect to the land and universe.

Tucked up and under, and constructed of natural surrounding materials, the dwellings of the Anasazi blend in well with their surroundings.

Thread closed. We will have a selection on Tuesday....thanks for all the great submissions this month!