Tag: photo tips

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Going Vertical

By Christian Begeman

Ever since smartphones put a handy camera in everyone’s pocket, I’ve been known to complain about vertical video and photos. As one who learned to capture media prior to the digital age, the horizontal format was never challenged. The dimensions varied from film to television, but we were all used to creating and consuming photos and video in roughly a rectangular space. Now there were exceptions. Magazine covers, for example, had to fit in a vertical space. Portraits, whether school ping pongs or 8×10 glossies from your favorite Hollywood stars were also mostly vertical. Even so, the vast majority of video and photography was shot in a horizontal space.

That has all changed. To me it’s more jarring on video than photography. I’m not the only one that hasn’t adapted easily to the changes. I’ve seen multiple t-shirt designs stating a common theme:”Just say no to vertical video.” I prefer horizontal photography due to my penchant for landscapes and skies. That said, there is a time and place for vertical photos. I guess. So, I faced up to the challenge of vertical imagery and explored it in this month’s column.

The most common time I find the urge to turn my camera sideways is under the night sky, particularly when the Northern lights are strong and high overhead. We are in the midst of the solar maximum, an 11-year cycle in which there are more sunspots than usual. These sunspots tend to produce more solar flares. The solar flares, when sent in our planet’s direction, are the main cause of Northern lights. The energized plasma interacts with our magnetic field to produce the Aurora, and if you can catch a stronger geomagnetic storm, it is quite a sight. These nocturnal events are also really fun to photograph. Our modern camera sensors pick up on the color of the lights better than our eyes, which flip rods and cones around in the dark. This means colors that appear dull to the naked eye really pop in a photograph. I like to frame these displays with country church steeples. Adding a strong foreground element makes a more interesting image.

Other times I’ve turned the camera vertically include rainbows after a strong storm, waterfalls and close-up detail like a backlit leaf in the autumn sunlight. In September and October, you can still see the Milky Way as long as you are away from strong light sources. As soon as it gets fully dark, the starry pathway shows nearly vertical in the south, southwest sky. This year I found myself at the Needles formation in Custer State Park for one such evening. I have long envisioned a shot of the Milky Way alongside the Needle’s Eye and found the best way to capture it was to indeed turn that camera sideways and go for the vertical shot. It seems old dogs really can learn new tricks.

Christian Begeman grew up in Isabel and now lives in Sioux Falls. When he’s not working at Midco he is often on the road photographing South Dakota’s prettiest spots. Follow Begeman on his blog.

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Small in Frame

By Christian Begeman

Earlier this year, I received a call to submit to a photo contest online with a theme called”small in frame.” The example photo was of a scarlet tanager on a branch surrounded by greenery. The tanager’s brilliant red was”small” in the frame of green-on-green foliage, but in spite of this, the vibrancy and beauty of the bird was accentuated because of how it was framed. This made me think about what else I have photographed, or could photograph, with this technique in mind.

In this column, I’ve found a few bird photos from this spring where I was forced to use a”small in frame” approach. The reason? I couldn’t get any closer to the birds. Shooting small songbirds during migration is difficult when not using feeders or blinds. While birding Palisades State Park in May, I found a good perch above Split Rock Creek looking over a few trees above the canyon. After an hour or more of soaking in the spring sunshine and birdsong, an Indigo bunting landed on one of the farther branches and the resulting photo is one of my favorites from that day.

Photographing country churches also provides a great opportunity to shoot”small in frame,” especially when showcasing our beautiful South Dakota sky and landscapes. Wildlife both large and small can make good subjects as well. Photographs of a lone elk on a ridge in Wind Cave National Park and a Monarch butterfly on a wild blazing star flower showcase the power of the technique.

In late summer, I’m often in northeast South Dakota on weekends seeking late summer wildflowers in the remnant tall grass and fen preserves. This year, I shot with”small in frame” in mind. I particularly like how this theme shows off not only the whole plant but the habitat and other grass species in which it thrives. I’ve always been a fan of macro photography and wildflowers naturally make great subjects. I found that pairing a photo of a wildflower species in its habitat with a macro close-up of its delicate beauty tells a powerful visual story.

I didn’t submit any photos to the”small in frame” contest, but if it ever comes around again, I will now be a little more prepared. Ironically, my strongest instinct as a photographer is still to get as close as possible to whatever I’m shooting, but this little exercise proves it is not always necessary to capture a unique image of the beauty found here on the Northern Plains.

Christian Begeman grew up in Isabel and now lives in Sioux Falls. When he’s not working at Midco he is often on the road photographing South Dakota’s prettiest spots. Follow Begeman on his blog.

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The Long View

By Christian Begeman

The latter part of November into early December brings deer hunting season to our part of the world. Growing up in rural West River, my family joined the rifle hunting season like many other friends and neighbors. One of my older brothers became our family’s mighty hunter and often I would go along as an extra set of eyes and another pair of hands to help manage the prize of a successful hunt. I wasn’t much of a hunter myself as I didn’t handle the big rifles near as much as my dad and brother, but I always did love a good set of binoculars. Which I think maybe primed me for a love of the long telephoto lens nowadays.

Dad brought home a new pair of binoculars when I was in grade school, and I was transfixed by them. I spent a lot of time looking out our front picture window towards the highway. I remember checking out the craters on a full moon and using them out in the countryside. Whether it was looking for grouse, deer or the random stray cow, binoculars became a huge help and an interesting tool that stayed in the work pickup at almost all times.

Nowadays, I substitute a long telephoto lens for binoculars to get long views across our landscapes. All the photos in this column were taken using a Canon 100-400mm telephoto lens. The majority of them also were shot with the addition of a 1.4 extender, which is a small accessory that gives you even more”zoom.” The engineering that goes into these tools gets better and better. A recent improvement is the ability to get closer focus with the newest telephoto lenses, meaning I no longer have to be up to 6 feet away to get something in focus. The distance has been cut in half, which makes birding with the telephoto lens even more fun –at least when the birds decide to let you get that close.

Late fall and early winter are the best times to look for wildlife with the trusty telephoto lens. Both whitetail and mule deer are in rut. Their usual cautiousness towards humans (and vehicles) is thrown to the wind when they catch the scent of a doe on the breeze. On Black Friday and the following Saturday of this year, I spent most of the daylight hours at Badlands National Park, Custer State Park and Wind Cave National Park looking for prize bucks as well as any other wildlife that caught my eye. Two of the largest mule deer bucks I’ve ever photographed gave me a quite a show, the first as daylight faded on Black Friday in the Yellow Mounds area of the Badlands. He was trailing a doe and didn’t mind me watching as long as I stayed still atop of a nearby mound. The second was slightly smaller but still magnificent, just inside the Wind Cave boundary south of Custer State Park. It was another successful hunt with the long lens, and I can’t wait to go out and try again.

Christian Begeman grew up in Isabel and now lives in Sioux Falls. When he’s not working at Midco he is often on the road photographing South Dakota’s prettiest spots. Follow Begeman on his blog.

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Tournament Time

By Christian Begeman

This column has been almost exclusively dedicated to outdoor and nature related photography. This month that changes. I have good reason to do this. First, I haven’t been able to get out into the great wide open much over the last month and second, I HAVE been able to get back into a couple of our premiere conference basketball championships held in Sioux Falls and fire off thousands of photos. Part of my job at Midco is to support the Midco Sports crew and one of my favorite aspects of this is to document the team pulling off their superb live coverage of both the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference Tournament and the Summit League Conference Tournament. The team pulls out all the stops for this coverage including upwards of 30 staff each session, a pre-game and post-game show, extra cameras (like the one attached to a 24-foot jib) and special graphics.

In addition to shooting time lapses of the venues to be used on air and behind the scenes photos and video of the hard-working crew, I also get to capture action photos to support player shot charts used on air and Midco Sports’ overall social media presence.

From my grade school days through college, basketball was first and foremost on my mind. As soon as I couldn’t play anymore, I started learning to take action photos. When I lived in Mitchell in the 2000s, I started a side hustle before side hustles were a thing, taking photos of high school athletics and providing images to parents who would rather enjoy the game than bother with pictures. From that gig, I learned all about wrestling, hockey, volleyball and soccer, all sports of which I had very little knowledge. But my first passion has always been, and likely always will be, basketball.

Over the years, I have learned a few pointers to get better action imagery. First, bench celebration shots usually make the best photos. They are fun, full of passion or angst and really tell a story, particularly the bigger the game gets. Generally, a photographer tends to think that the better action photo is getting as close to the action as possible. I fall into that rut as well. However, I’ve often had to relearn that shooting wider, particularly in the biggest games, tends to be the way to go. For example, late in the Summit League Championship game between North Dakota State University and South Dakota State University, Zeke Mayo, a true freshman for SDSU, drove baseline and floated a high arcing jumper over the defense. The Jacks were up by one and needed to score to stave off a hard-fought Bison run. When shooting this play, I stayed wide enough to see the bench about to react and the crowd watching intently to see if the bucket would go in. It did, by the way, but capturing that frozen moment of intense anticipation is something that helps cement why we love the drama of basketball around these parts come March. I’m already excited to do it again next year.

Christian Begeman grew up in Isabel and now lives in Sioux Falls. When he’s not working at Midco he is often on the road photographing South Dakota’s prettiest spots. Follow Begeman on his blog.

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Snow Day

By Christian Begeman

On December 10, Sioux Falls received its first major snow of the season. Upwards of 10 inches began falling in the morning and by late afternoon I couldn’t take it anymore. One of my favorite things to do is shoot first snow photos. Some of it has to do with the first snow bringing holiday cheer, but a lot of the joy comes from memories of past snow days as a kid. We didn’t always have snow, or at least much snow out on the prairies of Ziebach and Dewey County, but when it did arrive, we kids took advantage. Sledding into the crick, slipping and sliding on frozen puddles and stock dams were simple pleasures that would fill our non-chore hours. Afterwards, we’d come back to a house warmed with a wood burning stove and Mom’s famous caramel popcorn balls, still warm from the oven.

But I digress. This is supposed to be a column about photography. And more particularly, making images in the snowfall. A few years back, I discovered birds were often easier to photograph in a snowstorm. Like us, they prefer to stay out of the wind and snow. You can often find them with fluffed up feathers on perches inside sheltered tree canopies. With this in mind, I left work early on Friday and headed to Terrace Park next to Covell Lake in northern Sioux Falls, where I can usually spot a Northern Cardinal or two. Sure enough, just as I was about to turn back from a fruitless search, I heard the familiar metallic call and found a half dozen cardinals hunkered down in evergreen branches not far off the walking path.

After taking a few portraits of a male and female cardinal, I headed downtown. I was thinking Phillips Avenue with its decorations and busy-ness would make for interesting imagery. I wasn’t disappointed. However, I almost got snowplowed in while parking near the KELO Radio building. Tis one of the hazards of being out and about in the snow. The other is keeping your gear dry. I always try to keep a bath towel with me while shooting in the snow. I keep it over the camera and lens when not shooting and then use it to dry the lens and body after composing and taking a shot.

I had never been to Falls Park during a heavy snow in December. I believe I was one of maybe five souls tramping around the park at dusk. Three of those were city workers busily cleaning the sidewalks. The heavy snowfall was likely in the eighth or ninth inch by then, so cleaning the sidewalks was not particularly easy. The mood and ambiance of the park, however, was wonderful as music played and lights twinkled through the snowfall.

Saturday dawned clear and the blue skies and prairies blanketed with freshly fallen snow beckoned. I heard there was a snowy owl sighting near Volga, so I headed that way. I did not find said owl, but I did see myriad raptors and stopped for a small hike at Oakwood Lakes State Park. As evening fell, clouds appeared in the southwest and soon the setting sun painted them in exquisite tones. All these scenes helped to bring me a little closer to finding that holiday spirit. To all reading here, please have a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Christian Begeman grew up in Isabel and now lives in Sioux Falls. When he’s not working at Midco he is often on the road photographing South Dakota’s prettiest spots. Follow Begeman on his blog.

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Embracing Darkness

By Christian Begeman

The days of darkness are here. No, that is not an ancient prophecy now come true. Nor is it some scare tactic about the state of the world. It is simply the time of the year when I leave for work in the gloaming and return in the dark. As we head into winter once again and the daylight shortens, one may think that finding good photo opportunities diminishes with the light, but that is not entirely true.

I first notice the shortened days in early autumn. My custom is to take a fall colors trip West River and I’m always a bit surprised how soon the sun sets in the first days of October compared to the usual long days of summer when I typically visit places like Custer State Park and the Badlands. This year I wasn’t ready to quit making photographs when the sun set, so I set out to try something new. I tried to find interesting roads with curves in the respective parks and then set up my tripod for long exposures and waited for the day to dim.

My interest in night photography has always been strong. The problem is that as I get older, the more I loathe giving up sleep. Last summer, something happened in the northern sky that renewed my willingness to overcome the loss of sleep and make images in the small hours of the night. Comet NeoWise graced the sky for a few short weeks in July. With that celestial object, my night photography interest was renewed. Fast forward to late February 2021 and you would have found me taking long exposure sequences of Sioux Falls city scenes to make short time-lapse videos for Midco Sports coverage of the NSIC and Summit League basketball tournaments. A long exposure (anything longer than a couple seconds) at night allows you to capture moving cars with the headlights as streaks of light.

I wanted to try this same concept in the parks this fall. The goal was to find interesting stretches of road with passing cars and shoot them at dusk to create unique images. It was a learning experience, as I discovered that a strong night breeze plays havoc with a long lens even when it is on a tripod. If you look closely at the image of the Big Foot Pass road at Badlands National Park, you’ll notice the taillight lines are not smooth. Wind on my lens caused this, not crazy driving. I also tried this technique along Needles Highway and Spearfish Canyon National Byway. My favorite image is from the canyon. A small white tour bus came by, and with its lights positioned higher, gave an added vertical element to the streaks.

One last note about shooting night scenes in winter. With the air turning colder, the normal humidity and dust particles in the air are reduced, so the stars are seen more clearly. Add in the fact that the solar cycle is turning active again and there are new possibilities for glimpsing (and photographing) the elusive northern lights while gazing out and up into the night.

Christian Begeman grew up in Isabel and now lives in Sioux Falls. When he’s not working at Midco he is often on the road photographing South Dakota’s prettiest spots. Follow Begeman on his blog.

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Black and White Review

By Christian Begeman

November tends to put me in a black and white mood. The end of the year has begun. No more green. No more leaves. Brown on brown. Bleak on bleak. Stark though it may be, there is beauty in simplicity. And the lack of color can sometimes help to see a scene better, particularly in scenes of black and white.

I should confess that I’ve always been interested and intrigued by black and white images. When they are well done, they tend to evoke feelings of nostalgia and maybe even loneliness. They also can bring certain details to the forefront that might otherwise go unnoticed in color images. I first learned how to develop black and white images in an old-fashioned darkroom. The smell of the chemicals, the red light and the fascination of watching an image emerge from a seemingly blank piece of paper floating in the bath was both amazing and somewhat addicting.

For this column, I revisit my fascination with black and white. Folks have asked me over the years about technique and process, so I wanted to share some images from this most recent season of black and white moods. I’ll also share a few of the same scenes in full color. Then you can decide which one you prefer.

I never take black and white photos in the field. I believe some (if not many) cameras allow you to take photos in monochrome when you trip the shutter. This is akin to using black and white rolls of film instead of color film in the days before digital cameras. I used to do it myself, but not anymore.

Pretty much all digital photo editors nowadays allow you to desaturate images in one way or another. The more advanced versions even allow you to adjust the levels of reds, greens, yellows, blues and magentas when editing monochrome. This may seem counterintuitive at first blush. Why would the amount of red make any difference if the final image will have no color in it? Well, that’s a great question. The best answer goes back to photography techniques that the great Ansel Adams taught us. He would shoot scenes using red, orange and yellow filters. This technique altered that particular wavelength of light before it exposed on the film. A red filter would render blue skies black, and green grass would become lighter, for example. Adams taught us that the best black and white images had a true black and a true white somewhere within the composition. Adding filter allowed him to better find those tones. Nowadays we can simulate that technique with digital sliders and adjustments.

One of my first photography professors told me something that I remember to this day and with which I still agree. He said there is nothing quite as beautiful as grass in black and white photography. Add South Dakota’s famous blue skies accented with white clouds and you have a recipe for very interesting black and white scenes.

So maybe this season of early winter isn’t so bad for photography after all. I guess the bleak is what you make of it. This hobby of photography has taught me something that I never knew I needed to learn: there is beauty in almost every vista we find before us each day. It all depends on how you look at it.

Christian Begeman grew up in Isabel and now lives in Sioux Falls. When he’s not working at Midco he is often on the road photographing South Dakota’s prettiest spots. Follow Begeman on his blog.

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On the Rainbow Road

By Christian Begeman

“Somewhere over the rainbow, way up high.” Chances are good that if you read or hear these words a familiar tune will pop into your head. Likely it will be Judy Garland’s signature melody from the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz. Or maybe it will be Hawaiian-born musician Israel “IZ” Kamakawiwo’ole’s ukulele version that has 768 million views on YouTube. This song may be the most familiar rainbow tune, but there are plenty more. I grew up hearing Kermit the Frog sing”Rainbow Connection,” and then learned to sing it myself in music class. One of my favorite country songs from The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band reminds listeners that,”If we’re ever gonna see a rainbow, we gotta stand a little rain.” Rainbows are special. They are ephemeral. Unique. Often amazing. Plenty of rain fell this spring and summer, so there were more than a few opportunities to chase rainbows.

That’s actually supplanted storm chasing as my favorite hobby. As awe-inspiring and downright scary as a good high plains thunder boomer can be, my favorite part of summer is catching that first light after the storm. That’s when glorious things can happen in the heavens above. I don’t consider myself a storm chaser anymore. I’m a rainbow chaser.

It seems obvious, but to be a rainbow chaser one must stay weather aware. Storms toward the evening with little cloud cover behind them provide the best opportunities for horizon-filling rainbows. With sunlight shooting into the back of a rain cloud, the chances of rainbow creation are greatly increased. As a bonus, once the sun sets you have a chance to see that warm sunset light color the towering storm clouds from behind. It is an amazing sight to witness a changing — almost living — yellow, orange and red skyscape amble across the sky.

That’s exactly what happened when I met a strong storm that passed through Huron and was heading southeast towards Sioux Falls. I caught the front side of the storm somewhere north of Carthage. The wall cloud was menacing, so I skirted around to the south and then drove up the backside. A dazzling double rainbow was my reward. I trailed the storm to a country steeple northeast of Howard and then stayed for the cloud show. The scene before me was an artist’s masterpiece. An elegant spire standing tall in the midst of the slowly changing colors of a summer sunset painted on a storm cloud. It was a Psalm 19 kind of moment.

A panoramic of Belleview Lutheran Church following a thunderstorm in rural Miner County.


A couple weekends later, I met another summer storm and its rainbows. The magic happened east of Stickney in Davison County and then spilled over into Douglas County about 8 miles west of Dimock. This time the rainbow stuck around while the clouds turned sunset red. Chain lightning played across the horizon for an extravagant finishing touch. Visions like that are probably why there are so many songs about rainbows. On that particular day, I did indeed find the rainbow connection.

Christian Begeman grew up in Isabel and now lives in Sioux Falls. When he’s not working at Midco he is often on the road photographing South Dakota’s prettiest spots. Follow Begeman on his blog.

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Lighting Up the Night

By Christian Begeman

I grew up in the country. Going to town always felt like a treat, especially before I started school. Every December, Isabel’s Main Street, which also happened to be a state highway, was adorned with holiday decorations hanging from the light poles. It wasn’t much, just a swirl of a wreath above a red bell and colored lights that turned on with the streetlights. It was, however, enough to make the trips to town for ball games, evening church services and other activities a little more enjoyable. Songs at church turned into carols and were sung a little louder. Soon there were get-togethers, baked goodies and gifts.

At one time, our town had two grocery stores. One of them had few aisles of general store items where you could find shoes, clothing and other odds and ends. There was also a hardware store, a cafe, a candle shop and three gas stations. When Christmas rolled around, you could find gifts right there in town. Of course, most people would take the trip to Mobridge, or Bismarck, North Dakota or to Rapid City to do the serious Christmas shopping, but it wasn’t absolutely necessary. Between circling what we wanted in the Sears catalog and pointing out which fishing lures and how many .22 shells we wanted at the hardware store, you could get Christmas done just fine in our little town.

Later, as I outgrew toys and grew into high school athletics, the addition of holiday lighting on Main Street meant something else: the start of high school basketball season. I’d see those lights go up and know that the first games of the year were right around the corner. Back then, the Little Moreau Conference had its tournament at the beginning of the season, and it was held in Isabel for all my high school years. Our team fared well with the hometown advantage, good players, good coaches and great fans. The Isabel Community Hall would be rocking on those nights in early December and Main Street would be full of cars, cheer and those holiday decorations. Those are great memories.

Back in 2013, I happened to be on Phillips Avenue in Sioux Falls during an early December snowfall. It was a snow globe kind of evening, with giant flakes and no wind. It was so beautiful I had to get my camera out, step into the middle of the street and snap a few photos. I’ve never been one to shoot a lot of city scenes, but there was something special about all the lights and leading lines of the street falling off away from me. This December, I resolved to revisit a few smaller towns to capture a bit of this simple beauty on our main streets during the Christmas season. I used a tripod and shot long exposures with a high aperture to get the star filter effect and the light streaks from passing cars. I think they add visual interest. On my last loop from Salem to De Smet to Flandreau just a few nights ago, I stopped in Lake Preston and was both surprised and happy to discover that their decorations are the same as the ones we had in Isabel. I couldn’t help but be swept back into a wave of holiday memories.

Decorations and fond memories are fun, but the simple beauty of colorful lights reminds me of why Christmas celebrations come around in the first place. On a starry night long ago, we all were given the greatest gift of a babe swaddled in a lowly manger, and,”In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”

Christian Begeman grew up in Isabel and now lives in Sioux Falls. When he’s not working at Midcontinent Communications he is often on the road photographing South Dakota’s prettiest spots. Follow Begeman on his blog.

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Bye Bye Butterflies

By Christian Begeman

Some years ago, I heard about the Dakota Skipper. This small butterfly was a candidate for inclusion on the endangered species list. It hasn’t made the list yet, but is still vulnerable because of the reduction of its native prairie habitat and its unique life cycle. It only appears in its adult form for three weeks in late June and early July. The range map for the Dakota Skipper includes northeastern South Dakota, so I took it as a challenge to find and photograph this beautifully named butterfly on the first day of July.

Suffice it to say, after a very warm day of slowly walking through tall grass and much arm waving to keep the mosquitoes at bay, I failed. The good news, however, is that I did find a variety of butterflies including the regal fritillary, which is also considered a species at risk. I came across other species of skipper nectaring primarily on purple coneflowers, including long-dash, tawny-edged and Delaware. These skippers are small and brownish orange just like the Dakota, so I had to send my photos to a few experts to find out if I was successful or not.

Butterflies in general are an outdoor photographer’s dream. Colorful and often found on wildflowers, they are like ornaments of the prairie. Except they move, and often away from a large, sweaty fella with a camera. All butterflies are usually quite elusive, and that is another reason I enjoy photographing them. The satisfaction of getting a decent shot is all the more rewarding — if and when it happens.

Late summer is the best time to go butterfly hunting. A 100mm macro is my preferred lens. The colorful flutter of wings seems less elusive as they focus on the last of the summer wildflowers prior to migrating south. This year, the monarch numbers seem quite high. Last year, painted ladies stole the show. I’m not smart enough to know why, though I suppose it has to do with timely rains and overall weather patterns. It also seems that more folks are aware of planting pollinator friendly flower gardens as well as keeping the remaining native prairies as healthy and intact as possible. This is a good thing.

Twice in the last few weeks, I spent a couple hours sitting cross-legged on a hillside at Lake Herman State Park near Madison attempting to get new and unique photos of monarchs on blooming prairie blazing stars, goldenrods and Maximilian sunflowers. In doing so, I came across plenty of other species — moths, skippers and garden spiders — all hoping to catch a meal from all the activity. The beauty and complexity of these small things that thrive on our hillsides and grasslands is truly a wonder to watch and contemplate.

I still plan to get that Dakota Skipper photograph. I’ll have to wait for next summer, but it will be worth it to take another slow stroll or two amongst the beauty of our wild prairie hills.

Christian Begeman grew up in Isabel and now lives in Sioux Falls. When he’s not working at Midcontinent Communications he is often on the road photographing South Dakota’s prettiest spots. Follow Begeman on his blog.