Beautiful

As a little bonus for my friends and followers every month I provide a free image for use as your desktop background wallpaper on your computer. Each beautiful photo is a picture that I have created and it always includes a calendar overlay for the month. I know that I’m always looking for a calendar and having one on my desktop is very convenient! This months wallpaper image comes from the prairies east of Calgary. I haven't spent a lot of time out there recently, but for several years I drove the dirt roads that criss-cross through the prairie farm fields on an almost daily basis. I spent many hours searching for migratory birds and wild animals, and of course looking for beautiful landscapes. We took a family trip to the prairie to create a family portrait for our annual Christmas cards. I didn't have a firm idea in mind as to what I was looking for other than that I wanted to do something on the prairie, maybe making use of a big bale of hay, an old barn, or a grain bin. Something like that anyway. So we drove around to see what we could find. It was a fun time and although my kids were pretty goofy the whole time we managed to get a few usable portraits. It's much harder to photograph my own family than it is to do other families! While we were out I also found this beautiful prairie landscape that I had to capture. It was a wonderfully warm day today and the sky and clouds were lovely. I hope you will enjoy it as much as I do! Download To install the image as your desktop [...]

NEW - Ultra Wide Screen Saver for Dual Monitors This months background wallpaper image comes from Carburn Park in Calgary. This is one of my favorite places in the city to do family and children's portrait sessions at any time of year, but in the fall it's an absolutely amazing place to hang out. I took my kids for a trip to the park to enjoy the unseasonably warm weather (29 °C in calgary at the end of September) and the beautiful golden yellow leaves. The fall colors were spectacular and we had a wonderful bike ride around the lake. the kids got to play at the playground and to roll around in the leaves by the lake. It's just a great place to be! You can see some more pictures from this trip at the following link: Simply Sunday: Fall at Carburn Park You should also take a few minutes to watch the slideshow I posted yesterday from a family portrait session I photographed there this week: Slideshow – Fall Portraits at Carburn Park Download To install the image as your desktop background, simply click on the link below that corresponds to the file resolution you would like to use. When the larger image appears in your browser window right-click on the picture and select “Set as Desktop Background...”. For some browsers (Google Chrome for sure) you may have to choose "Save As..." to copy the image to your desktop first. You can then right-click on the file on your desktop and choose “Set as Desktop Background...”.

This months background wallpaper image comes from the Little Elbow Provincial Recreation Area in the Elbow Valley. This is the southernmost region of Kananaskis Country, accessed via Highway 22x through Bragg Creek rather than by Highway 40. It's a wonderful area of the park, yet quite quiet compared to many other places. It seems that in this area many of the tourists stop at the major attractions (Elbow Falls, Bill Allen Pond, Forget-Me-Not Pond, etc.) and don't get off the track so much. We did a wonderful hike up to Nihahi Ridge on Saturday and we saw very few people. It was fantastic weather and it was great to be in such a beautiful part of the province! The image was taken from our camp site at the Little Elbow Equestrian campground. I was relaxing in my chair and noticed the beautiful circular frame made by the trees around the cloudy blue sky above. I wasn't sure if I could fit the whole thing in with the camera and lens I had with me, but I had to try. And it worked! Sometimes in photography you just don't know what you're going to get until you try. That's part of the beauty of being in a creative profession!! Download To install the image as your desktop background, simply click on the link below that corresponds to the file resolution you would like to use. When the larger image appears in your browser window right-click on the picture and select “Set as Desktop Background...”. For some browsers (Google Chrome for sure) you may have to choose "Save As..." to copy the image to your desktop first. You can then right-click on the file on your desktop [...]

Free Desktop Wallpaper for August 2011 This months background wallpaper image comes from the Rock Glacier near the top of Highwood Pass in Kananaskis Country. This cute little critter is a Pika. They live in very rocky terrain in high-alpine locations. they are very photogenic and I love to watch them going about their business while in the mountains. We had some visitors from Ontario and we wanted to show them some of the beauty of the Canadian Rockies. In the summer the Highwood Pass area is a can't-miss location for stunning scenery and beautiful birds and wildlife. We hiked up to the top of Ptarmigan Cirque (which is probably the easiest hike in Kananaskis that lets you experience the true beauty of the Rockies while still actually getting a taste of hiking on glacial moraine above the tree-line) for a picnic and a great walk around the alpine meadow. We didn't see much wildlife on this part of the trip but we did find a couple of Pika's and the sounds of the Columbian Ground Squirrels calling all around us was very cool. On the way home we saw dozens of Rocky Mountain Bighorn Sheep and found quite a few more Pika's and Ground Squirrels during a stop at Rock Glacier. This is a can't-miss location for critter watching and I highly recommend you pull over for a short walk if you're ever in the Highwood Pass area. To find them you just need to stand still and watch for movement. The critters are all so well camouflaged that they can be standing right in front of you but if they're not moving you may never see them! They're pretty curious though, so they [...]