Hey guys,

Ever wanted to own one of my pieces for yourself, or maybe you want to give one of my images as a gift this holiday season! In celebration of 'Black Friday' you can use discount code EJVFXA through Monday for 50% off any of the images available on the 'Shop' link on my 'Into The RFD Photography' facebook page or at: [link] Just enter the code at checkout!

Thanks!

Hey guys,

Just wanted to get a link up to a quick timelapse I just created! Check it out and let me know what you think! The video includes scenes from supercell thunderstorms on the Great Plains both during the day and at night, as well as the Northern Lights when they are occasionally visible this far south!

[link]

Thanks!

Chris

EDIT: LINK SHOULD BE WORKING NOW!

Hey everyone,

Its been a long time since I've made any updates and I certainly apologize for that! I took a new job that requires quite a few hours so its kept me away from my camera and updating various web pages. I'm trying to finally make some progress on things on the home page and my various gallery pages over the next week! I have quite a few chase accounts to post from this season, but a drought also put a pretty major damper on much in the realm of chasing opportunities. A string of days in early May offered a couple of brief photographic opportunities. Then a pair of late May days offered some incredibly photogenic storms. The first being May 27th, as a tornado warned storm took on some mean structure in Central Nebraska! Here's an image:



Then on May 30th, I traveled to West Central Kansas with good friends and documented a supercell that fired, and then was caught by a squall line near the town of Jetmore! Here was one of our many views of this squall line above a mature wheat field as we neared Dodge City:



I also captured an incredible lightning strike with a rainbow in the golden glow of sunset!



I took a pretty long break while getting on my feet at work... then finally on August 2nd storms returned to the High Plains! We had an incredible intercept in the Black Hills and Badlands National Park in the southwestern corner of the state! Photogenic storms in photogenic terrain, it really doesn't get much better than that! Here's a couple images from the day:





Finally a couple weeks ago, I took a trip out to the Black Hills to camp with some friends for the Perseid Meteor Shower. We ended up spending the night atop 7200 foot Harney Peak on Saturday night, and while most of my better images came during the day, the shower from a mountain peak was an experience I won't soon forget! Here are a couple more images from the trip!





As you can see I have alot of image accounts to get up on the website! I'll be working on those the rest of the week... but until then I hope you enjoy the images! Thank you all for your patience!

Chris

Hey everyone...

I have so much work to do after the last week. I have been planning to make quite a few website updates but have been chasing storms for the past week. May 1st, 2nd, 4th, and 5th were all chase days. I also went out locally around sunset to timelapse some distant storms on May 3rd. After all of that time in the car I've been recovering and getting some work done the last few days and am finally getting around to work on things.

On May 1st... I chased in Southwestern Minnesota and Northwest Iowa and got a brief tornado warned supercell!





There was also a decent light show after dark!



Then on May 2nd, I chased in Southern Nebraska where the cap finally broke just before dark. A supercell tried to wrap up above my head!





Then I captured the best cloud to ground strike I had ever gotten on the way home!



On May 3rd... I went out around sunset to timelapse some local convection, I also included a timelapse of the supercell developing near Fullerton the previous day.

[link]

May 4th was a very frustrating day, where supercells tried to get going and constantly weakened right as we would get to them. Here is a quick shot of some mammatus from a dying storm and then a stack of lightning images after dark near Norfolk.





May 5th was the worst day of the bunch... a strong cap stopped storms from developing and we basically got a tan with 1000 other chasers. That being said it was great to chat with friends and put some facebook faces to names in the real world. Ill keep you updated here as I get these accounts done!

Thanks,

Chris

Hey guys!

As promised I got the storm chase accounts up from my 3 days on the Plains last week. Check them out at the following links!


-Northwest Kansas Low Precipitation Supercell-
[link]


-Southwest Oklahoma Supercell/ Lightning-
[link]


-Kansas Tornadoes/ High Risk-
[link]

To help you decide if they are worth a look I figured I better include a couple more teaser images! I'll continue working on getting some other updates done and keep you guys updates... in addition I'll finally be adding some more images here so stay tuned!

Thanks,
Chris

Hey everyone... in the middle of writing chase accounts to post from that 3 day sting of storm chases I talked about in my last post, some suprise auroras occured last night! It was probably one of the best displays I've seen so I figured I'd take a time out to make a quick blog post about it. I should have the 3 chase accounts ready to go tomorrow!

A friend had called and asked me if I had checked the aurora plots at all and I answered that I hadn't he told me to take a look... I did and we talked about how the Earth's magnetic field had been stuck to the south most of the day (good sign for Northern Lights) and the KP index was increasing steadily. Another photographer in Ireland noted that he had a very good display and nearly everytime he has seen them we have too! Somehow... the storm lasted until dark. As twilight set in I decided to head to a wind farm to potentially timelapse the aurora over the windfarm. Before twilight was even gone a noticable auroral glow was already happening! Here is a shot:



Once in finally got dark I had to jump into a couple shots while the first camera was time lapsing! Here is me being a dork with the aurora:



This green arc was rather steady over the next couple of hours... as it started to head north I decided to switch locations to the river front near my house with the hopes it would come back. Finally around 1 am it did... and even though the surge was rather brief it was INCREDIBLE! Here is my favorite shot from the night:



With 2 cameras and a nice aurora display... I made a pretty long timelapse. You can also find that here:

[link]

Check it out and let me know what you think!

Thanks again for your patience!
Chris

Hey everyone,

You may have noticed a lack of updates both here and on my website. Between work and chasing storms I've been pretty darn busy. I chased 3 days in a row last week. The 12th, 13th, and 14th of April. I figured I would make a blog post with a preview of some images so you would know what to expect when I get the actual accounts up on my website. Once that is done I will finally be working on uploading more images to my galleries. Anyway... the first day on the 12th (Thursday) looked good for some storms over Western and Northwest Kansas. There were some concerns about the strength of the cap the further south you went, but also concerns about gulf moisture making it far enough north to create favorable conditions for storms. We started the day in Nebraska and drove to Garden City, Kansas. Making it around 2pm. Soon after a tornado watch was issued for much of Northwestern Kansas and parts of Colorado and Nebraska. We moved slightly north and sat near Tribune watching storm towers rise and fall. It became obvious that the cap was going to hold and we needed to head north... so we went for developing storms near Goodland, Kansas along interstate 70. Once we caught up to the storm the wind shear was so strong it was of the low precipitation variety. Which made the storm visually interesting but not very strong. Here is a preview!



We stayed in Colby, Kansas for the night and awoke in the morning to a forecast that doubted whether we could get storms to form in Oklahoma before dark. But we decided to chance it. Storms fired very early (around noon) as we were just crossing the Oklahoma border. We finally reached a line of developing storms around 3pm. The cell we had targeted rapidly weakened as we approached near Chickasha, Oklahoma. As new storms developed to the southwest. We headed down interstate 44 towards Lawton, Oklahoma and then west. Reaching a high precipitation supercell near the Snyder, Oklahoma area in the Wichita Mountains area. Here is a quick preview from that storm!



We stayed that night in Oklahoma City... and Saturday was supposed to be the big day. A rare 'high risk' of severe weather was issued by the Storm Prediction Center and they called for a tornado outbreak. We awoke early and crossed the Kansas border. Reaching the McPherson, Kansas area before heading west towards developing storms flying northeast across the state at 55mph. After being stuck in fog and low clouds on the early storms we elected to head to the south and west and get into clearer and more unstable air as more storms fired near Dodge City, Kansas and rapidly started to rotate. Here is a shot with a funnel cloud on the storm near Greensburg, Kansas! It ended up as a rather frustrating day as we would get in perfect positions on storms and they wouldn't produce. While the ones we had just left to the north had tornadoes on the ground, or another storm to the south would produce. Sometimes thats just the luck of chasing storms.



Finally I'll sneak in one last photo from my trips to Badlands National Park (I'm working on an image account for this as well) Enjoy! Feel free to let me know what you think, and thanks for your patience as I complete all of these updates!



Thanks again,
Chris

Hey everyone!

I got my storm chasing accounts up from the 28th and 29th of March! The first account is from Central Kansas. I drove down early in the day from Northern Nebraska and waited for a few hours for storms to fire. I was slightly out of position but still managed to catch a developing supercell at sunset, and then some incredible structure with lightning in the dark near Madison, Kansas. That account is here:



[link]

After a late night I stayed with a friend in Lawrence, Kansas and then set up to chase along a warm front on the Kansas/Nebraska border the next day. There were a few occasions where I thought the storm would produce a tornado but it just couldn't quite get it done. However I still got to witness some incredible supercell structure before heading home. That account is here:



[link]

Check them out and let me know what you think! I have a couple more website accounts to create and then I will get back to updating my galleries including dA! Thanks for your patience and support!

Chris

Hello everyone!

WOW it has been a marathon 3 day stretch for me. Starting Tuesday night with an unexpected and amazing display of the Northern Lights! This lasted for about 4 hours and I headed to a wind farm near my house here in Northeast Nebraska to time lapse the display. I am sure I will have some still images coming from this one... until I get those processed, here is a time lapse of the display. 3 hours compressed into about 30 seconds!

[link]

Then on Wednesday and Thursday the parameters came together for some nice storms in Kansas, Southern Nebraska, and Northwestern Missouri. Needless to say after 3 days, 5 states, 1100 miles, 4 supercells, an aurora display, 8 hours of sleep total and ~30 hours in the car I am a little worn out but I wouldn't trade it for the world. Here is a preview from the first chase day near Dunlap, Kansas as the storm organized into a supercell.



Much more to come... I will probably make a post here better detailing the storm chases. Let me know what you think!

Thanks,

Chris

Hey guys!

I just got back from Badlands National Park for a second time... this time focusing on documenting that place in the daytime. I am convinced I could spend a month out there and not get it all but I did the best I could with the time I had! I plan to write a blog soon detailing the experiences and some of the frames I made while I was out there. Until then I figured dA would like to see a quick preview from out there. I stitched a couple of panoramas that were taken at sunset the first night we spend out there. The original files are both over 19000 pixels wide and almost 60 MB. Making some absolutely huge prints possible.

The first image is from the 'White River Valley Overlook' along the Rim Road in the middle of the park. This is one of my favorite places in the park... because it doesn't look very incredible initially with the parking lot being a little bit down hill from the peak. However a quick walk from the parking lot and walking out onto one of the narrow ridges puts you on a ledge surrounded by massive drops into deep gorges and towering rock formations all around you. I wish we had spend more time here... but for now this panorama image will have to do.



The second image is from aptly named 'Panorama Point' which is near the eastern part of the park before you decend into Dillon Pass and the visitor center. Here a narrow boardwalk takes you from the roadside onto an overlook surrounded on 3 sides by the stirated colors of the Badlands Wall. This is one of my favorite images from the trip! Direct sun light on the rocks to my east really allow you to see the colors and bands in the rocks, golden grasses lit up in the sunset give it some color. The grass in the foreground along the ridge we are standing on gives this some scale and depth too. You can also see the bottom of the deep, shaded canyon on the right hand side of the image which leads into distant rolling plains.



Anyway expect alot more to be coming from these trips soon both on my website and blog, as well as some images appearing here! Feel free to let me know what your thoughts are on these panoramic images!

Thanks,

Chris

Hey guys!

I have gotten even more website image accounts done! I've really been trying to get things updated there and I have even more image accounts coming... like I said in my previous journal I will definitely keep you updated here!

The first account is from my first display of the aurora back in August... and can be found here:
[link]

The next one is from a local storm chase in September of 2010, a day I didn't really expect to see much but gave me some really great images of storm structure at sunset! That one is here:
[link]

Finally the last one is from a local chase after work last fall... it also contains a couple of images you may recognize from my gallery, as well as some I have never posted before! That one is at this link:
[link]

Please feel free to check those out and let me know what you all think! I always like interacting and getting feedback about the images and experiences. Lastly... many of you may remember me talking about Badlands National Park last week. It left so much of an impression on me that I wanted to spend a little bit more time out there photographing the expansive landscapes that look like the moon or some other foriegn planet. I will be out there again from tomorrow until Thursday afternoon. Expect a blog about that experience when I return! Until then feel free to follow the twitter feed on my home page here, or add 'Into the RFD Photography' on Facebook for more updates. I will try to update twitter throughout the trip when data is available to me.

Thanks for all the support!

Chris

Hey guys....

Wow its been a busy few weeks but I am finally getting some work done! I have two new image accounts up on my website. The first one is from the brief display of the Northern Lights back on February 18th. You can get to that one here:

[link]

I also got an account up from my rare encounter with a snowy owl this winter here:

[link]

Please check those out and let me know what you guys think! If you have never been to my site feel free to check out any of the image accounts as there are quite a few images there that aren't found in a gallery setting here! I have a number of other updates in the works and I will certainly keep everyone updated here! Once I finish these image accounts it will be time to make sure they are in proper chronological order. I also will be captioning some of the videos there and updating my links section.

Lastly... I know most of you have facebook! ...and I've also created a facebook fan page that you can find here: [link] Give it a 'like' and share the page if you like my images! That is another place where you will find more than what is displayed here since this is more of a gallery setting to showcase what I feel are my best works! I'll resume posting images here tomorrow!

Thanks everyone!

Chris

Okay, the title is probably not true, but I must say after my last sighting of the aurora borealis combined with a recent one a couple of nights ago have me hooked. From nearly local midnight until 4am on Thursday evening/ Friday morning I had auroras visible despite harsh moon light due to a rather severe solar storm. With a pair of eruptions over the last couple nights... the displays are expected to continue through the end of the weekend and I am headed to Badlands National Park for a chance at seeing the Northern Lights over the moon lit rock formations in Western South Dakota. Don't expect updates for a couple of days, but feel free to follow my twitter feed on this page for updates as to how the trip is panning out. In addition, I shot a time lapse of the aurora display on Thursday which can be found here:

[link]

I recommend 720 or 1080p HD for the best viewing! Feel free to check it out and let me know what you think!

Wish me luck out west!

Thanks,

Chris

Hey guys... I have a photo thats being voted on right now in one of National Geographic's 'Your Shot' competitions! You can vote here! [link] Then click on 'Voting Machine' My shot is part of the selection from 'Week 3' of February! Voting ends March 1st, so please go in and vote for the images you like and share this link to help me out!

I realize people are probably sick of me posting this... I apologize, obviously this is a pretty incredible opportunity that I would love to take advantage of. I sincerely appreciate all of the support!

In addition I recently created another new time lapse of the recent planetary conjunction between Venus, Jupiter, and the moon which you can view here: [link] Please check it out and let me know what you think!

Thanks everyone!

Chris

Hey guys... I have a photo thats being voted on right now in one of National Geographic's 'Your Shot' competitions! You can vote here! [link] Then click on 'Voting Machine' My shot is part of the selection from 'Week 3' of February! Voting ends March 1st, so please go in and vote for the images you like and share this link to help me out!

Thanks everyone!

Chris

Hey guys... I have a photo thats being voted on right now in one of National Geographic's 'Your Shot' competitions! You can vote here! [link] Then click on 'Voting Machine' My shot is part of the selection from 'Week 3' of February! Voting ends March 1st, so please go in and vote for the images you like and share this link to help me out!

Thanks everyone!

Chris

*UPDATED* Fixed Link

Got updates coming like hot cakes haha... I can't remember a time where I have posted 2 journals in 3 days since I joined dA about 5 years ago, but I suppose there is a first time for everything. First things first. As I'm sure many of you have noticed from my recent posts I've been creating alot of time lapse material lately. Yesterday I made a new video that contains a few brief thunderstorm scenes that had enough frames for a time lapse. You can view the video here: [link] For best viewing I recommend watching in HD and full screen. Feel free to let me know what you think!

I also have 9 new image accounts coming on my website. Some highlights include an encounter with a Snowy Owl this winter, 1 million + snow geese migrating north at Squaw Creek National Wildlife Refuge, and some older storms that I had not created accounts for. I encourage you to visit [link] and get a preview of what's coming!

You can also follow along on facebook at this page: [link]

Thanks for all of the support lately!

Chris

Hey guys!

Just wanted to jot down a couple of things... I have been doing many updates to my website and also my facebook fan page. Which is 'Into the RFD Photography' on facebook! There are many images available there that are not on my site if you would like to add the page and follow along! I plan on making a number of website updates over the next couple of days! Including a few image accounts and will certainly post here when those are ready to go!

On February 18th, I was fortunate to witness a very brief, but beautiful display of Northern Lights. I will have some still images coming from this... but I also created a pair of time lapses from the display. I have posted the links below! Check them out and let me know what you think! Some of the still images were featured on spaceweather.com which was pretty exciting as well!

[link] (Brighter Version)

and

[link]

Also, to copy along a fellow chasers idea... I will be posting a couple of images today too for 'Tornado Tuesday'

Thanks guys,
Chris

*EDIT:* Images for tornado tuesday are now posted! Enjoy!

Hey everyone.

Just a couple of quick updates... I plan on adding some accounts to my website soon, but if you haven't already checked it out you can at [link] , feel free to click around there and let me know what you think! I added a couple of new images here on dA today and will be getting more up in the coming days. In addition I have been shooting alot of time lapse scenes of the night sky recently. I have included them below... please change the quality to 1080 HD and watch full screen for the best quality! Again feel free to let me know what you think! If you have youtube, feel free to follow me and I will return the favor!

You can view them here:

[link]

[link]

Thanks guys!

Chris
www.intotherfd.com

Well guys, now that I have a website up at www.intotherfd.com... I think its kind of time to switch things up here. I will primarily be using dA as a way to sell and market prints and to showcase my images in a gallery format. Because of that, I think I need to keep only what I feel are my best works on here. That being said they are in a very unorganized format. I'll be deleting alot of my images and sort've starting from scratch if you will. I realize this means that you may see some of the images you've seen before.

I will continue to post image accounts on my website and make blog posts here. Just wanted to keep people in the loop and apologize for the inconvience. Thanks for all the support you guys have shown and continue to show for my work!

Thanks,

Chris