Gavin Finds Out About My Second Channel 

Spoiler: It's just a joke. I don't have a second channel. I do have a wonderful 2024 Calendar you can still get for the new year!! www.alexarmitage.com/prints/2024-calendar-usacanada

After many years I finally made it to Rickets Glen on the 21st of October. I was in photographers sensory overload. It was just past peak color on an overcast day. Perfect conditions! I am already planning to return next year. It was quite the hike but well worth the effort.

Bummer, you guys missed the fall color in WV. You should check with me next time around. Southern WV fall colors was fast and furious this year. I only got maybe 4 or 5 images I liked. Most of which were in northern WV

OMG This was really funny.. Also I loved the images you took.. Absolute breathtaking.

Those were amazing pics at the end

I'm amazed that place wasn't covered with people. I guess the rain kept them away that day?

There's nothing like Fall in Colorado :) Those ending shots were fantastic !!

Love those photos at the end, the most Alex, must say! And always enjoyable when you have Gavin on also! Thanks for the laughs...

The portrait orientation of the swirls was better, in my opinion.

Hilarious with Jason Tucker showing up at Babcock. Wasn’t expecting that. Great video Alex.

The images at the end, lovely. Nice one Alex.

Kudos for putting that link in the descrippy.

Ohhh those frosty trees in the fog at the end...very nice!

Great shots Alex…..the ones at the end were stunning. I’m sure Gavin talked to you about Vancouver Island. Well if you haven’t been here I think you would love it. Gavin tried to give it justice but failed miserably “that’s why we sent him east” 😂. Just kidding Gavin miss your adventures out here.

I like the vertical swirl image better than the horizontal. Vertically, the cascade gets slightly stretched and is thus more impressive. The view down the waterfall? Eh. The last couple of shots at the end, though, were special. Great fun with Gavin and Amanda! I'm still trying to hook up with them.

Fun to meet up with the others. The water flowing away is okay, but like you said, it's just a little odd to see it flowing away. The New River Gorge photos were amazing! Were the trees coated with frost, or was that just the morning light kissing them (or both)?

Awesome videos Alex, on the video "Gavin finds out about my second channel", could I ask the name of the back ground music or the name of the album please.

Love that place! Shot a lot there. Will you be doing a Colorado workshop in the Fall? Did you do the whole loop At Rickett’s Glen? A number of much larger waterfalls are there.

Of the 4 images you wanted an opinion on, I somewhat preferred the first one of the pairs (especially image #2!). I always enjoy your music choices.

I was at the mill at Babcock State Park on October 13th. The colors were wonderful, but the stream was very dry with almost no water coming over the rocks.

Nice pictures. Ricketts is one of my favored park only 1hr. away. What do you think of the hike back up to the parking lot? And how did Gavin do on the way back up? Fall season in Pa was about 2 weeks early this year. October 18 was the best day before the storms that knocking the leaves off the trees. But as you can see the falls were running full on.

Looks like you're using an Osprey bag. Do you have a camera cube in it? How do you like it vs a dedicated camera bag? Have been considering the change as hiking backpacks tend to be better designed for comfort.

I do prefer rectangle over square for some reason. Perhaps years of watching little square tv's being and old bastard and moving to wide tv's. Always been a landscape frame to portrait but socials have forced me into rectangle portraits which I am now enjoying.

Great images as usual! I do have a comment and a question though. The comment is that after seeing your video several months ago about the Maven filters I purchased a set for myself and use them quite often. The question is, why is it that you have your lens hoods installed backwards and never use them?😂

A few observations on that nice waterfall/foliage/swirly pool composition. There's a strong underlying psychological component to why the layman observer/follower up to and including other photographers have a preference for one aspect ratio over another and that is the innate prejudice for the exclusivity of the horizontal for landscapes. I won't go into exhaustive detail and include the long history of classic painting except to mention, natural landscapes spread out and there can be a lot of interesting features over a wide area (hence a horizontal aspect for landscapes comes into play) and portraiture given its more intimate settings, for example indoors in carefully arranged spaces, and the human form being elongate, the face, hands, arms legs and torso all preferring a vertical aspect in order that the main focus is on the person being memorialized. All that hasty and not so eloquent preamble brings me to my FAVORITE of your two images, the vertical one and here's why: Both are fine images, but I find the horizontal one, having all that extra "landscape" of heavy, dark features of water and the bluff sides of the stream and the rocks, has a heaviness to it that robs some of the dynamic nature of the movement of the water among other things. I find the horizontal to be more oppressive for that reason. Now, the vertical with as you say certain elements/features right to the edge of the frame, accomplishes a few things of great compositional merit that deserve exploration. Firstly, those elements can be amplified as if they're saying "LOOK at ME see how wonderful I am." If you have nothing much of importance in the mid frame then powerful visual elements around the edges have no real purpose and the image has no real compositional importance overall. However, your image does not suffer any lack of interest in the mid frame. So now, here we have certain strong elements you mentioned, right to the edge of the frame: The large flat rock in the middle of the stream on the left edge, and the even stronger elements in the top left of the long rocks angling down into the stream and the long dark and strong horizontal of the upper left. First back to the horizontal composition: The strong horizontal elements of the upper left and right lose any great significance or contribution to the overall composition and it all comes down to the entire focus of the composition being a rather featureless expanse of water with the exception being the swirling foam and the jumble of leaves on basically one small flat stone on the mid left edge of the frame. That by itself is not powerful enough to carry or contribute to the overall composition. Overall, it's a good image but I have no strong sense of the dynamic nature of the scene and the feature of the large flat stone in the middle of the stream is completely lost. Now, back to the vertical: The features in the upper frame, the cascade itself and the strong elements either side. Being framed vertically they're even stronger elements as the vertical framing compresses them, squeezing the cascade and giving a sense of dynamism that a powerful and fast-moving stream does as we experience it in person, as observers without being photographers, focused on capturing a moment. That moment in the vertical is more dynamic. The mid frame becomes as important balance wise with the upper frame or the distant frame because the large flat stone on the right now takes on some importance and isn't lost in the image as it was in the horizontal and it serves to focus up toward the cascade for one, and the leaf covered second stone on the left takes on more real estate and becomes a much stronger feature. That is important for several reasons. One it anchors the left with some certainty as if to say here's a limit there's nothing except me, and second it serves as this last barrier to the flow of the water, that dynamic bit of swirling foam. It's as if we're able to feel the excitement and the release the stream feels as it explodes and rushes past that obstacle. Those mid frame elements and the elongated nature of the lower frame of just the rushing and swirling water are much more exciting than in the horizontal, and the overall from the vertical compression of the upper frame being so restrictive as is the narrow passage over which the water cascades, down through the mid frame, becoming a little more liberated, then down to the lower frame where the tension and compression is finally released in a swirling and rushing exultation! Also, there are two very lovely upside-down curlicue question marks beautifully placed in the lower left which I love.

Pano image on the right is my preference. Great video. :)

I like the vertical waterfall that includes more foreground features and gives more depth. Good work on the first swirls. I'm with the majority on the landscape version on this one - feels more balanced. The final shots made up for the bad timing on the mill.

#3 look great 🙂 lots of Applebees in Canada tooo 🙂 I give it about 4/10

Helping out a fan to elevate their photography. I can respect that! Gavin really does need advice and mentoring. Great images, 7,9 and 10 are my favorite.

The portrait orientation of these waterfalls work best for me - great work Alex.

Is that a lime green MeFoto Tripod? I have the same one if it is.

Ricketts Glen is the bomb for waterfall lovers, but the area could use some campgrounds. The park usually fills up and at the time we visited, there were only a couple of privately owned campgrounds and they were nothing to talk about ... they may have improved by now, but they were kind of sucky. And Dude ---- Babcock State Park is right in my backyard! Hope you enjoyed your time in the Wild and Wonderful! 💖

Babcock, that’s where I grew up. Love that place.

Great video and yes that last photos were beautiful 👌

Without doubt, the vertical shot is a more cohesive image. The eye leads though it much better than the landscape one which wants to make your eye meander too much. There's a directness to the vertical comp which just works better.

Wow! That first landscape shot of the swirls is just incredible. Stunning image. I favor the horizontal version. While I don't think it is as strong, I do like the shot of the water flowing away from you.

Alex I loved this vlog so much, your "come along for a ride with me" format is so much fun, and you're always such a good sport supporting your pals and their hilarious shenaigans, keep up the great work, always look forward to your regular content.. safe travels, stay awesome.. oh, and hey - come visit Sydney some time in 2024 please.. I'll take you out on a VIP photo trek of my humble little home town and show you some fun Aussie famous icons..

I was in Ricketts Glen Oct. 10 & 11 of this year. Damn I missed you. We hiked 5 miles & climbed 17 stories seeing most of the 21 waterfalls. I got a good long exposure image of the bubbles circling a waterfall. Nice images. You must have been there the following week in October since you had better fall colors than we had. Great images. If you ever get back to this neck of the woods, maybe check out Conowingo da in Maryland which has Bald Eagles fishing at the dam. Great place to use the 100-500mm lens.

I strongly prefered pic #2. On the swirl pic, I liked the portrait orientation better.

The Babcock Mill is probably the most photographed scene in West Virginia, followed by the New River Gorge Bridge. I live here and still misjudge the timing for fall colors at the mill. The gorge images were 🔥.

Good morning Alex 🌈. Your first "nothing special" photo looked pretty special to me. I thoroughly enjoyed you sharing your thought process when taking the shots. Looking forward to seeing what other shenanigans you get up to.

Nice images! For the ones @ 5:05, I prefer the taller one I think, but it would be like choosing between two children. I do like the down-the-hill waterfall image, but I think I see what you mean. I loved the mill when I was there 20-odd years ago white-water rafting down the Galley and the New River. Getting down into the river with all the stones across it is great too if the water is low enough. West Virginia is the best place I've seen so far for fall color, especially the spot you were at. The images at the end were striking. Was that frost on the branches?

great video. just an FYI for anyone considering going to the grist mill in WV in fall, There is a live webcam feed of the grist mill where you can see what the colors look like around the mill before making the trip there.

#2 vertical waterfall gets my vote. It draws your eye up and into the scene. 🙂

Some great images! Thanks for taking me along!

Careful Alex don't let Gavin get too near to your camera when you are near a river ! Remember what happened to the poor guy with the Pentax ( Tampax ) 😦😂 Great photos ! Thank you !

Images at the end were stunning!

Enjoyable video. However, I couldn't concentrate on the scenery and camera work because my eyes kept moving to that thing hanging out of your nose.

Unbearable music - found something quieter to watch.

I want to share my Post on Gavin's latest video. I know it doesn't appy to this video, and as I will unsubscribe to your channel as I can NOT support photographers who choose to ignore fences. If you felt entitled to climb over the fence to reach the cliff edge, I can't help but wonder how often you chose to ignore fences, signs and trampled plantlife unnecessarily Here is my post to Gavin's video of the two of at the valley before he switched to the swamp. 'I AM FED UP with photographers joining the selfie mob that IGNORE fences for their photos. As I travel I'm seeing huge amounts of damage to plant life and the landscape by crowds of people who ignore signs and fences. I'm not referring to your placement of your tripod over the fence but but you companion who chose to climb over the fence to set up, who I will no longer follow on you tube (Alex Armitage). I'm a bit sensative you might say, but I just returned from an area that has been turned from a beautiful lush green area into a dirt field due to people who chose to ignore the signs and fences. To see them clamoring along the clift edge with tripod in hand, cell phones clutched, climbing over the fences and trampling the plant life You tube presenters need to be aware that their behavior sets the example for far too too many viewers. Other than that, looked life a great adventure !