Autumn Porthole, Nisqually Wildlife Refuge, Revisited...

Last year, I took the family for a walk through the Nisqually Wildlife Refuge to shoot some pictures of the autumn leaves. Last Friday, I took my son back through, since he had the day off from school and it was my time to stay home with him. I remembered a certain tree near the entrance of the path that I shot last year, and I wanted to see what the foliage looked like this year. Here's the shot from last year:



Of course, I post-processed that image rather heavily -- too heavily for my tastes now. So, I wanted to shoot it again this year. Here's a couple of shots of that tree as it stands this year:





Hmm, looking at the picture from last year, which was taken about two weeks later than the pictures I took this year, I'm not as convinced the leaves have turned later this year at all. Interestingly, too, the blackberry brambles seem to really be taking over this tree. I shot these bottom ones with my 55-200 VR lens attached to my D1H (the D2H was occupied with the 400mm f/3.5). I'm still amazed that camera works as well as it does.