Tulips of Skagit County, Washington

Typically, I write articles on this blog that have to do with information that might help you be a better photographer. Today’s entry is a bit different.

After a great weekend conducting a workshop in Olympic National Park, I drove over to the Tulip fields in Skagit County Washington, about 2 miles north of Seattle. These fields are some of the biggest in the United States. Due to the climate and rain etc., the tulips are quite amazing if you can catch them at peak bloom.

Below is a 14 panel vertical panorama of one of the larger fields!

Though relatively close to my home I have been on the road the past few years and missed the bloom. This year I caught it (and its still going if you are local and want some amazing color!). I was there on a Tuesday and by 11Am the crowds were growing. I can only imagine what the traffic and crowds are on weekends.

As for the tulips, I noticed that there were not nearly as many fields as in the past. Perhaps the growers are making more income growing other crops than tulip bulbs. Some of the nicest fields were inaccessible, closed to the public by the growers. Additionally, there is very little parking on the roads and the local police patrol aggressively.

In any event I made a few interesting images. These all look a lot better on my big monitor, but I thought I’d share a few with you.

The light was flat, overcast and perfect for this kind of photography. However, it became quite breezy as rain was heading in later in the day. I had to use ISO’s of 2ISO 2500 and up. The FUJIFILM”X-T3 has little noise under 8000-10000 ISO–Don’t believe me?–try it!

I have been a FUJIFILM “X” Camera shooter for 6+ years now and I am continually amazed on the performance. I typically shoot one card in RAW ( just in case there are some highlights etc that I need to deal with that might be challenging in the JPEG format), however the images you see here are all quickly processed from JPEG files with my white balance, in camera, set to daylight.

I challenge any other brand to produce images as stunning with minimal processing as what comes out of my FUJIFILM X-T3 camera. Every image (other than the geese in flight—Fujinon 100-400 F 4.5-5.6 LM OIS WR ) were made with the FUJIFILM X-T3, FUJINON 50-140 f 2.8 R LM OIS WR. I used my Breakthrough Photography polarizer as well. The light was so flat the JPEGS were the way to go in order to save a lot of time!

If any of you are on the fence regarding the improvements of the new X- T3 over the X-T2 I can guarantee you there is a substantial difference. I too was a bit skeptical when the X-T3 first came on the scene, but after doing comparison testing, the X-t3 is a major improvement. (FYI—Fujifilm announced another firmware upgrade today that I’ll perform on my X-T3 tonight. CLICK HERE to access the firmware) This is another example of how the FUJIFILM company operates. The improvements in this firmware upgrade are major and ones that could have been incorporated into a new camera, but FUJIFILM keeps delivering… THANK YOU FUJIFILM for making me look good.

Anyhow enough … below are a few images from yesterday. I am posting them a bit larger than normal for this blog for you to see what I was so fortunate to have seen yesterday. These images don’t do the scenery justice, but it’s the best I can deliver! –JG

PS — Check out the final image below–we ran into what I think were perhaps 1000+ Snow Geese in a field while driving. I put on my Fujinon 100-400mm F 4.5-5.6 LM OIS WR with a 1.4 teleconverter and filled the frame when the blasted off. I shot this frame at ISO 10,000 1/480 sec at F 16