Lake Metigoshe Summer Scouting | North Dakota

So I photographed a wedding at Lake Metigoshe, North Dakota this past Saturday. However, I went up there the day before to do some location scouting and just familiarize myself with the area a bit more in the summer, since the only other time I had been there was in the winter with my brother. Check out that post here! Quite a bit different in the summer, I have to say, but really really really nice, especially since it was a bit cooler out and some of the leaves are even starting to change. I was also shooting around very near to sunset, so the light was pretty spectacular!

I'll start off with one of my favorite shots though as the header photo, a curious deer wondering what on earth I was doing on his trail! Also, this is going to be a fairly long post, but I LOVE these photos!

All these photos were taken with my Fujifilm X-Pro2 and 50-140 f/2.8, 23 f/1.4, or 16-55 f/2.8. 

Starting out I was trying to find a good location near the lake, but apparently pretty much ALL of the waterfront property is private, so that didn't really happen. I did find a decent ​spot right on an isthmus, but that was about it for on-lake locations (though more on that later.)

I had driven through a couple intense storms on the way up there, and one of them seemed to have caught up to me and gave me some really nice photos!

While still driving around in some of the neighborhoods monopolizing the waterfront looking for good lakeside photo spots I managed to get some really nice photos of some deer on what looked to be a very rarely used trail. With the grass and trees making a nice green tunnel it was a very picturesque scene, and I'm glad that I had a bit longer lens with me. I absolutely LOVE these deer photos!

After this I decided to pay my $5 and head into the State park. As I said I have stayed there before so I had a pretty good idea of a couple good photo spots, and the sun was looking amazing at that time of day, so I got a lot of really good color in the photos. The angle of the sun wasn't the greatest on the lake, but once I got in amongst the trees is where it really started to get good. 

I tend to focus a lot more on the details of a scene with only a few wider establishing shots. That being said I was also looking for good photo locations to put a bride and groom as well, so some of the photos might seem like they are missing something because I was imagining a couple in there. And then others are just nice details in the forest!

Thanks for looking! Really happy with these photos, and while the light wasn't the same for the couple photos from the wedding the next day I am still really happy with the forest vibe that we got even at 1pm!

​Kevin