After Freeman, I wanted to take some pictures within the entrance of Ranard School cave but decided to go back there another day. So after I picked up a much needed decongestant, and called Sean to confirm that Patton cave was indeed where I remembered it. I drove out 446 and found my parking spot. The rain had stopped but it was still rather cool outside. I put on my coveralls, geared up, and hiked down the trail into the Hoosier National Forest. I made pretty good time out to the cave. The hike was quite enjoyable. As I neared the cave, I noticed that there were some people at the head of a nearby ravine. I assumed they were collecting rocks or something. Anyway, I hiked up the ravine to Patton Cave and set up a tripod shot outside the entrance. I took both a profile and landscape shot of me sitting in front of the entrance and then I progressed inside the cave.
About 30 feet inside the cave, I set my tripod up again and prepared for a shot looking out. I positioned a flash to my left and soon was running back and forth to and from the entrance to pose in the picture. I noticed that the right wall of the passage needed some more light so I set up my other slaved Vivitar 285 on a rock to the right and took another shot. It was easy to get the light coming in from the entrance right by just adjust the shutter speed since a very quick shutter speed still caught the light of the flashes.
The decongestant hadn’t quite kicked in yet so I was still feeling a little off balanced. Somehow, I managed to knock my tripod over. Luckily the makers of my camera were bright enough to make the lens retract when it hits something so my camera remained undamaged. Anyway, I set the tripod back up and finally captured the shot I’d been working toward. I repacked my gear in my two dry boxes and traveled deeper into the cave. I began crawling after the passage bent to the right. Not far ahead, I stepped up into a small room. At the far end of the room I noticed a neat profile where a canyon like passage entered on the other side. I continued ahead to check for other photographic spots but found none so I retreated back to the room and set up.
I still hadn’t found my second camera battery misplaced during the Mccullough / River Cave phototrip so when I saw the low battery warning on my camera I knew I’d have to work fast. I turned my camera off and spent a little time thinking through shot and testing the lighting before laying the focusing reflector flag on the ledge to focus on. I set the focus, removed the flag, and set a 10 second delay giving me just enough time to run ahead and climb into position before the camera fired. I took a few shots to make sure I got it right and then took another shot lighting the foreground. I really needed 3 slaved flashes but meshing two pictures together provided the desired affect.
I didn’t feel like touring out the other entrance so I retraced my steps and packed my gear outside the cave. I hiked back to my car pretty fast and stopped at Ryans for dinner before starting before making my social rounds around Bloomington.
Patton
Me posing in front of the entrance to Patton Cave.
Me posing in front of the entrance to Patton Cave.
Patton
Looking out the entrance of Patton Cave.
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Patton
Looking out the entrance of Patton Cave.
I found an interesting passage profile to photograph about halfway through Patton Cave.
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