Mostly, I like to take my pictures looking in the direction of the sun - that means facing West for sunsets, and facing East for sunrises. But, sometimes the greater beauty is behind you, or beside you, where you may not be looking. The shot below is from last night. In this picture, I am shooting South. The light created a very wispy, pastel look in the clouds. Can you still call it a 'sunset' even though you are not looking at the sun??? Or is it just a 'cloud glow' or something like that?
Today, I had been watching the sky ever since about noon -- nothing but clear skys. Even as late as about 4pm -- nothing but clear skys. So, I figured that I could take the night off. But, a little after 6pm, I looked outside and saw basically what you see in the next shot. To the West were these great clouds already beginning to glow. So, I jumped into my boots and literaly took to running. And I'm glad I did.
In the next two shots, you can see that the sun is about to break beneath the clouds. I almost always shoot these at -1 EV, so that the brighter spots in the picture (like the sun!!!) are not totally too bright. And, this seems to greatly help bring out the colors, as well.
About the time that sun goes down below the horizon, it begins to light up the bottom of the clouds and can create that famous Arizona Orange, as you can see below.
And then, for only a couple of minutes, the sun is positioned just right to shine on the bottoms of the clouds that are overhead. I mean really, God has an amazing sense of the spectacular, doesn't He?
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