Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Water Is Wonderful!

I got home a little early tonight so that I could go for a walk with my son-in-lay Tommy, and two grandsons, Aizik and Lucas. I let them pick the direction to go, and wouldn't you know it, we ended up down by the community lake. And, wouldn't you know it, I just happened to have my Fujifilm camera with me. Here we are at the West end of the lake, with the setting sun to my back. Notice the nice clouds. Gee, almost seems like I might have planned it this way, huh?



Oh well -- Always be prepared. We continued our walk. Part way around the lake, here is a shot looking back at the setting sun. I tried to frame a couple of trees in the foreground to add some interest. The clouds were looking great.



If you look close in the shot above, there are a couple of decorative light towers in the middle of the lake. As you can see below, I like to position myself so as to line things up in unusual ways. Below, I placed the sun directly behind one of the towers. Not that you really tell from the small shot below, but it adds something to the shot anyway.



I also like to partially hide the sun behind trees and things like that. It also helps the reflection to show up a little better. In a wider shot like this one, the blue sky shows up better too.

Darn those street lights!!! Oh well. Big sigh.



Here is a shot with the sun back in the middle of the lake again. The sky is beautiful. And, I really like the reflection of the tree's silhouettes in the water.



After the sun finally goes down below the horizon, things slowly get a little darker, and the camera can increase the exposure somewhat. And, that allows the reflection of the sky and the clouds to show up better. In the shot below, I rotated the camera into portrait orientation because I wanted to be able to show the clouds higher up in the sky, to show that they were beginning to glow.



But, as below, I generally prefer landscape orientation. So, this next shot was taken right after the one above. Notice that it shows those great street lights again. Arrrggghhh.



And, finally, after a few more minutes, the direct sunlight is no longer shining on the overhead clouds. Even though I really love those extra bright clouds, I also am really fascinated when they take on the soft pink glow as seen below. These soft pink clouds almost form a frame around the shot.



Well, I think it was another worthwhile night. And, I got to go for a walk with the grand kids. Woo hoo!!!