Even MORE Pictures from Last June!

In my last posting, I said that I would show what became of the cloud bank that was above and to left of the cactus. So ...

In that last picture (in the last posting), the clouds behind the cactus looked nice, but normal. By zooming in for a closer look, the clouds took on a very pink appearance. This color was unexpected, and didn't really show up until I took this closer shot.



In just a short while, the sun went below the horizon, and the tops of the clouds above the cactus turned a wonderful orange. I love the shape of those clouds. Another thing that I really like in this shot is red glow on the horizon in the lower right corner, which is where the sun went down.



And, a little bit later still, and the overhead clouds turned red. Also, notice the sky shadows being cast by the clouds.



But, now I'd like to back up a little in time to just before the sun went down. This next shot shows rain falling from the cloud to the west. But, as it frequently does here in the desert, the rain never reaches the ground. You can see the wind causing the rain to fall at an angle.



And finally, here is a shot that I really like. I love shots where the sun looks quite large as it goes down, partially behind the horizon. But, look right above the sun -- you can see the rain falling, but not making it to the ground.

Still More Pictures from Last June!

Here is another installment of that special June evening. At the end of my previous post, I showed some cactus being silhouetted as the sun broke through below the clouds. If you look closely at those last pictures, you can see two Saguaro cactus in the foreground - a small one closer to me that has no arms, and the larger one with arms farther away. Also note the position of these two cactus relative to the sun.

The first shot below makes these cactus look quite strange. I've repositioned myself so that the sun is directly behind the larger cactus. What's happened here is that, coincidentally, the smaller cactus happens to be in a straight line with the sun and the larger cactus. And, yep, it makes the cactus silhouette look strange.



As the sun sank further down, there was yet another bank of clouds for it to pass behind. The following three shots show the sun disappearing behind these new clouds, and then reappearing once again. There are also some rays and cloud shadows in these shots that I just love.







Finally, here is another wide-angle shot, repositioning my self to once again show the two cactus in separate silhouettes. In this shot, notice the cloud bank just above and to the left of the cactus. In my next posting, I will show what becomes of this cloud bank.

More Pictures - Later Post!

OK, as I mentioned in the last post, I would present more of the photos from that special night of last June that started off with the unusual cloud formation. By the time I had driven to my target destination for the night, I could tell that it was going to be a very special night, indeed. Here is a little closer view of the sun rays beneath the clouds.



I believe that I have mentioned this in the past, but, it's worth mentioning again -- it's not always what's happening in front of you that's photo worthy! Sometimes you just have to look behind you. This is sometimes difficult to remember when you are shooting the sunset because your target is obviously right in front of you.

But, with a partially cloudy sky, some of the terrain behind you may be in direct sunlight while other areas are in the shade of the clouds. Depending upon the terrain, that may make for some beautiful photos. So, remember to look behind you!! Make sure to click on the following images to see a larger version so you can see more of the details of the mountains.





As you can see in the first image in tonight's post, the area below the clouds has an interesting orange glow. Zooming in reveals the nice mountain shadows.



After waiting long enough, the sun finally broke through beneath the clouds. By this time, I had repositioned myself, putting some delightful cactus between the sun and me. In the following three shots, I zoom in a little more each time, to change the composition of each picture. Take a close look at the top of the cactus in the last shot below, and the second shot above of looking behind me. The stuff that looks fuzzy on top is the cactus in bloom. Pretty cool.







If you have been following some of my earlier posts, you can tell that I was using the Fujifilm camera. This is obvious from the radials that shine out from the bright sun.

That will pretty much cover it for tonight. But, there are sever more special photos to discuss from this same night. So, 'till next time ... God bless!!

Unusual Clouds

Here are some photos, again from last June. As I left the house on this particular evening to go out to take pictures, I was stunned by this cloud formation. Before I even got in my car to head to the destination of choice, I had to start taking pictures. And, as I was driving along, I just had to stop several times along the way to take more pictures.

I really loved the clear blue sky above, the light fluffy cloud on top, the dark menacing cloud below, and the bright sun's rays. This first shot was taken from right in front of my house.



This second shot was taken just around the corner from my house.



The next two shots were taken just a short distance further along.





Finally, I arrived at my desired destination. The following shot shows what I saw when I looked back to the west.



Now, here is the really good news -- the above shots were just the beginning of a really great evening. To see more of these unusual cloud shots from the beginning of this evening, check out the web album at Unusual Cloud Formations. I'll write about more of the pictures from this special evening in a later post.

Cactus and Contrails

I'm still working on getting the June '08 photos uploaded to my Picasa web album. It takes a lot of time to go through all the pictures in the collection, select the ones to upload, and process them to add my watermark. The actual act of uploading is the quickest, simplest step of them all. Google's Picasa makes that step extremely easy.

I haven't been out to take any new photos for a couple of days, which usually gives me a little more time to play catch-up. So, here are a few of the photos I've recently uploaded. The first shot here is a rather simple sunset, but I think that the multiple cactus make it interesting.



Two days later, the sunset started out like shown below. I like shots that show the sun as a big round ball, especially when a portion of it is hidden. If you take a close look at this shot, you can see something else that intrigues me - the bushes in the foreground directly below the sun are softly glowing against the mountains in the background. It amazes me that sometimes, even though all the rest of the foreground looks completely black, that plants that are within a very close distance from the ball of the sun, show up quite clearly.

Actually, when I get almost all of my sunset photos onto my computer and examine them, I find that if I increase the brightness of the entire picture, I can see the details in the foreground. So, the camera is actually capturing more details than shown up in the normal picture. Of course, when I brighten the entire picture like that, then the sky and the sun look way too bright. So, I typically leave the pictures darker. After all, I like the silhouette look.



And, here is a shot a little bit later after the sun had gone down. Yup. Those are contrails, which I find rather fascinating when they are glowing with the sun shining on them. My question is, "Where are all those planes going, anyway???"



These last two shots were taken by the side of the road on my way back home yet a couple of days later. The camera that I had with me on this day was the Panasonic Lumix DMC-LZ75. This camera has always taken great photos, has a 6x optical zoom, is very convenient to keep in my briefcase.





The only down side to this camera, and those like it, have to do with looking into, at, or toward the sun!! The only viewfinder on point-and-shoot cameras like this is the LCD display on the back of the camera. When you hold a camera like this between you and the sun, you find yourself squiting so much that it is very difficult to see any details on the LCD.

On the other hand, the Fujifilm camera that I always carry with me now is quite a bit larger, but, in addition to the LCD on the back of the camera, it has a small LCD built into the viewfinder, that acts like the viewfinder on an SLR camera, except that you are not actually looking through the lens, but only at the LCD inside the camera. Holding the camera up to your face in this way, blocks out the sun, and allows all the detail to be seen in the viewfinder.

Sometimes a Surprise

Here are some more shots from last June. The night started off with out a lot of clouds in the sky. I've said it before, but, I'll say agan that I like the sun when it is peeking out from behind a cloud like this.



After taking the above shot, I went on up the highway about a mile to a place with some cactus up on the side of a hill. By this time, the sun was nearly down. At this point, the clouds look pretty much the same as they did earlier.



But, this was one of those nights where the clouds surprised me. Two things began to take shape. One, the upper bank of clouds took on an eerie glow. And, two, the lower bank of clouds, that I really didn't even now was there, began to show some streaks.



Here is a closer look at the lower bank of clouds. They took on a wonderful golden glow.



This next shot is a wider view again, and shows the very unique glow in the upper bank.



And, next is what the sky looked like after the sun was long gone. I love the soft change in the colors from orange into purple.



Finally, here is a shot from three nights later. Again, not a lot of clouds. I just found a spot between some bushes to add some foreground interest. I like the wispy look of the clouds. I think it looks like the sun is behind some of the clouds, and in front of some of the others. Of course, that's not too likely!!



To see more of these shots, visit the June album.

Sundown at Church (and Palm Trees)

It's likely that I'm getting carried away with today's posting. I've been a little too busy lately, and so it's been a while since I last made a post. And here are a few (probably too many) shots from last Thursday night.

I had to be at Church that night for a meeting that was going to start at 7pm. And, wouldn't you know it -- the sun was going to go down at about 6:57!! What a (wonderful!!) coincidence.

I was actually going to grab a bite to eat and do a little shopping on my way to Church. But, when I noticed the sky, I bypassed that and made a mad dash straight to Church. I've been trying to get some great sunset shots around our Church for a long time now. But, to do that, you need to be there when the sun is going down. (Well, duh!) I now live about 40 miles from our Church, so being there at sundown is usually a little inconvenient. And, on those nights when I've needed to be there, we haven't had any really good sunsets. Until last Thursday.

We have several very tall palm trees around our Church property. And, palm trees make great silhouettes.



Here is what the buildings and trees look like. This shot is looking North-East, so the sun is behind me. This only shows some of the palm trees -- there are lots more around.



I parked my car and walked around the property at least five times. Every time around, the sun and clouds looked different, and so I took lots of pictures. In the following shots, I really like the look of the the bright spot being right behind the cross. It gives these shots a rather antique look.





And I kept walking around. And, I really love the palm trees.



Here is kind of a soft shot, with the bright spot of the sun out of the picture.



And then, here is a shot repositioning my self to place the sun so that it is shining through the bell tower. I really like the radials that the Fujifilm camera makes in these cases.



And again at a slightly wider angle ...



Here I am back around the front of the Church again. I think that due to the way the buildings face, sunrise pictures would look best. But, let's see, that would mean that I would have to get there before the sun comes up. And, remember that I live about an hour away. And the sun is now coming up at about 6am. And, if I left the house at 5am, I really wouldn't have much of an idea of what the sky was going to look like because it is still quite dark. Not to mention the fact that I'm still in bed at 5am. Oh well, I think that sunsets will just have to do. OK, maybe some day???



Back around the rear of the buildings again, and the sun is behind a cloud, shining out both from the top of the cloud and the bottom. Notice the birds in flight?



And, again the palm trees. Notice the cross?



Here is a rather simple shot that I really like, showing the cross against the pink clouds. Simple, but nice. This is taken from the rear of the Church, but, if I didn't tell you that, you probably would never know, even if you were a regular attender at our Church.



Here is a shot that took me by surprise. On another trip around the property, I came around front and noticed that the sunset was being reflected by the windows above the main entrance. No, that is not light coming from inside the Church, but from outside. Now, we may like to the think the the Light lives within the Church walls. But in reality, the Light comes from above, and actually lives within God's people!!



And one final shot from the rear. The sun has gone down, and there is a completely different look to the sky.



I'd like to think that these shots bring a little more praise and glory to God, the one who made it all. And, putting one of His houses of Worship into the pictures, just seems to add something.

By the way, if you would like to see all of the pictures from this night, please come and visit my web album at Sunset At CCN