The McDonald Observatory and Guadalupe Mountains National Park!

 McDonald Observatory and the Milky Way

 Last weekend I traveled to El Paso, Texas to participate in my final art festival of the year. Weather for the festival turned cold, windy, and even icy, but the two days I photographed prior to the festival were great. The weather was warm with little wind and the clouds vanished after sunset for my first stop at the McDonald Observatory near Fort Davis. I had driven all day from my home in mostly cloudy conditions but it seemed the farther I drove west the clearer the skies became. My last minute decision to go photograph the observatory paid off. Skies cleared at sunset and a gorgeous Milky Way was clearly visible once all signs of the sun were gone. I was also pleasantly surprised by the red glow coming out of the observatory. I could barely make it out with my eyes but a long exposure made the red very obvious in the photographs.

Guadalupe Reflections #2

 After photographing at the McDonald Observatory, I drove 80 more miles to Van Horn and finally stopped for the day. After shooting a few things in Van Horn the next morning, I drove to Guadalupe Mountains National Park. The first thing I did when I arrived was to scout out the salt flats west of the park. I had heard that there was some flooding back in September and I also remember seeing pictures of the mountains reflected in a large lake. Sure enough part of the salt flat was now a very large shallow lake. My plans for the evening were now to come back at sunset.
 

 Guadalupe Sunset

After driving back to the park, I spent most of the afternoon hiking in McKittrick Canyon. GMNP has a lot of maple trees growing in the canyons and the fall color can be spectacular. Unfortunately, I already knew that I was about two weeks past the peak. Many of the trees had already lost their leaves and the rest were soon to drop. Peak color or not the hike is still very pretty. After the hike it was back to the flooded salt flats. Conditions could not have been better. The winds totally died and a few clouds pinked up at sunset.

 

 The Light From Within

Before starting my final drive to El Paso I had one more image I wanted to create. Just down the road from the salt flat was some abandoned buildings. I set up the tripod and set the camera for 30 second exposures. This gave me enough time to fire a flash with a colored gel several times during an exposure. I had planned to combine parts of several exposures but decided the light on this single exposure worked just fine.

Sooooooooo...after two pleasant days of photography just how bad was the weather for the art show? Well, the weather changed dramatically on Friday. During the show on Saturday and Sunday it was windy and the temperature never reached 40 degrees. I also knocked some snow and ice off the roof of my tent Sunday morning. That is the first and hopefully the last time I have to deal with that. I did manage to sell a few pieces despite the less than favorable conditions. Overall, I would consider it a successful trip to west Texas.

Shooting star over the Dallas skyline!

I had made a mental note in the back of my head that the next time the river floods, I need to go shoot the Dallas skyline and the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge reflected in the Trinity River. After the Dallas area received more than 4 inches of rain Tuesday night and Wednesday I decided I better head downtown for sunset. The river was definitely flooded but the lights on the new bridge were not turned on. Bummer! I decided to aim the camera at the downtown skyline and not worry about the bridge on some of the shots. The bridge looks so much better with the lights on and I could have really got some sweet shots had it not been sitting off to my left in the dark. Not the end of the world though. My archives didn't have an image of the Dallas skyline reflected in the Trinity River so I decided this was a good time to get a few. I was doing my usual thing, shooting 4 or 5 bracketed exposures of each scene. During a 13 second exposure I see something flash like a firework and then I see the shooting star streak down the sky, right in the middle of what I am photographing. Damn! How cool was that!
Quite honestly, I'm not sure if the picture does the shooting star justice. I like the photo just fine but I wonder if you would know what the streak was if I hadn't told the story. Feel free to give me your thoughts on that. I will probably never get another photograph of a shooting star in the skyline, but just in case you are listening up there  "could you bring it in at a 45 degree angle next time?"

An evening in Fort Worth!

Water Gardens

Fridays rain had stopped and it looked like we may have some nice light and clouds around sunset as I headed to Grand Prairie to pick up Gary yesterday. When I got to his house I could see that a line of cloud cover was already over Fort Worth and overcast skies was the kind of light we were going to have for our shoot this evening. We got some good shots from the Water Gardens and the Modern Art Museum but I do think a deep blue sky might have improved our images.

Omni Hotel

The Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth

Sometimes you just have to keep going back!

Entry to the Corner Pocket

I got together with my friend Mike Pittenger to go photograph in the rain last night. The afternoon had been gray and drizzly and I felt we could get some good reflections in the streets after dark. We drove through nearby Wylie,Texas looking for some interesting things to shoot. A few pixels were used up but nothing terribly exciting came of it. I decided we might try the Square in Garland. I know I keep going there to shoot but when conditions change like this you can create images not possible when it is dry. Good subject matter can be shot in a variety of ways. I also knew Mike had not seen the theater and it would give him a chance photographed it. When we got to the square the streets were dryer than I would have liked. It had only drizzled a little in the last two hours. Mike had some fun shooting the theater and I got a nice one of the entry to The Corner Pocket. We called it a night and we headed back to his place to get my truck.
 I stopped to get something to eat on the way home. I noticed it was raining quite hard outside now. Eat fast.  Bring me the check. Rain has let up. I need to get back to the square. The streets were much wetter when I returned and much stronger reflections. Below is one of numerous compositions that I took from an assortment of puddles that I was able to work with.

Plaza Theater in the Rain #3

I thought I would included this last image. It is the darkest of the four exposures which were combined to make the final image above. If I was still shooting film this is probably close to what I would have had to use as my image of the reflections. It is dark enough to retain some detail in the bright marquee but it leaves everything else much darker than what my eyes could see. Some people seem to think digital is sooooo easy. The truth is that you need to have quite a bit of software skills in order to get the above version instead of what is below. Just thought I would throw that out there.