Sunrise/Sunset/Sky

Sunset

Cathy called me at about 5:00 today and said there was a nice sunset. When I’m at my computer at work, which is most of the time, I’m facing away from the windows. Also, my window faces north, so I don’t usually see the sunset. This time, there was orange outside my window. I took a few from there but decided this sunset deserved a bit more attention, so I ran downstairs and out into the parking lot. There are trees that blocked the horizon but I still got a pretty good picture of the sky (I wonder if I could get on the roof of my building). What colors!

Sunset

There was a really amazing sunset this evening. Dorothy and I went to Maureen’s house and I had us leave at about 5:00 even though we were not supposed to get there until 5:30. We stopped on the way to take a few pictures and I’m really glad we stopped when we did. By the time we got to Maureen’s the sunset was basically finished. I said to Dorothy, “I left early on purpose so we’d have time to stop for pictures.” She said, “some people make allowances for heavy traffic. My dad makes allowances for sunsets.”

The first picture here, on the right, was taken with my 10-20mm zoom lens at about 17mm and shows a good portion of the sky. The colors were quite amazing. The second one, below, is a panorama made from six vertically oriented images taken with my 100mm. It basically just includes the brightest portion of the first image, right along the ground.

Sunset Panorama

Small Sunset

Some sunsets are grand affairs, filling the sky from east to west with brilliant color. Others, most, in fact, are simple and forgetful, with the sun dropping below the horizon without any special color or fanfare. Tonight was somewhere in between. There was a little color right down on the the horizon but most of the sky was clear and an ordinary blue. But with a longer lens, looking between the trees and our back yard neighbors’ houses, there was still a colorful sunset to be seen. Actually, for about two minutes some very thin, wispy clouds all across the sky lit up with a very pale pink, but the picture of them wasn’t as beautiful as the reality, so this is a picture of the horizon.

Moon After Sunrise

Looking out our back door this morning I enjoyed the view of the moon, as it slowly descended into the west. The sky was a beautiful blue with a few scattered clouds. By the time I left for work, the sky was totally covered with clouds and the moon was no longer visible. It wasn’t as spectacular as a colorful sunrise but the moon suspended in a clear blue sky was still quite lovely.

Evening Sky

There was another beautiful sky this evening. It didn’t turn as brightly colored as it has on occasion but it was still quite dramatic. I found a place to pull off the road where there was a reasonable view of the sky to the westward and took a few pictures. I love these blues.

Sunset

I love it when there are beautiful sunsets on consecutive evenings. Same with sunrises on consecutive mornings. I was at my mom’s this evening and hadn’t taken any pictures today when I got there. I was wondering what I should take and started looking around. It wasn’t long, though, before I realized I’d have a good view out the front door of the house. This was taken from the front steps of mom’s house. Pretty nice, eh?

Sunset

There was a beautiful sunset this evening and I took some pictures from my back yard. One nice things about having fewer trees is that we have a much better view of the evening sky from our kitchen and dining room. This sky was the sort to make it worth while. In addition to the vivid oranges in the sunset, even a clear, deep, blue sky at dusk is beautiful to me. I think that’s one of my favorite colors, the blue that’s almost black.

Storm Clouds Approach

There was rain in the forecast for this afternoon and when I left my building to go to an all-day class I thought about moving my car as well and putting it in the parking garage. I decided not to and by the time we were getting ready to leave it was coming down pretty hard. Thankfully, Albert gave me a ride back to my car. At lunch time I went out on the roof to take a few pictures. The sky was quite dramatic and very pretty at that point. About three hours later, it got dark and the thunder started to rumble. Another hour and the power had gone out and all our computers had shut down.

Evening Sky

After two weeks traveling in England, where finding subjects for pictures was not really an issue, I had a harder time this week. It was back to work and back to my relatively boring schedule. After work Cathy and I went to pick up Dorothy from my mom’s house, where she had spent the day (mostly working on her summer math packet). We stopped at the grocery store on the way home and I took a grand total of two photographs, both of the sky. Here’s one of them. That’s it for today, I’m afraid.

Sunrise, Ocean Isle Beach

One issue that I typically have at the beach is that the house is kept pretty cool and outside it is both warm and very humid. That means that when I go out, especially first thing in the morning, my camera fogs up and I have to wait a while before I can take any pictures. We switched houses for this year and the new house has a room that is not air conditioned. In the spring or fall that room is probably very comfortable but in late July and August it is quite warm. But it means I could leave my camera there and when I went outside with it, the lens didn’t fog up.

Anyway, I went out this morning, long after the sun was actually up, but the picture is still sort of sunrise-like. The beginning of a pretty day.

Sunset Colors

I don’t have a lot to say about this picture, my third posted for July 19. We were stopping to see a friend and this was what the sky looked like as we got there. This was taken with a 100mm lens. The sky was mostly dark at this point and there was just this one small area of color, but what color it was! Wonderful.

Sunset Colors

It’s been overcast all day after a mostly rainy day yesterday. This evening, however, the light turned the most remarkable color. It’s hard to describe what it was like, but later in the day, as the sun started to set, the light out our back windows was the most orangy green I’ve ever seen. It was green because it’s been a very wet summer so far and everything is so lush. But the light had an orangy, pink tinge to it that was absolutely wonderful over that lush green. I ran to get my camera but much of the light had gone by the time I got outside. This picture is looking nearly straight up with a very wide angle lens, and shows the source of the colored light, reflecting off the clouds. It doesn’t come close to doing it justice, so we’ll just have to remember how beautiful it was, although this photo is a small reminder.

Dramatic Sky

It was a very changeable day today, with heavy clouds and impending rain. It did rain a few times but never for very long. We were in Bethesda with some good friends this evening and got back to their house just as the sun was going down. The clouds, which were quite dramatic, parted and exposed some clear sky. This picture was taken looking almost straight up between a pair of trees. There wasn’t much color to the sunset but just a tinge in these clouds.

Sunset Over the ICC

We were coming home from a wonderful dinner with some good friends and the sun was slowly sinking into the west. For most of the way home there are trees along the road and no clear views but as we crossed the Intercounty Connector (MD 200) we got a very nice view. We pulled into the commuter lot and walked up onto the hill next to it, which provided this view. The sun wasn’t visible from here, being behind the trees, but it’s a pretty nice sunset shot, anyway. When preparing this for use as my new banner I trimmed the foreground tree at the right, which I think helps a little, but I decided to give you the full panorama here. This image is made from seven photographs taken with the camera in portrait orientation, 100mm lens, stitched together with Hugin.

Dark Sunset

It was an interesting and ominous sunset this evening. I don’t think I got a picture that really conveys what it looked like, but it’s close. Down close to the horizon it was quite dark in the sky with dark but very red highlights.

I took a few pictures through the trees first. Then I went out into the back yard so I could get a clearer view of the sky. Pretty. It’s nice that sunset will be an hour later after Saturday.

Sunrise

There was a pretty sunrise this morning. I think it was prettier a bit before this picture was taken but it was still quite dramatic by the time we got to the school. This is a panorama made up of five photographs taken with a 100mm lens, oriented vertically, and stitched together using Hugin panorama photo stitcher. It was pretty dramatic, even if not as colorful as some sunrises.

Dramatic Sky

Dorothy was away from Friday evening until this afternoon. When I went to pick her up at about 4:00 PM, the sky had become quite dramatic. It was very windy and I tried to take some longish exposures of tree branches waving in the wind but it was too bright to do that very well. Also, I didn’t have my tripod, which I’d have really needed for exposures long enough to do justice to the movement.

When I turned around, though, and looked toward the sun behind the clouds, I decided that would make a better picture, in any case. So, that’s what you get.

Sunset

We had a pretty sunset this evening. I happened to turn around from my computer at the right time to see this out my office window. Not a huge dramatic sunset but still very pretty, through the trees. In a few minutes it was gone and dark. I’m glad I got to see it.

Sunset

As I came out of my building I could see the sunset colors in the sky through the trees. Rather than take a picture from there, though, and since I had to go pick up Cathy next door, I drove onto the parking garage behind her building. From there I had a pretty good view of the sky and I took a few pictures.

I took a few with the long lens (this is one of those) and some more with the wide angle. The wide angle shots show a lot of blue sky and are pretty, also but I like the color in this one.

Sunrise

It’s been a rainy month. Not particularly cold overall, although there have been some cold spells. Today was balmy and beautiful. The clouds were moving off to the east this morning as I drove the carpool to school. A little earlier than this, the clouds were lit up from below, but I had a car full of students and not a lot of time to stop for pictures. This one is pretty nice, anyway. It was quite beautiful.