I happened to go upstairs this morning before my walk, and caught great sunrise photos from our balcony – I then took some more with our home in the foreground …
The Chihuly Collection
Yesterday we drove into St Petersburg and visited this spectacular glass sculpture collection adjacent to the Morean Arts Center – so pleased to see “photography encouraged” at an art gallery, too! Here’s lots of pictures, but really you should go see for yourselves …
Late October Sunset
At least until we move, I can capture great sunsets!
Chasing the eclipse
After leaving Charleston and staying close to I-95 overnight, we headed to Branchville, SC where we’d read it was a recommended but quiet viewing town – but the clouds looked bad and getting worse, so Margaret chose to relocate us to Norway which turned out to be a perfect choice giving us not only clear skies throughout the eclipse, but also a chance to do laundry – and a great lunch stop!
The eclipse was even more amazing than we’d imagined, and I’m very pleased with some of the photos I took (especially considering they are all hand-held / no tripod) … amazing too was how it really didn’t get dark till just a few minutes before totality!
Photographing the Sun
In preparation for next month I tried a bit of Sun photography this morning. A filter is essential both to get reasonable photos and to protect the camera; but a lens filter for my Nikon is more than $100!
Instead I found a very inexpensive (<$20) cardboard filter attachment, and tried it out this morning. I think I need some more practice with exposure settings as there’s no detail in the Sun – but the results are much better than with no filter.
Here’s the attachment, and a no zoom photo without and with the filter:
More interesting, some zoomed in images through the filter; the first image shows how the camera struggles to focus with this filter:
I did also try a “welding glass” as a filter but it’s pretty useless, making the Sun green!
Rainbow!
With Margaret driving us home this afternoon, we watched the rain get heavier while the sun continued to shine – a rainbow formed of course. But as we got back to Independence the rainbow showed really strongly, with a strong second too; we stopped so I could take photos!
I was very surprised to see the rainbow continue “below” the horizon; not sure if it’s a camera glitch or a real effect!
The Bellagio Conservatory (2017)
When we arrived, the conservatory was being redesigned, but now it’s finished. Not all the flowers are in bloom yet, so it’s not at it’s best – but it’s still very beautiful!
