Atmosphere; An McF Studios Series

Groggy and cold is now way to go through life. It's not even a good way to make a living. All the jobs I've had that required me to be present, lucid, and feigning interest at early-o'clock began as someone else's idea. The story about these tree images isn't any different. Sitting at the desk before dawn in January, I got an email from my girlfriend that read, "Get off your ass, it's really beautiful outside." Knowing that she hates the cold, I rushed out with the camera and two lenses, a 50mm and an ultra-wide. Shivering along the drive, my head started comparing places close by that might pair well with the fog. Had to be close, I was six minutes ahead of the sun, but the fog was really thick. I wanted trees and space. No space in town, but there are a few great trees in City Park, so that's where I headed. I started fantasizing about trees hit with god-beams while all around was fog and light. You get what you get. Everything was muddy, mediocre, dull. OK. Walk around shooting a few exposures, check the histo, change a lens, check again. Got it. Shoot the 50mm at f/1.4 min, f/2.8 max which will provide all the separation I need. Composing with the 50 also controls the distortion... ain't none. Just gotta keep picking up the sticks and moving until it's perfect. After that, I'm goin' full HDR baby. I shot 9 stop brackets, but only needed three. Had the intent of doing black and white, but when I saw the first return on the LCD, I wanted the little bit of colour because it increased the separation I was there to capture. Sometimes you just get lucky. Yeah... LUCKY! Today, I got lucky a lot. Lucky that the light was there. Lucky that I found an easy subject. Lucky that the means met the idea. Lucky for the girl who got me goin'. Not a bad day by my standards.
(the rest of this series is available at Flickr, enjoy)