Posts in category Sunset

Thanks Matt!!

May22nd
2012 2 Comments

Written by Mark

I got a text from Matt Dempsey the evening of May 11th. I was on my way home from work, and he wondered if I was going up to the Lighthouse to shoot the sunset. I told him I was pretty whipped from working, but you never know. He said he’d keep his eyes open for me. I got home and told Kristen that he’d texted me and I knew before I even opened my mouth, what reaction I was going to get from her. “Let’s GO!” We looked up the time of the sunset and agreed we’d need to be there about an hour before that. We zipped up behind the Jackalope, and were barely out of the car when we saw Matt and Bob Bodnar. Kristen called her friend who lives close by, and we all walked down the pier.

We all kept slowly working our way down the pier, keeping the setting sun directly above and, eventually, behind the Lighthouse. As the sun came down, Matt remarked that he should’ve opened the shutters when he was there recently (he’s one of the caretakers, and was recently interviewed by Neil Zurcher). When he said that, Bob and I started the razzing, “Wow! That would have been a GREAT shot if the shutters were open!” We didn’t let up until it was time to go. I just got around to narrowing down the best of the night’s shoot, and wanted to say again, “Thanks Matt!!”

Lake Erie, Lighthouse

Blown Away

Nov7th
2011 4 Comments

Written by Mark

It was a Friday night. It was the first night of my long break, Mike had gone bow shooting, Mar wasn’t home from the college yet. Kristen was flipping channels and I was tweaking some pics, when she asked what time the sun was supposed to set. I checked the weather site and found it would go down at 5:47pm. She said, “We should go up to the lake.” Knowing she was hoping I’d say ‘yes’, but not expecting it, I said,”Go get dressed.” And away we went.

Yes, it was that windy! It was blowing so hard, my eyes were tearing up. So hard, my hat was swept off my head. So chilly, Kristen actually thanked me for making her wear a jacket. THAT’S cold!

Family, Find Your Passion, Lake Erie, Lighthouse, Weather

Sunsets Are Interesting

Jul17th
2011 Leave a Comment

Written by Mark

Just by playing around with the shutter and the aperture, you can really do some slick things with a sunset. So, every now and again, I go back to the Lake and give it another shot.

Lake Erie, Lighthouse, Lorain

Beach Silhouettes

Jun20th
2011 2 Comments

Written by Mark

Mike and Kristen are getting to the age where hangin’ out at the beach is the thing to do. Gettin’ ice cream at K-Cream or DQ is on the list, too. Sometimes I get asked to give a lift. Sometimes Mike drives. Kids are growing fast. Where does the time go? This is from one night that I gave Kristen a lift to Lakeview. She was on one side of the park, I was on the other side (don’t wanna cramp her style, ya know?). Goofin’ with the shutter speed can make some interesting things happen.

Lake Erie, Lakeview Park

Chose the Sunset

Oct5th
2010 4 Comments

Written by Mark

Thanks go out to the 2nd Street resident that gave Loraine a call Monday night. She wanted to know if Loraine could give “Mr. Hawk” a call, you know the “Settlers’ Watch Photographer”, and let him know that a crew was working on taking down the First Energy building on 2nd and Oberlin. As I was going out the door, my Mrs. was coming in from work. She told me to check out the sunset on the way. The colors and clouds I saw while passing Lakeview were too much, and I was dragged in. I knew there wouldn’t be much light left for 2nd Street, so I’ll be going by there this week.

Lake Erie, Lakeview Park

Rejects?

Sep16th
2010 2 Comments

Written by Mark

Quite some time ago, I was ‘chastised’ by Loraine, because I posted a number of pictures that didn’t quite make the cut, as far as I was concerned. Well, a couple of the ‘rejects’ were pretty impressive, in her opinion, which goes to show what I know, sometimes. Shooting anywhere from 20 to upwards of 200 pics per outing, I have to take what I think are the best of the best, because no one wants to see 5? 10? 12? of the same photo, with minor color or lighting differences. That said, these didn’t make my ‘cut’ for the most recent posts, but still looked good by themselves.

Lakeview Park

Time Lapse: Take Two

Jun15th
2010 7 Comments

Written by Mark

I’ve learned a few things in the two times I’ve been out to shoot these time lapse videos. Know what you want in the shot and know where you can actually get that before you set up. Once you get set up and what you want in the viewfinder, LEAVE THE LENS THE HECK ALONE. Ahem, um, yea, like a big dummy, I felt the need to change the scene, thinkin’ ‘it won’t be that noticeable.’ Right. That’s like no one would notice the difference between a cell phone photo and something by Ansel Adams. Also, the difference between 160-some odd photos and 200-odd photos, at this speed, is about half-a-second. So, when next I do this again, and I will, I have to, because I’ve got to get this right, and I want something that I’m absolutely thrilled with, I will have to do a few hours worth of this. So, with that said, here’s what I got and I hope you’re not too distracted by the lens movement to not notice the sky.

Lake Erie, Lighthouse, Lorain

Golden

May31st
2010 3 Comments

Written by Mark

Lake Erie, Lighthouse, Lorain

Time Lapse Sunset

May24th
2010 4 Comments

Written by Mark

While I work on trying to get around the county more, and visit places I haven’t been to I’m trying, in the mean time, to do new things, too, with what I have around me. The PhotoPhun Challenges with Lisa help tremendously, and lead to things like this, which I hope to do more of soon.

One of the things I’ve recently come across, and you can do this with any camera and a tripod, is time lapse photography. You set your camera up on the tripod, with a considerable amount of area in the viewfinder/screen, and you take pictures at regular intervals over a certain amount of time. A video that pushed me to do this involved a little over 1000 photos over 12? hours time. It was set up a little before sunset, and had a lot of cloud activity, and then after the sun set, good detail of the stars and some jet activity, too, and then the sun rising again. It was quite stunning. (There was a setting on the camera where it would automatically take a photo every minute until it was stopped.)

My first attempt was a spur of the moment thing, wasn’t sure if I was going to do it but driving through Lakeview Park, and seeing where the sun was setting, clinched it. So I drove up to Lakeside Landing (I got it, Lisa!!) and parked behind the Jackalope and walked out to Mile Long Pier. I got set up with both lighthouses in the shot, and the sun, of course, and I started shooting every minute for about 12 minutes, and then I started increasing the frequency to 2 shots per minute, and finally to 4-6 shots per minute. I covered about 32 minutes and took about 160+ photos, and reduced it to 20 seconds.

Once I got home, I dragged them all into Windows Movie Maker, decreased the time to about a half-second per view, and a quarter-second per transition. It’s a little rough, but I was fairly happy with the results. I’ve got a better spot to shoot from next time, one where I won’t have to wish hateful things on the teen who felt the need to get his kite into my shooting.

Anyway, hope you enjoy and, I’ve asked before and I’ll ask again, if there are places in the area that you think or know would make a great photo op, that I haven’t visited yet, please leave a comment or drop me a note. There is a lot of traffic that comes through here from all over the country, and even more from the local area. I’m open to almost any and everything. Don’t be shy.

Lake Erie, Lighthouse, Lorain