Space and Space Problems

I've put up pictures of two very unconnected, but still fun photo projects I did recently. They were both fairly new for me, and out of my comfort zone (one because I'd never done it before and the other because it was too damn early), but I think the results were good. Hope everyone enjoys!


All pictures taken with an Olympus E-620 and Zuiko 9-18mm f/4-5,6, 14-42mm f/3,5-5,6, or 70-300mm f/4-5,6 lenses, except where otherwise noted.

Transit of Venus

I've had several interesting photography opportunities in the past week or so, some of which panned out, and some of which didn't. Attempting to shoot the full moon rising over the bay, for instance, was a miserable failure (damn clouds), while yesterday's sunrise outing was relatively successful, even though I'm still tired.  One particularly fun opportunity I had, though, was photographing the transit of Venus. I've never done solar photography before, but I figured I didn't really want to wait until 2117, so I decided to make an effort. A friend of my dad's happens to own an observatory along the western coast of the Leelanau peninsula, so he naturally decided to host a Venus-watching/beer drinking party. I suspect the latter may have overshadowed the former (except for me, because I was taking pictures and, well, driving), but it was fun nonetheless. 
I didn't have a solar filter, so I was more or less going in blind (no pun intended). Shooting through the eyehole of the gigantic telescope of the observatory didn't really work out, so I had to resort to using a telephoto lens and some eclipse glasses someone happened to have brought along. The result was probably the least attractive jury-rigged solar filter ever:

Taken with my phone- sorry for the bad quality!

Thankfully, this combination of masking tape, eclipse glasses, and wishful thinking actually worked out, and the results weren't nearly as bad as I thought they might be.

If you look closely, you can even see sunspots- success!

Not Venus, just my dog enjoying the last rays of the transited sun.

Why Does the Sun Have to Rise So Early?

I've been meaning to do some sunrise shots for a while, but my work schedule is such that I never really feel like being up that early. Yesterday morning, I decided to finally bite the bullet and get up to see it. Unfortunately, even at the western edge of the time zone the sun still insists on rising before 6 AM, which means I had... A less than sufficient night's sleep. Granted, I could have gone to bed early instead of going dancing in the City, but that wouldn't be any fun, would it?

Anyway, I managed to drag myself out of bed and race across the county to get to the spot I wanted to try out sunrise pictures. I was kind of anticipating some intense mist like we usually have here, but upon arriving at Bass Lake, a small lake a fair ways away from my house, I found out that it was completely mistless, so I relocated to Little Traverse Lake, a ways back up the road, racing against the sunrise. After some walking through a grassy field that turned out to be a lot colder and wetter than I really expected, I made it to the lake. The mist was great, and the colors were beautiful. I may have snuck onto several peoples' docks to get out into the water, so my deepest apologies to the people whose property I trespassed upon (although you should know that your front yards have an absolutely beautiful view in the morning).

I'm always one to make really stupid mistakes when I do important photo shoots, and this time it was to have left my memory card in the card reader back at home. Thankfully, I had to smaller cards to use, but they weren't nearly the capacity I wanted. The nice part was that it forced me to be more selective with my pictures. The annoying part was that i didn't have the $#%@ing space to take enough pictures. Gah. 

Space problems regardless, it was a successful, albeit cold, wet, and early photo outing. The light was great, mist is fun to photograph, and I got to see the first good sunrise I've seen in months. I'll be making a road trip to Minnesota tomorrow to pick my mother up after a bike tour, so there may or may not be some interesting pictures coming after that!

Until then,

-Forest