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Wide River Needs Wide Lens
I knew the perfect place to try the lens out. There was a photo that I’d had in my mind’s eye for years, but I’d never had a wide enough lens to make it reality. I had to wait a few days for some clouds in the west at sunset. I raced to Carlton, Minnesota’s Jay Cooke State Park and the Swinging Bridge. I set up my tripod and looked through the lens set at 10mm. It was too wide! I could see the support cables of the bridge. I zoomed to 14mm…better. Now I waited. Pink highlighted the clouds and I was about to start shooting when some visitors stepped onto the bridge. Well, the swinging bridge swings; not a good thing for long exposures. Finally I had my chance. I’d never been able to get the whole triangular island and both branches of the St. Louis River in the frame before. I set the ISO to 100 and the aperture to f22 to get a slow shutter speed that would allow the water to “flow.” I like the image…and I hope to go back in different seasons.
Blue Mounds Bison
I woke early as raindrops fell on the tent. I have learned that, as a photographer, one should never make an assumption about the weather or quality of light while lying in bed! So, no matter how cozy you are, get up and get out! On this particular summer morning, I was trying to ignore my own sage advice. But I crawled out of the tent and went to check on the bison of southwest Minnesota’s Blue Mounds State Park. A big bull was right next to the fence. What an amazing animal when viewed from an arm’s length away! Power. Wildness. The sprinkles stopped and an orange glow spread across the prairie. All of a sudden, one of those strange dawn rainbows formed. And I was ready.
I can finally capture a rainbow from end to end. You need an equivalent of about 18mm to take in the entire arc (11mm on a Canon 10D). Of course you could always shoot several overlapping exposures and stitch them together in Adobe Photoshop. The problem is that this technique works best with a moderate focal length lens and taking in the height of the arc becomes an issue. You could try and take overlapping vertical images.
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