Sunrise Worship Episode #7
January 29th 2021, Friday
Happy Forking Friday Folks. Wow. I'm so glad I decided 20 degrees without a windchill was warm enough. Once I arrived I realized many people thought that this morning as Pratt beach was full of sun worshipers. The first pano above was shortly after I arrived taken at 6:59am, and the second was as I was leaving taken at 7:24 am.
The preshow was really where it was at this morning. There is no comparison when the reds are ablaze and the clouds appear to be burning. I have about a 5 block walk from my apartment to the lakeshore. When I get to Sheridan I can usually see what might be in store. My pace often changes at that point and today it got a lot faster that last block. Ideally I arrive at least 30 min prior to sunrise. However, in the winter that usually gets cut down to about 15 minutes before. Only because my poor toes. I usually stay until I start to feel them going numb which can be dangerous for me since my foot surgeries and the fact that my big toes experiences significantly less blood flow than the rest. Today it took awhile to get back to feeling and back to normal color. I need some heated socks or some seriously insulated rubbers. The latter will have to wait until income is a thing again...lol
Below is the first video clip from my iPhone 11. Every morning the first struggle is whether I go, the next struggle is how much equipment do I take. I have a dji
mobile stabilizer for my phone but I just don't have hands for it if I'm taking the tripod which I actually did today. So time-lapse coming soon. Hopefully I will be finished with it soon so I can tack it in to this blog post. I need a beach wagon! That way I don't have to carry all of the equipment down there.
Here is another iPhone video with my morning mug in it. Sorry for the speedy panning.
Made a new sunrise friend today! There was a woman who I saw last time I was out who had a drum. She was out again this morning so I had to approach her and introduce myself because last week I took some cool shots that she was in that I wanted to share. I'm a huge fan of community and think it is the answer to so many things. The sunrise community here in Rogers Park is great, I'm always looking to expand it. Of course I had to ask her what sunrise was like for her. As she was giving me a beautiful answer I had an idea! I want to make short video clips of all the Pratt Beach Sunrisers saying why they come out and what it means to them. I think that would be an awesome way to extend my sunrise love and share this amazing community. If you are interested and/or willing please send me a message. Here is a little clip of it, unfortunately you can't hear the drum.
Here is the 17 second clip that I shared to my facebook and instagram. I love the little ducky in it. There were several ducks out but they moving far less than normal. I was wondering if they were partially frozen...lol.
Before it was all over I decided the sky was so beautiful I would cut the time-lapse short and do some pans while I had a moment. A lot of people have been asking about my process and motivation for the pans. There were two specific motivating factors. 1. The desire to do more with my sunrise stuff. 2. I saw a digitally panned image on instagram that I loved. So when I say digitally panned I mean they took a still image and added a panning effect in post. As I am a HUGE ADVOCATE of IN CAMERA obviously I wanted to do something similar but not in post. So for the process. I use an extended exposure my favorite is about 2.5 seconds, a darkening filter on the end of my lens, the camera is on a tripod. I line up the image frame to just outside the sun. Then click the shutter and pan the tripod during the exposure. So the main bright line you see is the actual sun being pulled across the frame and the lighter areas are the reflections in the water. I generally run through the different white balances to get an array of colors. Then my typical lightroom processes added after. In my mind I see these in series' of three on large canvasses.
Ok now for the finished time-lapse. I'm putting the 1 minute one in here. I often do two a one minute and a 30 second. I have found for social media the 30second ones do better. I guess thats the attention span these days. The technical details for the time-lapse are:
1/40 of a second shutter, F9, ISO 125, Canon 7D camera, Canon 70-200 2.8 lens at 95mm. Image capture every second put together at 15 fps with 907 images. I hope you enjoy. Remember what you focus on expands!
