After Sunset

Seagulls wading the surf shortly after sunset at Robert Moses Beach

The beauty about photography is that you never know what to expect and rule #1 is to always keep an open mind. I have come to learn that if I have any type of preconceived notion of what sort of picture I want to capture, I more often than not fail miserably. This might be especially true for landscape photography, where you can never 100% predict the weather, the clouds, the wind and the lighting conditions resulting from all of the above. I came to shoot what looked like a promising sunset, yet ended up being bland and boring and disappearing half way through behind a thick layer of haze. Yet the light reflected beautifully in the sand once the sun had set and those gulls just made for perfect models.

Stark

Bare branches at dusk, starkly silhouetted against a cold yet beautifully colored winter sky

I ventured out on one of the coldest days of the season to date with entirely different intentions, namely to capture a picture of the Big Duck in it's Holiday dress. I passed my turn-off and ended up turning around at a this dead-end street overlooking Flanders Bay. I was enchanted by the evening sky and picked this tree to provide a focal point. Goes to show you that you never know what to expect. The Big Duck pictures didn't come out at all, but this one's fast become one of my favorite landscape pictures of all of 2011!

All My Swans in a Row

Swans heading into the setting sun

Suffering from a bout of cabin fever after yet another snow storm moved through the area, I headed out for snow pictures in Gardiner County park as soon as the roads had been somewhat cleared. I arrived at the bay just around sunset and some remnants of dark storm clouds were still lingering in the western part of the sky. A lot of swans were hanging out along the eastern part of the beach, and as dusk started to fall, they suddenly began heading towards the shore. This group flew for a short stretch and my heart just stopped when they suddenly settled right on the darkest part of the water in a perfectly straight line. I had to run to catch up and wasn't looking where I was going, and ended up crashing through the frozen slush at the edge of the bay. But in my opinion, this shot was worth my cold wet feet ten times over :)

Silver Lining

A sliver of light and color at the end of a drab and stormy early December day

I know it's been a while since I've been posting one of those ocean shots, but once in a while I just have to sprinkle one in...Here, the storm clouds gave way to a small band of orange at the end of the day. I just loved the speck of otherworldly red in the sky, but oh boy was it cold! I specifically drove down with tripod and all my gear to take photographs, and this is the only (& handheld) picture I took before running back to my car shivering like crazy!

Goosed

Geese settling in for the night on the Nissaquogue River

As much as I often curse life in suburbia, sometimes I cannot help but feeling enchanted by the many beautiful spots which still remain and continue to defy the steadily progressing development of Long Island. This was a chance encounter with some geese and some magical evening light, and although I did not have my tripod handy, I simply had to stop and take a shot.

Merry Christmas 2008

Montauk Lighthouse dressed for the holidays

For the first time in 211 years, the Montauk Lighthouse at the Eastern end of Long Island's South Fork is decorated for the holidays. As soon as I heard about it, I made plans to drive out there and take some pictures. It really looked beautiful and for those of you who received a Christmas Card from me this will look familiar. I am wishing everybody a wonderful Christmas. Here's my personal Christmas wish to everybody who sees this. Amid all the frenzy, the shopping, the food overload and gifts, lets take some time out to remember that Christmas is really and truly about love! Merry Christmas to all!

Setting

Sun setting between dunes

It's been a while since I've posted here and it's been a while since I posted one of those ocean shots, so hopefully, I'll get away with it. I felt as if I was just on a roll, when some horrible injury befell my beloved Black Lab Boris. It's called "Fibrocartiligous Emboli" or FCE for short and basically paralyzed his hind legs. Thankfully, in his case the prognosis was good and 5+ weeks later, he's made an astonishing recovery. But for the longest time, I couldn't take him along on my photo excursions and it simply felt wrong to leave him behind, therefore I didn't really go anywhere at all. But now that he's much much better, our first outing was to our beloved beach, and although some stupid park rangers prevented me from taking him all the way down to the water, I managed to take some poster shots of the sinking sun. It really was a nice sunset, and that dune grass helped a lot to prevent the usual overblown glare. The clouds were pretty cool too!

Smoked

Lone cloud system moving past "Short Beach" by Smithtown, NY

Do you guys know the feeling? Sometimes there's just nothing to photograph. You haven't been anywhere interesting, the weather has been blah for days and the sky is white whenever you have some time to spare. That's how it's been for me lately, but today I was determined to capture something somehow with my camera. I went to an odd and out of the way place I found on Mapquest, just out of curiosity. It didn't look like much with the white sky and all. In the very far distance I spotted what I presumed to be a tiny cloud. After walking around for an hour and unsuccessfully trying to shoot gulls, I noticed that the "tiny" cloud started to obscure the sun and was actually quite the dynamic formation. I sat down in the sand and waited for it to move across the water. When it finally did, I took this shot. Not one of my best but I feel like it was at least worth the wait. What surprised me was how the light changed instantly the moment the clouds moved in front of the sun. It was bright afternoon light before and suddenly it looked like sunset an hour ahead of time.

No Lifeguard On Duty

Lifeguard Station at Robert Moses Beach

Closed for the winter, these beach buildings are looking peaceful and pretty in the evening glow

Blasted

Sun blasting through sky, wind blasting my face

And I thought yesterday was cold. You have no idea... The temperature was "only" 32 degrees, but the wind chill, at gusts (and steady blows) of 50 mph, I don't want to know. But it was worth it. Was out all day shooting pics and this one, just before sunset, is my favorite. Eyes were watering and ears were ringing, I am surprised it came out as well as it did!

Game Over

Deserted Game Table at West Point Beach

Abscence seems the essence of this shot yet again. I seem to gravitate toward these lately, although it's not too hard to find deserted places on Long Island's waterfront during this time of the year. I am surprised this shot came out - the air was quite frigid and the winds just brutal. I had the hardest time to keep myself from shivering and holding the camera steady. Ah yes, I finally picked my camera up from Nikon this afternoon!

Footsteps

Footsteps in the sand at Robert Moses Beach

Although the evidence of people present prevails, the beach was deserted during my sunset walk. You can tell that it has gotten colder by the sight of shoe prints as opposed to bare feet.

Lonely

Stony Brook Harbor at Sunset

I don't know exactly what this area is called but I love this shot. It was taken from a promenade at the historical district of Stony Brook Village right before sunset and the light was just right. Love the way the grass glows!

Sundown

Oyster Bay boats shortly after sunset

Unfortunately this photos isn't all that sharp but it's all I've got for today. Went to the Oyster Festival being held this weekend and was hoping for some fun shots but no, it was waaaaay too crowded and manic to put me in photo mood.. I found this peaceful evening scene at the harbor once I had fought my way through the crowd just after sunset. This, by the way is looking east. Still, the sky was impressive!

Triple Play

After 3 days of numerous restarts and unsuccessful attempts to get my computer to see my card reader, camera or scanner, I finally just turned the darn thing off for the afternoon. And voila, tonight it's working again. Since I couldn't post for the past two days, tonight will be a triple play. Enjoy!

A father and son watching the sunset after a day of fishing

This was taken at the Cedar Beach Marina on Ocean Parkway. I particularly liked the floppy fisherman's hats those two were wearing.

Land's End

After a long stretch of warm and sunny days, rain and fog are moving in during the evening hours, turning the sky a pale gray as in this shot from the Lindenhurst fishing pier

Sun and Shade

One thing I will never tire of is taking pictures on the beach. Each day looks different and Long Island has some of the most beautiful light I have ever seen. This one's strange because a huge cloud blocked the beach from the sun, but the sky was still full of light.