Morning Photos

As the world turns and as the stomach churns, my body and I have been slipping into a new phase, one of which I'm not always totally appreciative. I speak of my new found early to bed early to rise proclivity. I find myself fading by 10:30 these days, but going to bed that early means that I am waking, literally, with the birds — anywhere from 5:00 to 6:00 as a rule. The other morning, I was found heaving myself out of bed at 4:30. Sometimes, I try to get back to sleep, and sometimes it works. Sometimes, I just give up and get up. This puts me the position where I am dead tried by 10:00 or so the next night. I may try to stay up and read in my easy chair but tend to find myself succumbing to the gentle arms of Morpheus.

I'm not exactly complaining because I do tend to be getting 6 to 7 hours of decent sleep, and that hasn't always been the case in what passes for my little life.

In the event, I made the decision to try to use that time better by trying to get out to take pictures. We are told that dawn and dusk are the golden hours for photographic light, so I thought I might as well give it a whirl. Following are a few images from my first two early morning shoots. For all I know, my sleeping habits may change, and the will be the only two early shoots since, traditionally, I have not been a morning kind of guy. We shall see.

My first stop, below, was to catch the sunrise over a misty field near us. The mist picked up the rays very nicely. (Note: if you click on one photo, you can it in a somewhat larger view and then easily proceed onto the others from there. The first one in particular is best viewed large, and this link leads to an even larger version on my Flickr site.)

Then it was off to photograph our train station (above and below). By getting there early, there were no cars in the way, and by using my wide angle lens, I was able to get behind the distracting signage, poles and wires out front. The track was pulled up in 1990 but the station still gets used by other local groups.

On the second morning I drove around town, not quite knowing where I would end up. As it happens I ended up spotting an old barn on the edge of town. It's so close to the town-township boundary that I'm not sure which side of the line it is on. The first shot sets the scene while the second is a closeup of the barn.

Is it bedtime yet?