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I don't ask for much from others or life, but I was hoping for a nice sunrise on Christmas morning. When I awoke an hour before sunrise, it looked might I might get my wish. I have some pre-planned spots to go to if there's a nice sunrise that depend on the time of year. This is one of them for winter - shooting from a bridge on Route 31, under which Nippersink Creek flows. It's part of Glacial Park, recently also designated Hackmatack National Wildlife Refuge. It was quite cold. The temperature was 20 degrees, which isn't that bad, but there was a wind, and that always compounds it. It was really hard to keep my fingers warm enough to operate the camera, but I managed to get off over 25 different shots as clouds kept moving through at a good clip. I offer them in sequence to show you the kind of Christmas present nature gave me (except for the cold)

I started out shooting the "old fashioned way" with a 4x5" field camera and by creating color transparencies. I then scanned them at either 1200 or 2400 dpi. Every effort is made to match the original transparency. That said, there was a time when I developed cataracts, and scanning and preparing images for this website became difficult. Now that I've had surgery and can see clearly again, some of the images seem a bit too saturated in color. That's because cataracts mute colors. It's like looking through window covered with a film of grime and dirt. The challenge and reward in 4x5" landscape photography is to capture things as they really are, and get the exposure just right. And at over $6 a shot, it pays to be very selective. ...