Flying Santa comes to Scituate!

Yesterday Santa made a trip to Scituate, no not by sleigh, train, boat, but rather helicopter!  More information can be found at the Friends of Flying Santa website, and if you have some time you should read the history portion as it is actually really a cool thing!

http://www.flyingsanta.com/Mission.html

I'm hopeful that we might see some snow before the holiday, as I have a few shoots in mind that I think would be awesome!  In the mean time I might try and sneak out and get a few more shoots in the next few weeks, I do have a lot to do in order to get ready for the holidays!  As you can imagine this involves a fair amount of printing etc....  One other thing that might be on the horizon is greeting cards!  With the help of a friend I have looked into greeting cards, which will be available shortly if it works out!  I'm getting some I hope by Tuesday of this week and I'm going to attempt holiday cards for the family!  These won't be available this year, but I hope to have them for sale come next Heritage Days!

 Flying Santa #1

 Flying Santa #2

 Flying Santa #3

 Flying Santa #4

 Flying Santa #5

Flying Santa #6

Starting to look like Christmas

I was out and about yesterday and like anytime I go down through the Harbor I always take a look out toward the lighthouse how could you not?  It by far and away is my favorite spot to just go and get away from all the stress that life brings! Sometimes people say why are you such a weather nut, I mean who likes cold and snow!? Well I do and most know that, but it is really something special to go down to the lighthouse during a storm, I recommend going at night for the best effect! Just take a moment or two and take it all in, the sound of the powerful winds and surf crashing along the coast and the snow hitting you in the face what could be better! Well to many I guess a lot of things but to me, well it just does not get any better!

The point of this post however is why it might not feel like Christmas yet, it is starting to look like it and the lighthouse has been decked out for the holidays! I like how it is nothing crazy just 2 simple wreaths!

 Scituate Light Christmas #1

 Scituate Light Christmas #2

 Scitaute Light Christmas #3



Heading Into Winter!

We are finally rounding the bend and heading into my favorite time of the year, winter!  Though it has not even felt like fall of late, so where is winter?  I think it might take a while to see the true signs of winter, but if you like cold and snow which I do I think it will be worth the wait!  In the mean time I have taken advantage of the pleasant mornings, where I don't have to worry about freezing in attempts to capture some photos!

 Thanksgiving Sunrise #1

 Thanksgiving Sunrise #2

Thanksgiving Sunrise #3

Scituate Lobster Boats

Back At It!

Sorry for the lack of post in November!  I had an event lined up on November 17th and a lot of time was spent the in the beginning of the month preparing for it.  The event was put on by an organization known as campus of caring.  There goal was to raise money to build a hospice home on the South Shore.  The event was held at the Scituate Country Club and was a nice thing to be a part of!  I had the chance to meet new folks who had nice things to say about my work to them I say thank you!

I have a few photos that I have managed to grab in the past few weeks I just thought I would post them and I am going to try and get out more in the next few weeks!

 Beached Boat #1

Beached Boats #2

Lawson Tower HDR

A Historical October Nor' Easter

The eastern seaboard was slammed by and early season Nor' Easter that had the characteristics of one that would occur in mid winter! What made this so unusual was the fact that just away from the coast many locations received measurable snow, in October! Why it is has happened before you kind of had your doubts, I know I did! By the end of the week though models had converged on a solution that would leave many spots in interior SNE digging out from at least a foot of snow or more! As with most Nor' Easters they come with many components snow, rain, wind and coastal flooding!

Most locations on the south shore and Cape Cod did not see much in the way of snow that accumulated. The ocean temperatures are still in the 50's and with a north east wind temperatures held steady in the upper 30's low 40's and only toward the end temperatures fell once the wind shifted around more to the north and colder air could bleed in.  In the end it was a little too late and all we saw here in Scituate was a few hours of snow that did not amount to much.

Winds were another fierce component to the storm as high wind warnings were posted in southeastern sections of SNE including Cape Cod and the Islands.  For the immediate coastal waters storm warnings were hoisted, while the outer waters saw hurricane force wind warnings issued!  Luckily we did not lose power this time around!

The coastal flood aspect of the storm was not as bad as it could have been. Coastal flood warnings were in place for the Eastern Massachusetts coastline and the potential was there for a moderate flood event, with the combination of a 2-3 foot surge and high seas pounding the coast!  Luckily at the time  high tide approached around 2:30 AM the wind had shifted to more of a north direction as opposed to North East, as a result the wind was more parallel to the shore rather than from the east which would have drove the water into the shore!  In the end only pockets of minor flooding were seen in the vulnerable locations in town.

Today the day after the storm the seas were still running high so I took advantage of the nice dry conditions and made my way out to some of my favorite locations in town!

October Nor' Easter #1

October Nor' Easter #2

October Nor' Easter # 3

October Nor' Easter #4

October Nor' Easter #5

 October Nor' Easter # 6

 Fish Eye Minots Light

Fish Eye Scituate Light

October Nor' Easter #7

October Nor' Easter #8

Perfect Sunrise?

I awoke this morning and made my way down to the lighthouse unsure of what to expect for conditions.  Some monrnings you get just what you are looking for other mornings not so much.  This morning worked out perfect!  There was a nice layer of clouds that actually helped to enhance the colors.  I have always told people the best sunrises often come where there are clouds in the sky.  When it is totally clear it is still nice but the colors don't have a real chance to saturate and explode so to speak.  Anyway I thought these came out pretty well!

Jetty HDR Sunrise

Scitaute Light HDR #1

Scitaute Light HDR #2

Scitaute Light HDR #3

Old Scituate Light

"Old Scitaute Light"

Enjoy!

Where is Fall??

I have been waiting with great patience to see what the fall colors will bring around these parts.  I am starting to see a splash of color here and there, but I am not sure it is going to be that stellar region wide this year for a few reasons.  The first reason being Irene and her southeast gales carried a good deal of sea salt in the air which is just a killer for leaves, foliage chances and all that good stuff.  Back a few weeks ago you saw some trees right at the shore that had lost all of there leaves already before we even started seeing color.  Another reason I am not sure is the weather!  Most people enjoy this but as I have told everyone I am hardly a fan!  But in all seriousness the lack of crisp cold nights outside of a few has not helped the colors to start snapping so to say.  The peak season down in our region is not until the end of October maybe I will be surprised because I have some ideas I would like to try.  In the mean time another sunset!

HDR sunset

Sunset

An HDR sunset!

Lobster Boats

A few HDR shoots of Lobster Boats in Scituate Harbor.

Full Moon Trouble

I managed to get some good photos of the harvest moon on the rise behind Scituate Light.  The issue looked to be in doubt as there was a thin layer of clouds however it did not disappoint and the color of the moon was amazing!  I took a bunch of photos maybe close to 50!  But what i thought were a bunch of good photos only had a handful that actually came out ok.  The problem was the telephoto lens is maybe to much of a monster for its own good!  When you are doing longer exposure shoots in the evenings any little movement of the camera even with a timed shutter release will leave the photo horrible with a blur to it.  Hence tonight a few things went wrong I think obviously movement, second there was a little wind which might have caused this movement even with a tripod the weight and extension of the camera is just a lot.  I am not very happy at all right now but you live and learn and next time out when I use the telephoto lens on a tripod I will have to figure out how to guard against this! Below is one of the better ones that came out I have a few more but I just thought I would put this one out!

" Scitaute Light Harvest Moon"

HDR Fun!

HDR photos are really something that I am growing to love, but again it takes a lot of practice more often then not you don't get what you are looking for!  With all this in mind I have been studying up on how to get the camera into the exact settings that give me the best opportunity to make it happen.  Below are a few examples from today I am close but still a ways to go in getting exactly what I am looking for!

Late Summer Evening

Just a few photos from this evening!

HDR Scituate Light

Finally went ahead and purchased the photomatix program.  In short the program converts a series of photos at different exposures and blends them into one detailed photo.  I am going to try and do more of these photos, but I thought I would share one!

Hazy, Hot and Humid Moon

It was a true New England scorcher today!  I think that is what I love the most about New England is the extremes of the weather, you get days like this, then in January we will have sub zero wind chills with a howling Northeast wind!  Anyway I had noticed the past few nights that the new moon is in the process of moveing toward the first quarter, the only problem was the past few nights when I noticed the moon was in the process of setting and sliped below the tree line so I was not able to get a photo.  I took this photo right from my backyard nothing special, I just thought it looked cool!

Minot Light Sunrise

I don't get many  mornings where I can actually dig in and take my time with trying to capture a good sunrise photo due to my work schedule.  Come to think of it the only morning where I have the time is Saturdays, with that in mind I decided to head out and see what I could come up with.  My intent was to drive over to Sandy Beach in Cohassett and try and get some decent shots of Minots light from a different vantage point other then Minot's Beach.  As I was heading over there I could not help but notice that there were going to be some good shots with more to them if I set up shop in the Atlantica Restaurant parking lot.  I thought these came out fair, the only problem this morning was the mosquitos were out in full force!