Skylog (with planes!)

Parallel approach at dusk, after the rain.

Rain, rain, go away...

It had been raining almost all day in Melbourne. I had been reading Conversations With Glenn Gould and listening to KMCO when around 1700h a smidgen of sun appeared amongst the dark gloomy clouds. I had to go outside...I spend almost all of my work days indoor in front of computers. I needed to see the sun.

So I packed up and checked my motorcycle before heading west on 192. During daytime, 192 is one of my favorite roads to travel: Sparse traffic, no toll booths, and smells of manure every few miles. At night however, 192 can be a very scary and messy place to ride, because most of the road is unlit, and there are A LOT of insects smashing into you at 50 MPH. My face-shield contained an insect collection by the time I returned home.

Oil spill in the clouds

I am not an optics expert, but I think this one is a variant of a circumhorizontal arc. I stopped by the side of the road to photograph this beautiful phenomenon. Other than sharpening and contrast, the colors that you see in the photograph are real.

Sunset and Silhouette

737 Southwest

I wasn't prepared to spot...I decided to head to MCO out of a whim to photograph silhouettes of planes. I had never done it before, and Florida has a tendency to produce beautiful skies right after a hard rain.

Using the 18-200mm lens, I snapped away at the arrivals, paying closer attention to how the sun outlines the planes vs the planes themselves. The transition between sunset and twilight is very short, and I was standing in relative darkness 30 minutes after I arrived. All in all I was only able to get about 20 photos, of course none of Airliners quality. At this point, I really don't care about submitting my photos to them anymore...

Silhouette of 737 Southwest