A story about German fog.
Often when shooting a landscape, things don’t work out as planned. You may plan ahead as much as you want, as a photographer you’re always subject to whatever the weather is willing to offer you. And the weather can be quirky. Last week I tried to shoot an image I had previsualized entirely in my head. But I ended up with something completely different.
It was a location I knew well. I’d shot it before, in the summer. The leaves were green, the air was clear, the light was a bit hard. It wasn’t bad, but I could do better. I would do better! So I planned a drive over there in the autumn. Golden leaves, fog over the water down below, the rising sun straight ahead across the water. It would be perfect! A couple of days ago I set the alarm for 3 am, and off we were.
But you see, what I had in my mind was not what I found when I arrived at my destination, one hour before sunrise. That wasn’t just fog hanging in the valley, those were just plain clouds. I could barely make out the top of the hill on the inside bank. Even though I was counting on the fog breaking up in the warmth of the first sunlight that would appear, I started shooting right away. It didn’t look that bad after all. And if the clouds would start rising, it would be game over.
Guess what? They did rise. From behind me murky clouds started moving across the landscape and blocking the rising sun. The fog rose up above the level where I was standing, and it didn’t look like it was going to lift within the hour. It was a good thing I started shooting when there was still some clear sky ahead. Luckily the early morning pinks and oranges reflected nicely on the canopy of clouds beneath my feet, to make for a lovely image. But it didn’t end there.
Lately I developed the habit of simultaneously shooting with a wide angle and a telephoto lens. While one camera is on a tripod, connected to a cable release for easy triggering, I pick out details of the view with a second camera. While I was shooting the previous image, which was developing slowly, I had time to do a panoramic multiple image shot of the horizon. It turns out this image is my favorite from that morning. It wasn’t what I set out to achieve at all, but it’s nice none the less. I returned quite happy.
