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.

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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.

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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.

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