April, 2016. I have photographed rainbows in the morning only a few times. Two of those times were this month.
The first time was at sunrise on April 15. I photographed a partial rainbow over St Rose Health Center.
Sunrise rainbow over St Rose Health Center, Great Bend.
On April 24, storms once again moved in around sunrise. I photographed the rainbows from along the Arkansas River first.
Brilliant partial rainbow over the Arkansas River, Great Bend.Artistic rendition of a double rainbow over the Arkansas River. The river is swollen after recent rains.Double rainbow panorama.Double rainbow over the Arkansas River.
I then proceeded to the Barton County Historical Society. I captured parts of the rainbows with the old church. It was raining lightly, and the dark clouds moved in quickly and the rainbow faded.
Old church at the Barton County Historical Society.
It was a fun morning to be out, and a great way to start the day.
Dr Clyde Tombaugh and his family moved to Burdett, KS, my hometown, when he was 16. In February of 1930, Dr Clyde Tombaugh discovered Pluto. He dedicated his life to studying the stars. In 1955, he helped found the Unitarian Universalist Church of Las Cruces, New Mexico.
In 2001, the church dedicated this memorial window which is 8 feet tall and 18 feet wide. I contacted the church when I found that I would be traveling through Las Cruces a few days before Thanksgiving this year. The ladies at the church were very friendly, and graciously allowed me early access to the gallery to accommodate my travel plans. Walking into the gallery, I was stunned by the beauty of the window. It captured the morning light perfectly. The colors were amazing, and the artist, Arthur J. Tatkoski, crafted exquisite small details throughout the memorial. Additional information can be found on the Church’s webpage.
Here is my photograph of the window, along with closeups of each panel.
Dr Clyde Tombaugh Memorial Window, Unitarian Universalist Church of Las Cruces, New MexicoUnitarian Universalist Church of Las Cruces, New MexicoUnitarian Universalist Church of Las Cruces, New MexicoUnitarian Universalist Church of Las Cruces, New MexicoUnitarian Universalist Church of Las Cruces, New MexicoUnitarian Universalist Church of Las Cruces, New Mexico
On July 15, 1982, a large cast metal historical marker, sponsored by the Lions Club of Burdett, was erected at a new roadside historical park beneath the Burdett watertower along K-156. Dr. Tombaugh was present at the ceremonies and afterwards signed autographs for purchasers of his book Out of the Darkness: The Planet Pluto.
I recently took the following photograph of the marker, and the second photograph I took in May of 2014, in the middle of the night.
Historical Marker, Burdett, KSHistorical Marker, Burdett, KS, at night.
I would like to thank the ladies at the church who allowed me to visit the gallery. The experience was wonderful.
The evening of September 27, 2015 was a beautiful one in central Kansas. Light winds, a cloudless sky, and comfortable temperatures made for a great evening to be out. A few minutes after sunset, a super moon rose through the haze of the horizon. I chose to photograph the moon against this windmill.
I photographed the first 3 images with a 300mm lens, to include more of the surrounding environment. I then switched to a 500mm lens for the next image. This isolated the windmill and moon. I was across the pasture from the windmill, so the long lens also compressed the scene and helped to give the moon a much stronger presence.
Super moon rising, 7:32pm
From both experience and a quick scouting mission the night before, I knew where the moon should be from various locations in Great Bend. I started at Stone Sandpit, so that I would have a good view as the eclipse started. I decided to do a time lapse image. I took a 1 second exposure to capture the glow of the bright moon on the sandpit waters. I then took a series of photos that were only 1/160s long, so that the moon would be properly exposed. I then merged individual moon shots with the landscape image. Each moon photo is 3 minutes from the previous image.
Super moon eclipse time lapse, progressing to near totality; 3 minutes between exposures.
As totality neared, I relocated to the Barton County Courthouse. I captured the following image just after totality. I did replace the moon with a better in focus image taken a couple of minutes later.
Barton County Courthouse, just after the moon entered eclipse totality.
The next image is the First United Methodist Church, north side.
First United Methodist Church, Great Bend.
I finished the night back at Stone Sandpit. I captured a wide angle photo, exposed to show the stars. I did have to replace the moon with a properly exposed image since the 15 seconds for the stars left the moon with motion blur.
Stone Sandpit, full view.
The following two images show the difference that focal length and time can make in lunar eclipse images. The first image was taken at 300mm at the beginning of totality. The second image was taken at 500mm at the end of totality. I cropped both images to the same size; neither focal length will create a frame filling view.
9:17pm. This was the start of totality and taken with a 300mm lens.10:08 pm. This was the end of totality and taken with a 500mm lens.
I enjoyed the night, especially since the eclipse happened at a decent hour of the day and the weather wasn’t bitterly cold like many of the recent eclipses.
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The evening of September 10, 2015 didn’t start off to impressive. There were storms on the radar, but not close to Barton County. I went ahead and went out to Cheyenne Bottoms.
Distant storms with crepuscular beams, 5:46pmTwo fronts meet.Light beam between the storm systems.
The merging storm cells created some nice crepuscular rays. More impressive was the light beam that formed between the cells. This gap was visible on cloud enhanced radar also.
Looking to the northwest, I could see the darker storm clouds coming. Mammatus clouds poked out ahead of the system.
Panorama of the approaching storm with mammatus clouds, 6:33pm.Close up view of the approaching mammatus clouds.
It took another 10-15 minutes for the shelf cloud to finally appear. This close up shows some of the storm details. The white streaks are a flock of egrets, blurred by a slow shutter speed.
Approaching shelf cloud with egrets streaking by.
After the storm had come closer, I shot this panorama, looking down one of the dikes.
Panorama of the approaching storm, 7:09pm.
I attempted to capture some of the intermittent lightning by shooting continuous 1 second exposures. Most of the lightning was these little cloud bolts, and there wasn’t that much of it.
Shelf cloud and lightning
I then changed locations, moving up the road away from the storm a short distance. This brought the storm into a better position for this panorama. The low sun is on the left, lightning on the far right, and the headlights of an oncoming truck coming down the road.
Shelf cloud panorama, 7:20pm.
After capturing this panorama, I backed up a little farther in order to place leading edge into a slightly better view. Another series of 1 second exposures only captured a couple more lightning bolts.
Shelf cloud and lightningShelf cloud and lightning
The green under the shelf cloud was eerie. Even more unsettling was the sudden lack of wind as I was shooting the next image.
Shelf cloud, 7:25pm.
I quickly packed up my tripod and camera, and headed for the highway. I beat the rain/hail, but not by much. I circled around to the south of the storm, coming up behind it right at sunset. The low sun created a stunning glow in the passing clouds, which were often back lit by distant lightning.
Sunset glow, 7:46pm.
The whole experience was amazing. I have photographed a couple of other shelf clouds, but never from this close and length of time. The backside of the storm brought extreme straight winds to the county and points east, causing loss of power and significant tree and roof damage in places.
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Big thunderstorms rolled across central Kansas the evening of July 25, 2015. The first round of storms passed just south of Great Bend; later storms would bring some rain to town. The photos in this series are from the first storms, from around 9pm to 10pm. Lots of lightning all over the western and southern skies, most of which was out of my camera’s field of view. All of these photos are either 6 second or 8 second single exposures.
The evening started off slow, but I finally captured this first big blast.
First capture, it would only get better.
Lots of lightning as the storm slid by town.
This was the biggest crawler that I captured.
Pure power in a single bolt.
There were several fishermen around the lake. Two were on the dock and two more were in a boat on the far side.
The light streak was created by his headlamp as the fisherman walked back to shore.Watching the storm
Thank you for viewing the photos in this blog. Lightning was flying everywhere, with plenty of cloud to ground and crawling lighting.
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Kansas has had a stormy summer, and the last few days were no exception. This blog showcases some of the best photos I captured of the storms. I took all of these photos either in Great Bend or north of Pawnee Rock. Each night that I went out, the radar suggested that a more western view would be the best.
This first photo was taken just after sunset on 7/16. Distant storm clouds glowed in the late light, and I photographed them reflecting in the calm waters of Stone Sandpit.
Glowing reflections, Stone Sandpit.
The next three photos were taken from Pawnee Rock State Historic Site. The passing storm clouds had an ominous look to them; notice the blue glow within the storm. This storm dropped large hail in places.
Storm clouds from Pawnee Rock SHS, 7/17/15, 6:21pm.A break in the clouds allowed bright light to shine on the monument; 6:36pm.Storm clouds behind the monument, 6:45pm.
This last image from that particular storm was taken north of Pawnee Rock, looking north into a strong thunderstorm.
North of Pawnee Rock, 7:02 pm.
I loved the stack clouds at sunset of this image from 7/17. I photographed the clouds over Veteran’s Lake.
Stacked clouds just before sunset, Veteran’s Lake, 8:35pm.
The rest of the photos in this blog were taken north of Pawnee Rock on 7/19, at or after sunset as a massive storm system hammered central Kansas. I stayed dry at first, but eventually the rain came over my location. I set up the tripod under the back hatch of my car and covered my camera with an old flannel shirt. The camera stayed dry; I got wet but not drenched :).
I don’t often see shapes within clouds, but the clouds in this first image appear possessed to me.
“Possessed” cloud.
The next 4 photos were taken looking back south to Pawnee Rock. Each is a single exposure of either 1 second or 2.5 seconds.
At this point, I turned the camera to the northwest. Each photo is a single exposure; the first 4 are 4 second exposures, the last 3 are 8 second exposures. The whole series was taken in under 5 minutes.
I consider this last set of photos to be some of my best lightning photos. The whole experience was great, and I loved the show that Mother Nature put on over the weekend.
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We camped at Sand Hills State Park, near Hutchinson, over the July 4th weekend. The campground is nice, and was very quiet. We currently have 7 small dogs- 4 are ours, 2 belong to my mother-in-law, and we are fostering one for theGolden Belt Humane Society . These were all in the camper with us, and of course one needed to go out before sunrise on the 4th. I am glad she did, because there was a dense fog. I quickly got dressed, and headed out to find a location to photograph the sunrise. I am not not very familiar with the area around the state park, so I drove to one area that I thought might work.
Sand Hills State Park has dense tree growth, interspersed with open areas. I wandered a short distance down one of the paths, waiting on sunrise. Turning around to watch the sunrise, I was amazed to see the sun beaming through the trees and fog. I spent the next 20 minutes moving from spot to spot, photographing the light beams as the sun slowly rose and the fog burned off. I can’t recall having seen this phenomenon in person before, and it was a wonderful, beautiful experience. Please enjoy the following series of photographs from that morning.
Just before sunrise.The rising sun created a soft glow through the fog.Sun beams and fogSun beams and fogSun beams and fogSun beams and fogSun beams and fogThe show was almost over…..Golden glow as the sun rose above the trees.
After lunch, my daughter and I headed home to spend time with my family and to shoot some fireworks. That evening, we decided to go over to Larned for the first time in years. Growing up, we always went to the Larned fireworks show at the baseball stadium. Now, the show is held north of the old Armory. A jazz band consisting of members from the area played prior to the fireworks. They always do a great job, and that night was no exception.
I had just read an article about a different technique for photographing fireworks. This method uses a dark filter that allows for longer exposures while limiting overexposure caused by multiple fireworks. I am very happy with the results. Here is one photo from the finale, which would not have been possible without the filter.
Finale from the Larned firework show.
The complete series from the fireworks can be found in my Larned Fireworks album on Facebook.
The show was a beautiful end to a great day.
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A distant storm cell created a relatively heavy cloud layer on the evening of June 17, 2015. Looking at the sky from home, I wasn’t sure that I wanted to go for a drive. I didn’t think the prospects for a good sunset were that great. I eventually did drive out to the Bottoms. Once I was out there, the clouds still looked to heavy to allow for a good sunset, but I did see a layered look to the clouds on the horizon which suggested a slim possibility of seeing the sun.
Heavy cloud bank over Cheyenne Bottoms
As can be seen in the following series, that possibility happened :). The sun managed to peek between the layers, creating beams of light that kept getting better and more defined.
8:51pm,Wide view of the emerging sun beams.8:52pm, the beams become better defined8:52pm, the beams become better defined8:54 pm, well defined beams, along with a flock of ibis
The beams faded as the sun set behind the lower cloud bank. The clouds to the north still glowed with soft color.
8:56pm, glowing clouds at sunset
Sunset was at 9:01pm that evening. The color left the sky, and I packed up my tripod and camera. A few minutes later, as I was driving slowly back home, the sky exploded in color once again. Surprisingly, a faint set of beams once again appeared. The glow lasted only a few minutes, before once again fading.
9:07pm, afterglow and ibis9:08pm, close up of the afterglow
I started driving home once again, but didn’t get far before noticing the lightning bugs. One clump of grass seemed to consistently have lightning bugs on it, so I pulled over. I haven’t tried photographing lightning bugs close up before, and I knew it would be a long shot to get good images in the low light, but I tried anyways. The next 2 photos aren’t the best quality wise, but I am happy with them under the circumstances. I was pushing my camera settings to try and get an exposure that I could hand hold the camera at and still produce an image. Focusing was nearly impossible in the low light. I would watch for a flash of light on a grass blade, then try and manually focus on the bug before it flew away. They didn’t sit still very long, and most of the my attempts were out of focus or missing the bug completely.
A note on my camera and lens for these 2 photos. I use a Canon 7d mark II and had a Tamron 70-300mm f/4-5.6 vc on. At 300mm, the lens aperture is 5.6, which is really slow, and doesn’t let a lot of light in. I set the camera to ISO 6400, and a shutter speed of 1/30s. The vibration control/image stabilization of the lens helped somewhat at the slow speed. I still had to brighten the image in processing and apply quite a bit of noise reduction. A 300mm, f/2.8 lens would have been nice, and would have allowed for lower ISO or higher shutter speeds and made focusing easier :).
9:25pm, lightning bug9:25pm, lightning bug
The night still had one more surprise for me. I glanced behind me, and witnessed the sky glowing once again in a narrow beam. This was almost 1/2 hour after sunset; the last intense glow didn’t last long.
9:27pm, one last glowing beam
Kansas sunsets are amazing. This evening was even more spectacular to me because of how many times the sun created beams and cones of light. In the winter, I expect afterglow like I saw that evening. I don’t usually witness that kind of afterglow in summer.
I have been blessed to twice, in the last 9 months, photograph a double rainbow over the circles of St Rose Health Center in Great Bend, KS. After the first time in September 2014, I couldn’t believe my luck, and thought it would be a once in a life time opportunity. However, on April 16, 2015, I was once again able to photograph an even better double rainbow over the circles. Two hours after photographing that rainbow, we began the move into our new building. Demolition of the circles has begun, and soon the circles will be no more.
4/16/15, Double rainbow over St Rose Health Center
I am offering prints of this second double rainbow photograph for the following prices:
8″x10″ $20, 11″x14″ $35 . Shipping is $5 for any prints that must be mailed.
Please email me at sales@ksimager.com with questions or if you wish to place an order.
A print makes a great gift for anybody with a connection to the hospital, as a way to remember this unique building that served Great Bend for so many years. I have worked at CKMC/St Rose Health Center since 1992, and like so many others, will miss the circles. However, in our smaller building, we can continue the tradition that was started by the Dominican Sisters in 1903 of providing quality healthcare to the people of Great Bend and Barton County.
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5/25/15, Cheyenne Bottoms. The skies had cleared over Great Bend during the afternoon, while strong storms popped up just to the east. Late in the afternoon, clouds started moving in again. About an hour before sunset, I decided to take my chances, and went for a drive around the Bottoms. I suspected that there was enough room below the storm clouds to allow the sun to break through as it set. I was right, and was treated to a beautiful sunset. There were great clouds to the west, storm clouds to the east, and some high clouds that drifted in right at sunset. The total time between the first and last of these images was only 11 minutes. This was one of those nights when it was hard to decide which direction to shoot :).
Dropping below the clouds.Light beams formed as the sun dropped below the clouds while shining through a gap in the clouds.Looking east, the setting sun lit bands of clouds even as the storm produced a bright bolt.8 minutes after it cleared the clouds, the sun started to light the underside of the storm clouds as well as the high clouds that had drifted in.Closeup of the setting sun and clouds.Even as it set at the horizon, the sun was still lighting the high clouds, as well as the rain from a nearby shower.Last light, illuminating the high clouds, storm clouds, and rain curtain.
After heading home for a while, I went back out after dark to try and capture the clouds and lightning. Most of the lightning from my positions was buried in the clouds. The first picture below was taken from across the Bottoms, looking towards Hoisington, and shows an interesting cloud over town. For the second shot, I moved in closer to the storms. Again, most of the lightning was in the clouds, but I liked the storm elements highlighted by the frequent bursts.
Storm over HoisingtonLayers of storm clouds and rain, illuminated by in cloud lightning.
It was a great night, especially the sunset. I was glad took the chance and went out and was able to witness and capture the beauty of a stormy Kansas sunset.
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