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Chester County clouds Downingtown Drawdown HDR Lakes Marsh Creek State Park Nature Photo Essay Photo Journal Photography Tone Mapping Water Weather

Exploring the missing water – Day 1

Earlier in the morning, after getting the kids off to school, and checking in with the digital world, I looked out the window to see if I should make the trip back to the dam at Marsh Creek Lake.

I was not too convinced that it be a good day, but I did eventually made it up to the dam, where I had only been two days before, but this time with my tripod.

My goal was to start at the spillway gate, and head north along the shoreline as far as I could go, and maybe even get onto the concrete of the main emergency spillway.

Spillway Gate
Spillway Gate

Walking across the rugged rocks, I wondered to myself several times, if I should not head straight up the hill to the vehicle road, but decided against it, and was greeted with this view when I looked back at the spillway gate.

Looking back across the dam
Looking back across the dam

Continuing down the shoreline, I was heading towards the pilings that I had seen from the opposite shore two days before, and was one of my real quests for today.

Woodhenge at Marsh Creek
Woodhenge at Marsh Creek

When I got there, surprised to see that what looked like a dock or morning from a distance, seem to be pilings randomly placed poles into the shoreline.

Lonely Cat o’nine tails
Lonely Cat o’nine tails

I walked around the point, and onto a dry area which would have normally been covered in several feet of water, and continued looking for a way, to further explore down in the spillway.

In the Marsh
In the Marsh

It was difficult walking in the dried swamp grass and cat o’nine tails, but I could see animal tracks heading the direction I wanted to go.

Tt was very apparent that the creatures knew how to maneuver the terrain better than I could.

Eventually time was getting the best of me, and I had to head back to my car before my kids got home from school.

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Categories
Chester County Creeks Downingtown Events Hurricanes Photo Essay Photography Streams Water Weather

Norwood Rd Creek (1/11 5/11 10/12)

Hurricane Sandy passed through our area early last week, and since then, I have gone out several times to take advantage of the photographic challenges that such a storm presents.

The following is a triptych created out of three images from

on a small little back road of Downingtown, Chester County PA.

To get the FULL image, you may need to Zoom-In, 2-times, by Double-Clicking (1000×588).

Norwood Rd Creek (1/11 5/31 10/12)
Norwood Rd Creek (1/11 5/31 10/12)

More of my Hurricane Sandy adventures can be found in my blog.
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Categories
Chester County Creeks Downingtown Events Nature Photo Journal Rivers Water Weather

pre Hurricane Sandy

After spending much of the day, waiting for Hurricane Sandy, I finally got so stir-crazy, that I grabbed my camera and headed put for a quick drive around the neighborhood to see what ‘life’ looked like, and here is what I saw…

You might also be interested in taking a look at last years Hurricane Irene photos.

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Categories
astronomy CCPaPhoto Chester County Downingtown Facebook Long Exposure Marsh Creek State Park Photo Journal Photography Science space Weather

No Super Moon – Still had a good time!

120505 Super Moon 007
120505 Super Moon 007

Last Thursday, May 3rd, Nina Downing Cazille posted on the Chester County PA Photography Facebook page, a Yahoo! News story, that suggested on Saturday night, that not only was the Super Moon going to be visible, possibly Saturn and maybe a dusting from Halley’s comet!

There was some spirited discussion on who might attend, and much speculation about the weather, since much of the past week or so, has been very cloudy and rainy.

When I woke up on Saturday morning, and looked out the window, only to find the skies still thickly clouded.

This was not good.

With coffee in hand, I went to the Chester County PA Photography page, and started a new thread, trying to finalize the details for our rather impromptu meet-up, later in the night.

Throughout the day, I kept looking at the sky, and try to figure out which way the clouds were moving.

In the mid-afternoon, I took both my kids down to East Ward elementary school, to burn off some energy in preparation for the evening, and when we started to leave, I was beginning to see increasingly larger sections of blue sky, which was very encouraging for a night of photographing the Super Moon.

By the time dinner had been prepared and consumed, the cloudy skies had returned.

Just before I left, I quickly checked the radar for clouds, and the hourly animation strongly suggested that there were big clear pockets of clear sky, coming down from the north, and would be over us within an hour or so.

Using Creek Road (Rt. 282), I got to the boating side of Marsh Creek State Park, within 20 minutes, and was able to find easy parking because many people were already packing up and leaving for the night.

After parking, I started to get my gear, but hesitated from getting it all out, because I still feared that no one was going to show up.

When I reached the predetermined meeting point, I was very delighted and relieved to see several other people standing there with their cameras!

  • Nina Downing Cazille
  • Shannon Chambers McMahon
  • Tony Babcock
  • Elaine Erwin-Babcock
  • I know I am missing some folks!

It was very nice to know that I am not the only crazy one!

After the various introductions, I headed back to my car, and grabbed my gear, heading back to the group to setup for the rest of the evening.

As the night wore one, we talked about various topic, and exchanged various stories about photography, family and life.

We also tried to identify which towns were glowing against the sky line, as well as experimenting with flashes and flash-lights.

At 23:35, when perigee finally arrived, the clouds were still as thick as when we started, but it did seem a little brighter, which could also have been from us standing in the dark for the past three and half hours.

It was not long after, that we packed up our gear, said our good byes and headed home. In reading the subsequent posts on the Facebook page, it seems that everyone had a good time!

– Andrew
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Categories
Chester County Downingtown Events Nature Photo Journal Photography Tone Mapping Weather

Panorama of Kerr Park Post Hurricane Irene

I finally finished this MONSTER!

As I blogged before, this image is composed of 42 images stitched together in Photoshop CS5, and then some Tone Mapping.

NOTE – By Clicking on the Image Twice (2 Times) you can see the FULL image!

Kerr Park - Post Hurricane Irene - Panorama
Kerr Park – Post Hurricane Irene – Panorama

At one point, this file was 3.7GBs in size!

But I have been able to get it down to a little over 7MBs as a JPEG file.

It has been interesting to see which sites are having problems with the size…

 

Sites having issues with the FULL size image – 11336×1000 (157.4″x13.8″)

Sites NOT having issues with the FULL size image – 11336×1000 (157.4″x13.8″)

Hope you enjoy!

– Andrew
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