sunrise | Beautiful Flower Pictures Blog

New Photos on Our Website – October 1

by hankinslawrenceimages | Oct 1, 2008 | News

I’ve just added twelve new photographs to our Hankins-Lawrence Images website.

The new photos include two flower photos – a Zowie Zinnia and a Passion Flower.

In addition to the new flowers, there are several landscapes. Most are from Maryland, including Sunrise at the Docks from Havre De Grace.

There is also one new landscape photograph from the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in Tennessee.

We’ll have all the new photos available at shows this fall.

Let us know what you think of our new photos.

Havre de Grace Maryland Sunrises

by hankinslawrenceimages | Sep 13, 2008 | Photo Locations

In late August, I spent a couple of days photographing in Harford and Cecil Counties in Maryland. While there – I discovered some great spots for photography – and I’ll definately head back to do some more exploring.

Some of the best photos I took on that trip were taken at sunrise in Havre de Grace along the water in the area near Concord Point Light, the oldest continually operating lighthouse in the Maryland. Havre de Grace is located at the head of the Chesapeake Bay and the outlet of the Susquehanna River in north east Maryland.

Here’s Concord Point Light just as the the color was starting to light the morning sky.

About twenty minutes later, I spotted a seagull perched on a post with a bright orange sky behind it. And yes – the sky really was that color.

The next morning, I just had to head back to the same spot to see what the sunrise would look like. I was hoping for another great sunrise. I was not disappointed!

Here’s the dock with one of the benches early in the morning.

A few minutes later as the sky lightened up – a sailboat motored across the bay. I was amazed at all the different colors in the clouds and sky that morning. It was amazing.

In addition to the incredible sunrises in Havre de Grace, I spent time exploring some of the state parks in the area on my trip. I’ll try to get some of the photos from the area up soon.

In the meantime please enjoy the photos from two incredible sunrises.

Magical Morning at Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge

by hankinslawrenceimages | Sep 3, 2008 | Photo Locations

I was sorting thought some photos I took last spring when I came across a set I took one morning at Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge in Cambridge, MD. As I looked at them – I realized how the light and sunrise changed in a brief thirty minutes.

The photos were all taken on April 19th between 5 and 5:30 AM. I was photographing from the side of the road along MD Rt 335 just before it crosses over Gum Swamp. My tripod was basicly in the same place for all the photos – I did move it around a little bit. In addition, I changed lenses a few times and zoomed in and out. Sunrise was at 5:22 AM that morning.

Here are the photos showing the progression of the sunrise on April 19 at Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge.

These are really quick edits on the photos. I’m still trying to decide which ones I should do detailed editing and make prints of.

The chance to see sunrises like this makes it pretty easy to get up in the morning and head out with my camera.

Washington DC Cherry Blossoms 2007

by hankinslawrenceimages | Mar 24, 2008 | Photo Locations, Washington DC

Last year’s peak bloom was very short. There was a cold snap just before the expected peak – and then a pretty major wind and rain storm a few days after the peak bloom started. Even so – we got some incredible photos last year – since the peak bloom coincided with a full moon in Washington, DC

This photo of the Washington Monument was taken a few days before peak bloom – just a few trees had blossoms – the rest were still primarily buds with some early leaves.

We went back a few mornings later – when the full moon was going to be setting on one side of the Tidal Basin – while the sun was going to be coming up and shining on the Jefferson Memorial. We knew if the light was right – this could be incredible.

So Bill set up his large format camera for the full moon setting over the Tidal Basin and Arlington Cemetary

Full Moon over the Tidal Basin with Cherry Blossoms in Washington DC

While I set up my camera and tripod focusing on the Jefferson Memorial and the sunrise.

For the first time in years – there was no scaffolding visible on this side of the Jefferson Memorial.

By the next morning – the calm peaceful waters of the Tidal Basin were no more as the storm came in. Another day later and DC was in the midst of a rain and wind storm that took most of the blossoms off the trees.

So we were really glad that we had made the effort to go down on Monday for the full moon. Had we waited just a few more days – there wouldn’t have been many blossoms left.

As for 2008 – we’ll hopefully know in another week or so what this year’s peak Cherry Blossom bloom will bring.

Heavenly-Opportunity: Must Have Software for Landscape Photographers

by hankinslawrenceimages | Jan 9, 2008 | Photo Locations, Software

As landscape photographers, one of the great challenges is knowing when to be at a location for either sunrise, sunset, moonrise or moonset. A few years ago, we discovered a software program Heavenly-Opportunity that makes this task much easier for photographers in the United States.

Heavenly-Opportunity accurately predicts the time and location for each of these events, as well as the phase of the moon for over 30,000 locations in the US. The program includes information for much more than just about every city or town in the country. It also includes information on 500 National Parks, National Wildlife Refuges, and recreation areas and 2500 names lakes, mountains or other named geographic feature In the past we had to find information for the nearest major city, now we can have information about the exact location we’re planning on shooting at. On our recent trip to Blackwater and Bombay Hook National Wildlife Refuges, we knew exactly when and where sunrise and sunset would be, which made it easy to plan our photography.

In addition, the software allows you to enter a latitude and longitude and get information for a specific place. This is a great feature if you are using GPS to determine your location.

Another wonderful feature is the ability to search for specific criteria for a location – and determine what dates you should plan on shooting. For example, we had been trying for several years to get a photo of the Lincoln Memorial, Washington Monument and U.S. Capitol Building with a full moon over the Capitol. We knew where to take the photo from (in front of the Netherlands Carillon near the U.S. Marine Corps War Memorial in Arlington, VA), that if the moon comes up between roughly 80 – 100 degrees and if moonrise after sunset – we should be able to get the image we want. With Heavenly-Opportunity, we knew there were four nights between July 2006 and June 2007 to take the photo. One of them was on March 4, 2007.

That night, Bill took the photo we call Full Moon Over DC.

Full Moon Over DC

Yes, Bill really did get the Lincoln Memorial, Washington Monument, US Capitol Building with the Tower of Learning of the Jefferson Building of the Library of Congress silhouetted by the full moon all in one shot. It’s not a composite image. And it only took us four years of trying to get this photo.

Heavenly-Opportunity isn’t the first software we tried for keeping track of the sun and the moon. We still use Ephemeris by Jonathan Sachs on our Pocket PCs. It’s fine if we need quick info out in the field.

Heavenly-Opportunity has two main advantages over Ephemeris: the much larger number of locations included in the program and the search function. The search function alone is well worth the cost of the software. If we’re planning trips, we use this program to plan where and when to be.

Heavenly-Opportunity is distributed as shareware by Fossil Creek Software of Fort Collins, CO. You can use an unlicensed version for 30 days. After than, you really should purchase the license. The cost for a licensed version is $ 24.95. The license allows you to install as many copies of the program as you need – we have it installed on both our desktop machines and our laptop.

As far as we are concerned, Heavenly-Opportunity is must-have software for landscape photographers. We really encourage everyone to go to the Fossil Creek site and download the trial version. Be sure to buy your copy before the 30 day trial period is up. Once you start using Heavenly-Opportunity – you will wonder how you ever got along without it.

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