Columbus Day Weekend Shooting

Sunrise over the Potomac River

With the long Holiday weekend, I went out a couple mornings for some early morning photo sessions.  I was largely motivated by the Mindful Eye Community Assignment on long exposure night photography.  This assignment required an exposure time of 4 minutes or longer.

The first shot, shown above, was of the Potomac River at Algonkian Regional Park about an hour before sunrise.  The sky was perfectly clear, the river calm, and the sun rising to the east provided a beautiful gradient of color across the sky.

More images after the jump.

What I saw when I got to Algonkian that morning, but didn't have time to capture before the sky began to lighten, was a wonderful place to capture a star trail with the stars circling around the North Star.  I had been wanting to create an image like that for some time, but have never been out when it was dark enough and had a clear view of the northern sky.  So, I went back to Algonkian another morning and had just enough time to capture the image below.  It's a composite of four 4-minute exposures to create an effective 16 minute exposure.

Star Trail at Algonkian Regional Park

I created the next two images while the sun was rising.  As it got closure to sunrise, I was having trouble capturing the full range of gorgeous colors in the sky and the thin layer of fog on the ground.  So for the 2nd image, I took several different exposures and combined them into an HDR.

Sunrise at Algonkian Regional Park

HDR of Sunrise at Algonkian

As always, I welcome your feedback.  Please use the comment box below to let me know which of these is your favorite.