bowtie`

A nice night out at the pond. The clouds were out there. And it was just a pleasant evening to soak up the colors. Close to local sunset, real close... Close to maximum color dynamics ... Once again had that violet color late, late in the evening. Very pretty...

Had some normal clouds to go with the smoke this evening. Sun above the horizon... Sun below the horizon... Late color and clouds...

Not a cloud in the sky for the sunset this evening. But I made a guess that maybe the Canadian smoke might make a nice visual. I might have guessed right. Local sunset... looks OK if maybe a little boring... Max orange... starting to look a little bit better... The rest of the images are all about the violet and red... Starting off with the red up high... Full on gak violet, on the horizon... Ending the evening with max red on the horizon and the billboard lit up...

Some crepuscular rays when I got out to the pond this evening... About the best I could do before the virga on steroids ran me back to my car. I was not expecting rain at all....

The dry air was winning this evening. The clouds did not make to the sunset. So this is a single image looking south at the retreating clouds while the sun was still above the horizon.

0.72 in my tippy bucket which matches nicely with KIND's 0.68 so far. It was a nice typical July storm to bring in some cooler air. So far the dews have been above 70 degrees for all of the three day reporting period. That is going to change, and soon.

Tonight the sky conditions changed rapidly and seemingly constantly. Could not complain about being bored out at the pond. Was busy from the time I got there to the time I packed up and left. When I arrived it was still raining as you can see in the pond here... Fortunately the rain stopped and the clouds right on the horizon in the first image climbed to above the billboard... As close to local sunset as the conditions would allow... Getting more vertical showed all the different cloud layers... While there was a little color post sunset, the scud tried to put a block on the max orange here... There was just a little red and it was on the backside of the scud so it is kind of hard to see but it did make a nice ending for the evening...

I am going to start off with an error that ended up looking fairly decent. After dinner, grabbed the camera which had been inside all day in the A/C and ran to the pond. Set up the camera, popped the lens cover off and *poof* instant condensation. Taking the cold camera and lens from the cold house straight to the oven like conditions gave me a cloud inside the lens. So I am taking a picture of clouds through the clouds in my camera. You could say I am doubled down on clouds in this image. I kind of like the result... Here is what it looked like after the lens had equalized and I could get back to trying to accurately image the conditions... Here is the post sunset clouds...

No great amount of clouds this evening. But the smattering was positioned properly, so the attempt was made. Started off toward the side of the pond I do not make it to very often. The orientation of the clouds took me over there... Back to the fishermen point but seeing how they were driven indoor with the blistering heat, I had to whole place to mayself. Max orange... And ending the evening looking due north...

Lake influence?

Well, I had no plans for sunset pics this evening. Had a dental procedure today and was not feeling 100%. Plus it looked like the Bobby remnants had over run the area. Well a couple of sucker holes opened up just at the right time. But I had already put the car away and was about to jump in the shower. So I just took these from the yard with all the trees, lights and wires in the way. What it looked like when I realized it was going to do something... A shout out here to a gal in the back seat of a Jeep product, that when they drove by she pointed over my shoulder and all I heard was "bowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww". Turned around and darn if she was not right. an orange rainbow from the orange light. Back to the northwest again and the max orange... Max red and I was able to step back into the house and call it an evening...

Did not make it this far south (Lebanon).

With a boundary to the north and east. And Bobby to the west a south, an alley of clear from Indiana to Iowa with a northwest orientation was perfect made for some post sunset color. It did end up being nice. The conditions when I got out to the pond... As the post sunset start with the light orange... And now onto the dark orange... And finishing up with the red flash...

After two straight days of not a cloud in the sky for the sunset, it was nice to have something to shoot. Even though it was distant and diffuse. The start of the orange... Max red, which did not last long...

Stick around. It is the Midwest. I will change. lol

It is a good thing I did not look at the visual satellite before going out to the pond this evening. After dinner I just looked at the sky and thought, " I might get lucky and catch a break between cells". I would have missed some color if I did not go out there. Did not start off well though. Originally I walked down to the pond but while there, a bolt of two of lightning and a shaft of rain drove me back to the car. First image was from beside the car while it was still sprinkling but the lightning had moved east and north of me by then... I was finally able to make it back down to the side of the pond even though it was still spitting raindrops. I do not quite understand the red in this image. It was still too early for red. The rain shaft must have bent the light somehow to get the red in this image. You can see the bright yellow behind it! A head-scratcher for sure... I think this is the only image here of the evening with no raindrops falling in it. And this is the start of the orange up high... Max red and I was back under the spitting rain again... Good night my darlin' wherever you are...

Looking at the visual satellite this afternoon, I thought there was a decent chance of a nice sunset this evening. When I got to the pond all the clouds were well on the horizon. Here is what it looked like post sunset with the 100mm... Once the Sun rolled over the horizon the cirrus overhead started getting illuminated. Do not ask about the focus here, operator error... Things got really wild with the red flash. Got some cloud shadows from over the horizon to add some spice... Conditions stayed good through the red passing to the horizon. It was so dark that the billboard even lit up... Well worth losing a little sleep over this.

I love this time of year. A *cold* front moves through and KIND goes from a high of 90 on the sixth to 88 on the seventh. Anytime you do not need a coat or a jacket after a frontal passage is my idea of heaven.

Tonight was all about the crepuscular rays and cloud shadows. Some of them quite vivid. This way... That way... Just a little bit of a search light on that tiny cloud in the upper left... Even some with the max color dynamics of the evening...

Oooops. It is after midnight. I have been late in processing this evening's photos. So those of you looking at this months later, these were taken on the evening of the sixth. Houston we are go for main engine start. Ignition! … Maxorange. And I am proud of this image because it has zero cropping. The way you see it is the way it came out of the camera other than cloning out a semi on the interste and the lights on the warehouse. … Some max red and blue with a little bit of violet thrown in... And this is extremely late. So late that the color at the top is all with incidental light. Reflected light off of the horizon gave me a second and very late *red* flash. Enjoy!

Nice images. Some of mine...

Watching of the visual satellite images of the morning convection putting out the boundaries when they collapsed, and them the early evening stuff exploding on those boundaries was cool as heck. Only got 0.01 here though. Could use a bit more. I must be crazy for asking for a little more rain but there you go.

I had no plans to head to the pond. But leaving the eatery I saw that there might be a chance of a rainbow so I changed my mind. On the north side of town it was bone dry. When I got to the center of town, where I live, it was spitting a few drops. I grabbed the camera and started heading to the south side of town and the pond. The farther south I got the rain became steadier and the sun popped out. By the time I got to the south side park it was raining a decent clip and the rainbow was bright so I pulled over and snapped this... Glad I did stop there and take that as when I continued on, by the time I got to the pond it was raining too heavy for good rainbow conditions. But I did take a shot of the *hole* the Sun used to make that rainbow after the sunset sank below the cloud level... In both instances I was shooting through the open window of the car while the camera was still on the tripod. The tripod is just lying across the seat and it is hard to tell if I am level or not. Also with it raining in both images I apologize for any image quality degradation.

Tonight was a much simpler decision choice. Close to local sunset with the overhead still white... Max color overhead but it was only orange this evening... Extreme post sunset and some over-the-horizon cloud shadows. Probably from the top of the cells in Iowa...

I hate when sunsets are good like this. I can not make up my mind which image to share. So I just end up sharing way too much. Prepare to be bombarded. When I got out to the pond, looking south... Pre sunset... Local sunset... A bit of a searchlight going on here... Rope-a-dope orange/red from over head towards the horizon... Red flash the normal way, on the horizon... Hope I did not break your viewing device.