Nadder Than Ever....!!

Indeed, you'd need to be certified to be groping on the banks of the River Nadder at 4.30 in the morning, hoping to get one final moon time exposure!

Put my head out at 3 a.m. and is was beautifully clear and starry, but when I walked the 1.5 miles to this spot, at 4, it clouded over, rather quickly! There had been so much rain that the river levels were well up, spilling out over the reed-beds.

So, what does this fool do, well he sets his tripod with its legs in the deep mud, losing most of its height and making peering through the viewfinder the act of a lithe gymnast (which I am not...)

The original scene was a LOT darker than this, with the moon mostly largely hidden by fast moving cloud, so I basically guessed where the 10mm end of the Nikkor 10-24 was pointing. I had to straighten it very slightly after but otherwise I haven't cropped it. It's not perfect, the wind moving the branches but rather than chopping it up, I've left it as it was.

Colour is unaltered from the RAW, though there has been selective shadow extraction - the street-lights over the far bank adding a pleasant pale orange hue, collecting on and bouncing off the cloud, over the near 3 minute exposure.

Worth going LARGE, I'd say..

As I left, the wind really got up and then rain. THAT hadn't been forecast on the detailed online forecast I looked at just before I'd left home and so the 1.5 mile walk back wasn't the most comfortable I've ever done...The Thompson Twins and Muse Live on the Ipod helped...

So, a lot of trouble for just one image - is it all worth it? Whatever the answer to that is, I shall probably be taking a break from such time exposures on dark muddy river banks, at least til after Christmas!

A HUGE thanks to all who liked my fisheye Blip of my mate Matt yesterday - it was still at the top of the Spotlights by the time I posted this one up!