HDR Photography
I took this picture two years ago, during a wonderful springtime in Berkeley when a rainy winter had made the hills lush and green. The view is enormous, overwhelming: Oakland, San Francisco, Emeryville, and Berkeley all packed into one. I like the contrast of the tiny path on the green hilltop on the left side of the image providing a quiet contrast.
There are perfect days in the hills above Berkeley, and they happen a lot more frequently in the spring.
Berkeley Lab’s Molecular Foundry hangs in the air like a spaceship coming in for a landing in the outskirts of the Bay Area. When the clouds hang low on a spring morning, the effect is even more pronounced.
There’s that perfect moment when the sky is still blue but the oranges of sodium vapor lamps begin to scatter from the surfaces of the clouds and the Eiffel Tower looks particularly otherworldly. When so many American cities have switched to lighting their streets with white LED lights, I was surprised at how much of Paris is still lit by sodium lamps.
Though much of the country is enjoying crispy fall weather, the mountains and hills of the northeast have already been carpeted with the first snowfalls, and much of the bright foliage has already fallen to the forest floor.
Though we may officially have a couple more weeks, summer has practically ended when schools resume. St. Lawrence University’s campus is buzzing with students and faculty at all hours of the day and night.
Now can we please be done with the summer weather? Bring on fall.
After a day of rain, the clouds peeled back around sunset to reveal the foothills of the Adirondacks to the south. This bucolic landscape (on the right side of the image) is actually the eastern reach of St. Lawrence University’s 1,000-acre campus.
The ancient lake bed that became the Bonneville Salt Flats refloods with water each winter—but just a few inches. As a result, raising these tracks even slightly above the bed is all that’s needed to protect them.
The Space Needle through “Eagle” by Alexander Calder.
There’s a sunset balance point when the intensity of San Francisco’s city lights precisely match the intensity of the light remaining in the sky. When those photons are in equal proportion, even a busy city can look oddly peaceful.
Seattle center’s International Fountain in the late spring and summer always reminds me of trips downtown for various festivals.
At the right time of day and with the right hints of weather, San Francisco looks extra futuristic. Home to the tech industry, I think the city usually merits the descriptor.
Nothing finer on a sunny Seattle day than admiring the beautiful Puget Sound.
This weekend marked the first truly warm days (i.e. spring) after a long winter, and there’s not long now until St. Lawrence’s students graduate on that sunset-lit quad at the center of the image.
Decaseconds 