Autumn over the Lake of Constance

[Peter S.]

Dear fellow photographers,

as I have to walk the dog on a daily basis, there is a lot of
photographic output - at least if the weather is fine. Which it
was on a late october (when I just came back from Bavaria).
One of the best vantage points is just over the western end
of the lake. On a comfortable morning time is looks like this:
(there are the alps in the distance below (and behind) the
clouds)


Morning over Lake of Constance - view from the Haldenhof.
MD 1.8/35(?) on my blue XD-7

There is a small roundtrip which means a little less than half an hour
walking time. The small hike starts between the rock and the bush:


Autumn Leaves, MC Rokkor-PG 1.4/50(?maybe 35mm), XD-7, Polarizer

I looked up and got this picture:



I think, this is one of the best pictures I took in my photographic life
(which I still a very young one). But it is a beast: it compresses hard
as it is loosing its magic when shrinking it. Maybe I overdid it a bit
with the polarizer - the blue was deep, but the pol makes it looking
like crazy. I did *not* manipulate the colors in PS.

I even took a few wide angle shots (which I'm generally still not
good at)


MD 2.8/24, XD-7, Polarizer

And there are even more lookout points:

MD 2.8/24, XD-7, Polarizer

I am lucky with the last one, too, since the wide angle is not obvious
here. It got a very natural look - yet the tree was so near, I needed
the 24mm focal length so badly.

Hope You like it...

Best regards
Peter

[John Parry]

Hi Peter,

I like the first lake shot very much - you've got interest and composition just right.

You're right about the great contrasts in the second of your tree shots, but I find it slightly lacking in the interest department. For that reason, I prefer the last.

Regards - John

[Peter S.]

Dear John, dear Ron,

the first picture was quite an interesting one. I do take a photo from exactly this position
*every* time I am there. I often steer the camera a bit deeper, because the sky is often
uninteresting and monotone.
But this didn't work on this morning. The sun wasn't either low enough (one can say I got
a bit late to do a sunrise photo ;-) ) to yield these redish tones, nor was it high enough
to got a intensely blue lake.
So I felt, that it might be a good idea to have that unconventional composition, where a
cut-off half sun is just on the corner of the picture and where light rays were going down
to the bright reflection on the lake. The sun needed to be pretty much centered, which
might be a point for nit picking, but this is the only way, I got the diagonal of the foreground
being in shadow.

Best regards
Peter

[GeneW]

Peter you have some spectacular scenery to shoot! I wouldn't mind walking a dog there!

Nice shots!

Gene