Wednesday, July 20, 2005

Monsoon Sunsets


I've taken about 150 digital photos in the past three days.  The combination of great picture-taking conditions and serious sleep deprivation leaves me with even less ability than usual to pick and choose what I show you.  So this entry is going to have way too many pictures.  Sorry.

The reason I've been taking so many photos, aside from the Round Robin Photo Challenge, is that Tucson's had dramatic weather this week.  Ladies and gentlemen, we have a monsoon!  Quoting from the National Weather Service monsoon page:

The 2005 Monsoon began on July 18th, 2nd latest start.

That goes along with all sorts of records this year for having a long string of very hot days, almost all of them topping out at 110 or higher.

The monsoon, of course, is a seasonal weather pattern that brings moisture up from Mexico and the Pacific to fuel most of Tucson's annual rainfall. The web site I linked to above explains it better than I can. Basically, it means that for parts of July and August in Tucson, it frequently rains between five to seven PM, and occasionally at night.  Most of the rain falls on the mountains that ring the city, but sometimes we get a serious thunderstorm, with flash floods and power outages.

The monsoon brings clouds, of course, and clouds are fun to photograph, especially as part of a sunset.  So I've been taking a zillion pictures of clouds and sunsets, and even of darkness.

Monday evening, while waiting for chicken wings near Safeway:


One of a zillion sunset pictures from last night and the night before. This was the night before.

Monday's sunset reflected in an unrented storefront.

Tuesday evening at Boston Market, 22nd and Kolb:

Tuesday sunset from Boston Market

Windy night at Boston Market as the storm blows in.

The wind of the approaching storm toys with a promotional banner and a string of banner flags.

Boston Market again.

Sunset viewed from inside the restaurant.   I took at least a dozen pictures outside, too, but this one is more unusual.

  Here comes the rain!

And here comes the rain!

There was lightning in the distance all evening long, but not much rain.  I took about thirty pictures in five minutes around midnight, trying to catch lightning in a box.  None of the lightning was that great, I didn't get lucky, and the camera wasn't up to the challenge.  But I like this shot of the Safeway lot at midnight:

Safeway at midnight. That is not a lake!

The thing that looks like a lake is the roof of my car.

Here is the best of my lightning pictures, taken near my house when I got back from Safeway.  I fiddled with it to make it more visible.  It ended up looking a bit like Starry Night, except, you know, not very nice.

I had to lighten this a lot to make anything visible but the street lights.

The balls of light are street lights.

Wednesday evening:

Hansen's, 22nd and Wilmot

I took this picture more to capture the lights on the gas station than to photograph the sunset behind them.  The lights flared too much to look the way I wanted, but it's still kind of a neat shot.

in motion, 22nd and Wilmot.

Taken in motion after the light changed.

My street, post-Sunset.

Just past sunset on my street.

Cloudy dusk, Wednesday.

I took this one in front of my house at dusk.  Again, I lightened it a lot.

Weird.  In trying to be selective, I've left out almost all of the pictures I specifically set aside for tonight.  Oh, well!

Karen

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

    Beautiful ... just beautiful. It looks that like me, you have trouble narrowing your photos down to just one :-)
                                    *** Coy ***


Anonymous said...

Photography can be so fun, I have chased lots of sunsets and rainstorms, stood in the street to get a shot I'd die without.  Nature is the best model of all, eh?  Can't wait to see what else you're saving for later.  :)
Dawn

Anonymous said...

Glad you have Monsoon!
Sorting and selecting can be a strange process indeed. I often skip the photo I think I'll blog. Never really set until I convert it and upload it!

Anonymous said...

It's funny...since there are almost always clouds around here, I tend not to look at them unless I am a passenger in a car (looking for shapes in the clouds is one of my favorite "long car trip" activities).

Anonymous said...

Beautiful pictures. You are so talented.
Elisa