Cloud City

I think it might be time for a flashback to elementary school and a pop quiz.  Here's the question, it's not really difficult.  You're in the process of recovering from a rather long bout of the flu.  You find yourself with a day off.  Do you, A)Stay at home and take it easy or B)Go outside in the -20 degree weather to take some photographs?  If you chose 'A', you probably made the right choice that 9-out-of-10 television doctors would prescribe.  I, however, am not always known for making the right decision, so I chose 'B'.  It was the second cold snap, or I guess the new buzzword is 'Polar Vortex', of the winter and I had missed out on taking some photographs the first time because I was doing the 'Day Job'.  I really wanted to make my way down to the St. Lawrence river in order to take some pictures of the vapour coming up off of the water.  Last year, I posted a photograph that I had taken a few years before on a similarly cold day.  However, I was always a little disappointed with it because there was no vapor on the water.  This time I had all of the vapour I could have wanted and then some.  I began my morning by dragging my butt out of my warm and comfy bed and then putting on as many layers as possible.  A brisk Metro ride and walk later, and I found myself  back on Île Sainte-Hélène, at the exact same spot where I had taken some photographs of the fireworks a few weeks before.  As I had hoped, there was lots of vapour coming up off of the river, thick enough at times to block out the buildings of Montreal just across the water.  The vapour was so thick at times that you could see the shadows from some of the waterfront statues actually climb the vapour as if it was a wall.  You can see an example of this in my third photograph.  The other thing that I really like about these cold days is how blue the sky gets.  I really like the blue of the sky on these freezing cold mornings.  I almost didn't get any photos at all.  As soon as I got to the waterfront, I took my camera out of it's bag and I couldn't adjust either the aperture or the shutter speed.  I was able to change shooting modes, but not the settings.  After a couple of minutes of swearing under my frosty breath, I took out the batteries and held them in the palms of my hands for a little bit (thanks for the tip Pierre).  I put the batteries back in the camera and thankfully everything began to work properly once again.  Well, except for dust spots.  For an example of what Montreal would look like with the Chicken Pox, keep on reading.  The original plan was to just get some shots from the waterfront and head back to the comfort of home.  However, since I was already on the island, I decided to hit a couple of sites I've been to before and take a couple of extra photographs before calling it a day.  After all, it was only -28C with the wind.  The first photograph was taken at f/4.5, 1/640sec, ISO 100 at 24mm.  The second photograph was taken at f/2.8, 1/2000sec, ISO 100 at 65mm.  Photograph number three was taken at f/2.8, 1/2000sec, ISO 100 at 25mm.  The fourth picture was taken at f/13, 1/320sec, ISO 100 at 24mm and the fifth photograph was taken at f/10, 1/200sec, ISO 100 at 24mm.  I tried playing around with different camera speeds in order to create different effects with the vapour.  Some of the shots taken at slower speeds kind of make the vapour come a little more alive as the slower speeds captures more of it's movement.  Had I brought a tripod with me, I could have probably used some longer speeds, but the sun was very bright so I would run the risk of over exposing the photos.  I'm still happy with the shots I came home with.  Just to finish us up, here's a panorama style shot that I like to make.  It was shot at f/13, 1/80sec, ISO 100 at 24mm.  For those of you who have stuck around, here's the dusty shot of Montreal.  I used the Levels tool in Photoshop to make the dust more clear.  I clean my lenses every time that I use them, I use a hand blower to clean the sensor on the camera, but my dust problems only seem to be getting worse.  If any of you have any tips, feel free to let me know.