My photog buddy and I got up at 4am to avoid the mass throngs of tourists and to be able to move quickly around to capture moments like this. After grabbing a bunch of pre-dawn shots in the Piazza San Marco, we rushed over to the Ponte dell'Accademia to catch the sunrise. The clouds were just picture perfect, lazily hanging in the air as if waking from a sleepy slumber. The canal was almost picture perfect still, a polar opposite of how it is during the day. The sun was slowly starting to make its rise, slowly creeping up from behind the horizon, warmly illuminating parts of buildings on the canal. These are the moments that make it worth the early AM rise, just to get that one amazing shot you'll remember a lifetime. Google Maps Location: http://goo.gl/OOlMl
While shooting time lapse with my main camera body in Arches National Park, I had rented a second camera so I could wander around and grab shots. The sunset was just getting to the best part, where there is an amazing blend of warm and vibrant red, orange and pink rays of light. Off on the horizon, the Windows section of the park is getting showered in an amazing menagerie of color, which includes the North and South Window, plus Turret and Double Arch. This tower here has no given name, like the Three Gossips or Courthouse Towers just out of frame, but is no less beautiful. There is no shortage of immense beauty like this in the park, for everywhere you look, you get to experience something like this. Arches National Park, Moab, UT Google Maps Location photo was taken from: https://goo.gl/Hkfr9U
The hike to Laguna Capri (2.5 miles), to make the morning sunrise on the face of Fitzroy, started at 4am in the morning, in the pitch dark, with torch lamps to illuminate the trail. I was gearing up to start on my own at the start of the trailhead, when I saw torch lamps off in the distance. A father daughter couple was doing the same exact thing as me. I joined up with them, which made the hike in the dark that much more fun, getting to know the two. One problem when we finally arrived lakeside, was that we had worked up a sweat for almost 2 hours hiking. Before the sun popped its head out, you were looking at about mid 40s, chilly, with lots of wind. We were jumping up and down to just keep the blood flowing. The moment the sun came up and illuminated the face, warmth began to spread onto us as well.