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Valdez Bow
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Valdez Bow

by Gary Minish

Gallery: Weekly ChallengePosted September 19, 2017123 views4 comments
It had been raining for days and finally the sun came out.  I was driving by the tide flats when it peaked through the clouds and lit up the grass and then it topped it off with a huge rainbow.  Fortunately I had my boots on because I had to slog out through the wet grass and tide flat muck to get the right perspective for  the rainbow.  I wanted to frame the town of Valdez with the rainbow, which is what you see here.  I didn't need a bunch of extra gray sky in the scene so I shot two horizontal frames and stitched them with AutoPanoGiga. In the version sized for my 4K monitor you can clearly see the buildings in the town and various seagulls in the sky.  They don't show up as much in the tiny size allowed for this site.

Sony a6300, SE1670Z@24mm, ISO-100, f/8.0, 1/1250. 2 frames, hand held.

Comments

4 comments
Comment posted by Mark Seaver on September 19, 2017 at 10:08 AM
A fine catch on the full angle rainbow, Gary, with a nice glow in the foreground grass.  You're right that Valdez is hard to see, but there' one gull in there catching the light that stands out well.
Registered on January 23, 2011, 1103 Posts, 17270 Comments
Comment posted by John Tobias on September 19, 2017 at 12:42 PM
A unique "Alaska" image!  It is a bit difficult to make out the town and gulls, but even so the tideflats and rainbow combine for a very nice image.  Good job on stitching hand held images.  TFS.
Registered on September 12, 2009, 2120 Posts, 6455 Comments
Comment posted by Wayne Jones on September 19, 2017 at 10:41 PM
What great fortune to catch the town under the rainbow!  I can see the buildings pretty well in the large version, as well as a few gulls (now that you told me what they are).  I bet people in Valdez (and visitors) would love to get a big print of this.  It could be just differences in monitors, but on my machine, this looks a bit brighter than I might expect (time to recalibrate).  I wonder if a bit more contrast (darker) might add more impact?
Registered on April 18, 2007, 953 Posts, 6435 Comments
Comment posted by Dennis Plank on September 24, 2017 at 6:44 PM
Very, very cool rainbow, Gary.  Worth slogging through the wetlands a bit.  I like the brightly lit mash with the dull hills in the bg.
Registered on January 28, 2008, 1767 Posts, 23192 Comments