God Rays and Jammed Tripod Heads

The weather forecast looked promising for god rays on Sunday morning, those shafts of light that pierce through the clouds like huge torch beams. It's difficult to predict when they will appear, although I always seem to see them when I'm in my car driving somewhere without the camera!
Early morning and early evening presents the best chance of getting them as the sun is low in the sky. Some broken mid-level cloud is also required to 'channel' the sunlight into thin beams, but you also need a dose of luck and to be in the right place at the right time!

I set the alarm for 5am (actually 6am with the clocks going back) although unknown to me the alarm on my mobile phone had corrected itself for daylight saving so when I stepped outside it was already getting light! First mistake of the day.



It's an hour's drive to the coast so by the time I got there the sun was already coming up. I wasn't too concerned as the cloud cover was quite thick so sunrise shots were out of the question anyway, so that left only god-ray shots to try for.
As I made my way between the slippery rocks onto the beach I could see shafts of light breaking through the clouds! My prediction was correct but I had to work quickly as the wind was picking up so the light would not stay that way for long.
I grabbed the camera and checked out a couple of possible compositions before setting up the tripod. Once happy I got the tripod into a rough position and then went to attached the camera to head. This is where mistake number two happened. The camera would not lock into the head. Now I don't use cheap camera gear, the head is a Manfrotto geared one which cost a lot of money, but for some reason the lever that locks the plate was stuck in the locked position. It wouldn't budge and was jammed solid as a rock. I looked up at the light and could see already the light was changing and the god rays were starting to disappear! I had to think quickly - waste time with the head or try balancing the camera on the tripod while hand holding it? I went for the latter.



I did manage to get a couple of shots, but due to the faffing about and low light and high winds many of the shots had obvious camera shake. I was very lucky to get any shots at all though. When I got home I dismantled the head and found that the spring under the lever had dirt and dried salt in it which had caused it to seize up completely. The moral of this story is that don't just check your camera, lenses and filters before you go out on a shoot, check your tripod and head too or you may miss the opportunity to get some amazing shots!

The Weather Guessing Game

Autumn is upon us once again and it's getting colder and darker in the mornings. I do love this time of year though, as it means that sunrise is now at a more respectable time. Now that's not to say that dragging myself out of bed on a cold dark Sunday morning at 5.30am is any easier, especially while everyone else is tucked up warm and snug in their beds! I'm always half tempted to bounce the alarm off the wall and turn back over, but I know that I'll hate myself later if I miss that beautiful pre-dawn light that I'm hedging my bets on will show itself.



It doesn't always work out like that though. You check the weather forecasts the day before and it looks promising, you check again at night and it still looks ok, you then wake up up at an ungodly hour and look out the window to see nothing but a blanket of low level cloud. How could the weather forecaster get it so wrong? or is this blanket of light choking cloud localised to my area? Do I risk an hour's drive to the coast only to find the same cloud cover there? It's the dilemma of every landscape photographer wishing to catch that fleeting beautiful light that welcomes the new day.



It's always a risk, as the light is never guaranteed anyway even if there is no low thick cloud cover. The best you can do is make an educated guess. Get it right and you have the potential to get some fabulous shots, get it wrong and you simply go home and have a nice big breakfast waiting for everybody else when they get up!