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Sunset Off of North Inner Pier in Ludington

More and more often I find myself lying on my stomach to make my photographs. Getting extremely low to the ground or water gives me a fresh perspective on the world and it ensures that my photographs have immediacy which adds emotional impact and drama to a photograph.

Sky Drama

Ludington North Pier Light

Spotted Redone

Ion Blasts Ludington

The moon setting over the Ludington North Breakwater Light is a view that I never get tired of trying to capture. At first glance you would think this was another sunset photograph until you look at the amount of light hitting the front of the lighthouse. As the sun is coming up, the moon is setting in the distance.

It was a great sailing day in Ludington today. With a stiff and steady wind, I watched several sailboats cruising the lakeshore. I was geeked when one of the bigger sailboats decided to pass the pier heads under full sail.

By using the full manual exposure mode on my camera, I set my shutter speed to a half second so that the motion of the rolling waves would show up in my photograph. With the camera on a sturdy tripod, the rocks and snow in the foreground are both razor sharp because they never moved, but the rolling ice in the channel showed motion.

Amidst the Fury

Totality

Lighthouse and Badger

This scene would look very flat and two-dimensional most days. Except for a few fleeting moments today, the light and shadows cooperated and turned the Ludington shoreline into a beautiful arrangement of lines, shapes, textures, and colors that appears to be much more three-dimensional.

Turbulence in Paradise

Badger Mirage

Like a giant teapot in a tempest, the Ludington North Breakwater Lighthouse is almost completely engulfed in a roiling sea at the height of a November 1, 2020, storm. I observed this storm for more than three hours, photographing during times of peak waves and peak light. The light in particular changed dramatically. This was one of the rare moments when the waves were the brightest and the storm clouds the darkest. I watch and wait a lot, yet try to remain always ready to trip the shutter.

Wearing my life jacket and ice grippers on my boots this morning, I slowly walked and crawled my way out to the Ludington North Breakwater Light to photograph. My local knowledge and experience had taught me that if I got close enough to the lighthouse, I would probably see a reflection of it on the ice. As expected, the reflection was there. Now all I had to do was wait for the big splash. As you can imagine, I got very wet and cold.

Sunset on the 4th of July

Carferry in Fog