Occasionally, I jump in the car with my cameras and roam the Lake Michigan coast. I did the other day and ended up in Muskegon about 2 hrs north of Kalamazoo in the late afternoon. In addition to my usual collection of Nikon film cameras, I also had along a Nikon Coolpix 950 and grabbed a few shots of the Muskegon lights. These include the inner light at the Muskegon USCGS...



I'd never had the opportunity to walk out the breakwater to the breakwater light at its end, so I took the time to do that too.



I also ended up shooting some very high contrast shots of the south pier lights at Grand Haven on film, as well as the sunset from the beach to the south of the south pier as the sun is still setting well to the north of the pier and is presently going down between the inner and outer light when shot from the south. The angle is such that this is still pretty much a shot with a wide angle feel to it despite needing about a 200 mm lens because of the distance. I'll be back up there again week after next with Bill Taylor and Terry Forrest who are coming into town to photograph with me here in SW Mich for a week. If there are any others from the forums in the area who want to join the traveling circus for a session or whatever, you're more than welcome... e-mail me and we'll make some sort of arrangements to meet somewhere along the coast and we'll take it from there. I know we'll be shooting at St. Joe's while the sun is still in a decent location at sunset to give Terry and Bill a chance at some shots like "Fading Light." and who knows where else up and down the coast during the week. Anyway, I'll have the slides from GH back tomorrow so I'll add some additional posts to this thread later.

Gary

Gary, those are BEAUTIFUL pictures! I love the first one - The panoramic shot makes you feel like your right there look out your kitchen window at it. I wish I was up there, I would join the cirus! (My mom would be proud of me - she told me for years that I should join!) But I won't be in that area for a month and a half. DARN! Maybe one day I'll be there when you decide to do another roaming Lighthouse trip!

BJE

Great pictures as usual Gary. Thanks for sharing.

Be sure and let me know when you're up to Michigan, BonnieJean, especially if you have the opportunity to get over to the Lake Michigan or "sunset" side of the state while you're up here with your husand. Glad you like the photos. There are bunches more on this forum as well as on my website.

Thanks for the comments, Brian. I keep waiting to see more from you, hoping to see more of hte lights there in the area around the Chesapeake!

Gary

Gary, how far is the west coast from Detroit? It looks like I can pretty much take I94 all the way over to the other side. Will it be snowing by November? The more that I think about it, the more I am looking forward to getting some pictures of Lighthouses in the Snow! The red Lighthouses would look beautiful with the white snow falling around them. Are there any lighthouses open in your area around November, or do they all pretty much close around Labor Day?

BJE

Glad to see you not resting on your laurels! LOL
Great red of Grand Haven Light vs that spooky sky!
Bob

Fantastic pictures Gary. We really enjoy your postings.

John & Mary

Gary

Great shots, thanks for sharing. What kind of time frame are you looking at for St. Joe? We just might be able to get up there when you are there.

To answer BonnieJean, Old Michigan City Lighthouse is open in November. The hours are Tuesday thru Sunday 1:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m. Indiana time. Let me know when you might come and my wife and I would be glad to meet you there and give you a tour.

Thanks for your comments, everyone. I'm glad everyone is enjoy the pics posted on here... I certainly enjoy sharing them with all of my friends here. BTW, Bob, that's the Muskegon breakwater light against that sky above. The slides that I mentioned form Grand Haven I just picked up yesterday afternoon but haven't had time to scan any of them as yet, but they're coming and there were some really good shots in what I got back... some sunset stuff from South Haven earlier in the week last week along with the Grand Haven sunset from last Friday night!

Gary

Nice daytime shots Gary! What with all those sunrise and sunset photos I was beginning to think you may have been a vampire. Just kidding, your photos are all wonderful and I enjoy every one.

Thanks also for all the tips you and others give here in this forum. While most of them are way beyond me and my cameras I've still managed to learn a bit, such as not always putting your subject smack dab in the middle of your photo.

Hey Mombo, glad you find the tips on here helpful. Many of them are simple things we all need to be reminded of once in a while!

As for me being a vampire... I've been accused of worse you can be sure! Generally speaking, I don't photograph much at all during what you might call the "heat of the day" and that has nothing to do with temperature, but rather the quality of the light. If I'm doing serious photography, I'll start shooting when there's barely enough light to see until about 8 or 9 AM or so in the summer... a little later in the winter when the sun is at a much lower angle. I start shooting again in the evening about 2 hrs before sunset and will often shoot until 30-45 minutes after the sun has gone below the horizon. While it seems dark to our eyes, film records light in a cumulative manner so that if your camera can read the light levels to give you an accurate indication of what the expopsure time needs to be, you can take photographs in what is often beautiful light that is too dim for our eyes to enjoy otherwise. For me to go to exposure times that range from 4 to 8 MINUTES or occasionally longer, isn't uncommon at all.

As long as everyone enjoys my photography, I'll keep posting them here to share.

Gary

Well, I'm finally getting around to scanning a few of the slides I shot a little over a week ago when I started this thread. I don't know where the last week went... it sort of evaporated.

Anyay, here are a few sunset shots from Grand Haven. If anyone wants exposure data, let me know... I pulled all of it down from my F5's I'm just being lazy about not looking it up to include on here tonight.







And a couple more a different evening a week or so ago from South Haven... The pier that night was shoulder-to-shoulder with people watching the sunset!



But after most of the "show" was over, far fewer people stayed to enjoy it. I was still shooting from up on the bluff when the catwalk lights came one making for quite a show photographically.



Gary

Fantastic stuff once again !!

Definitely great stuff, Gary! But then we also had great light when you, Bill Taylor, Mark Cassino and I were at Grand Haven with Toni Lankerd looking on!! Great waves, too!

Sometimes it's fun to just jump in the car and drive. I've done that myself, it's a great way to unwind after a stressful week. And of course the icing on the cake is when you get pictures like these. Very nicely done.
One friday I found myself at White River, which is about 3 hours from my home. I was there for all of five minutes before it started to rain. Hard. That caused some stress, but at least I got to photograph a new light. I'll scan one of the decent photos and post it in a new thread shortly.