The calm before the rain storm.

In another few hours it will start raining. I’m writing this after the fact not knowing exactly when it’ll start and how much it rains but what I did know is that we needed the rain.

When we go from dry to wet the sunsets before are pretty spectacular.

Sunset July 20, 2017

I do my best to capture what it looks like around here when the sky changes during the golden hour of dusk. The photo is nothing like standing around here watching the hues change from harsh light to pastel. Then the light fades into infrared glow and then, around here at least, total darkness.

Surface of Jupiter? Or hay field?

No, just some hay bales from 400 feet above.

20 years ago I wracked my brain trying to figure out how to get a camera elevated to take some photos. I figured that the view up there with a still camera that could be somehow controlled would make for interesting photography.

My process was a complicated and unscientific process involving a big kite and a windy day; the polar opposite of what I do today. But I kept trying because I just knew there would be interesting photography up there. I knew this because I flew an airplane and wanted a way to capture the beauty of what I saw when I flew.

My ideas didn’t amount to much. Most of the photography I have is from a camera in my hand while at the controls of an aircraft flying over 100 miles an hour. Hardly stationary but with some work I could get the photos I was looking for. But boy was it expensive and time consuming.

I’m glad I was able to see this process unfold in my lifetime. This is a view you can only get from a stationary platform relatively close to earth but high enough to see the contrast that will tell a story.

The photo above is a story of mid-summer harvest. The fruit of someone’s planning. Some of the bales are new and some are from the last harvest. Still, there must be a need for this stored energy.

They made hay while it was dry and made some interesting etching on the earth in the process.

It would rain the next day. Four inches of rain fell from the sky and turned everything deep green again around here.

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