Close, but no cigar

For months I've been trying to get a photograph of a jet, or any kind of plane, passing in front of the moon. I know it's been done before: check out this photo.

My best attempt so far was a near miss in August. I used a Digital Rebel and shot through my 100mm Orion refractor telescope.



I was too early and then too late. I've tried again since then, but have not seen an aircraft cross the moon. Maybe I should shoot near an airport instead of in front of my house.

Vacation photos

I've been on vacation the past week, and I've been taking lots of photos: photos at night, photos at dawn, and lots of fall folliage photos.
For months I've been wanting to get a photograph of a moonlight canal boat ride on the D&H Canal in Cuddebackville. Saturday night I did, sort of. The ride was over by the time I got there.



This picture was taken as people were leaving the boat for the night. I used a 25-second exposure with my Canon 20D. To light the boat and the trees on the left, I walked up to the boat and fired a flash: once at the boat and once at the trees.

I like the way the photo came out. But I think I dropped my compact flash card case that night in the dark. I went back early the next morning but could not find the case. I did decide to go to another location to take more photos.

I drove down Route 209 to Port Jervis and went to Point Peter, which overlooks the city. The fog from the Delaware and Neversink rivers was beautiful.



I'm going to try to get photos at another canal ride later this month. I might also try to get back to that spot above Port Jervis.

Welcome

For the past 25 years I've been a photojournalist at the Times Herald-Record in Middletown, N.Y. Fairly recently I've started taking more photographs for myself. This blog will be a place to show some of those photographs and talk about how and why they were taken.

As a staff photographer, the pictures I take for the newspaper are owned by the newspaper. And designers at the newspaper decide how the photos will look in print. That's why I like taking my own photographs.