Morning Shots in Phoenix

Keeping it Local

I didn't end up getting out of town this weekend. But, yesterday I did get up at 3 AM to go shoot some kind of pictures, and of course, my photography dog Elmer went with me.

I first thought of the Arizona Cardinals stadium, named "University of Phoenix Stadium" (UoP). It's a large building and in its short existence has become an easy to spot landmark along the Loop 101 that runs through Glendale, AZ. I notice it on my way to Cabela's which is near the UoP Stadium.

It's an interesting structure - not box shaped at all. It seems like it should yield some interesting photos of the curves, material, size, or something. I was hoping that it would give them up in the early morning.

On the way, I stopped and got a coffee from a gas station mart. I can't drink it right away due to the temperature so I put it in the cup holder in my Explorer.

Tail Lights

Instead of going right to the stadium, I decided to try a shot I've been wanting to try for some time - a long exposure of moving cars from an overpass above I-10. This particular overpass does not run all the way through - it provides an exit from, and entrance to, the H.O.V. lanes of I-10. And, it has area to park and take a picture from.

I'd never done it from there because my cheap tripod didn't have the feature required - an extension arm. The overpass is lined with chain link fence and I needed a way to get the camera close to the fence, suspended over the thick concrete wall, to allow me to point the lens through an opening in the fence. The Manfrotto 055XPROB works great for this with its center column in the horizontal position. I did find that I wish that I still had some way to more easily adjust the column vertically. Once the center column is in the horizontal position you have to adjust the tripod legs to change the vertical height and it was necessary to futz around a bit before the lens was centered on an opening in the fence.

Once the camera was positioned, the rest was pretty easy. I set the aperture to f/25. I just wanted to make sure I got sharpness from front to end. I didn't change it for any of the pictures I took; I'll go back sometime and try with a bit larger aperture like f/18 or so. I kept the ISO at 100 as usual, and by shooting the exposure at the sky, got a time of 30 seconds. No problem. Using my infrared remote, I let her fly.

While the camera was working, I went back to the Explorer and had a sip of coffee. The cup was leaking and it was hot on my little fingers. I had another empty cup in the car (that I keep for sunflower seed shells) so I put the coffee cup inside of it and went back to the camera.

I took about 6 shots total and decided to leave. They weren't turning out great - not because of the camera, but because at about 3:30 AM on Saturday there just wasn't much traffic. I'd envisioned a lot more tail lights in the picture.

University of Phoenix Stadium

I headed up the UoP and found a place to park. The large parking lots were actually gated - preventing me from getting any kind of distant shot unless I walked out there. I decided to shoot the main entrance where there is a large, illuminated Cardinal logo. I discovered that there were no easy or good shots for it. The trees around the main entrance had grown enough that any distant shots would have the logo obscured. It would likely have been poor from the far end of the parking lot too, since they are all on level ground.

And, there was an awning set up in front of the logo so taking the shot from ground level also wasn't great. I took a few shots anyway but it ended up being a waste of time. At least, I couldn't find any shots I thought were interesting.

I got back in the Explorer and took a sip of coffee. The coffee had leaked out inside the other cut and it made a nice large and hot spill on the front of my Cabela's shirt! That, along with the waste of time at the stadium, made me grumpy a bit.

Encanto Park

So, I decided to head to Encanto Park in the middle of Phoenix. I'd never stopped there before but I had driven by it. By the time we got there my shirt was fairly dry.

The park was wonderful. It was still nice and cool (I didn't look, but it was probably in the 70's which is great for Phoenix). I got my camera bag, tripod, and Elmer, and found the man-made lake. We got there about 5:00 AM or so, when it was still pretty dark, and there were people already there fishing or preparing to fish. My kind of folk!

I was able to get some pictures before the sun broke over the horizon, and really liked them. The park lights were still on and they ended up as a star-burst in the picture and I like it. There are a good number of bridges in the park, and they all appear to be unique. I shot pics of a few of them but now I know I have to go back. I left because even at maybe 6:30 AM there were enough people in the park that it was hard to get shots without people.

I also got some pictures of the many ducks at the park. They're fairly tame and used to humans so you can get pretty close without scaring them off. I also want to go back to try my had at more of those shots.

Overall, I really liked the Encanto Park pictures, and it's close to home, making it easy to get back there. You can see more of my pics on my online gallery at:

http://www.RandyMorter.com/photos.