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Friday, May 16, 2008 - 9:34PM 
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Clear skies?
A welcome break in the clouds arrived this evening. IR satellite seems to indicate we may stay clear through the night, with even a nice sunrise on tap for tomorrow before the clouds return. With clearing skies at night after days of rain, fog is a near certainty tonight. Whether or not it will be the photogenic valley-hugging fog remains to be seen - but it looks like I'll have a reason to wake up early tomorrow.
The following scene is looking west from the Trace Fork shopping center on Corridor G on Friday evening.
Friday, May 16, 2008 - 5:12PM
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In the depths of an upper trough
Coming to you today from Seattle, West Virginia in our third consecutive day of cloudy rain and overcast (with at least four more to go, if the forecast is correct). Nothing's more of a bummer after getting a new camera than having a deep, slow-moving upper trough move in, locking in a pattern like this for over a week. I did get the nice day on Tuesday, but since then I haven't had the benefit of sunlight and blue sky to really try out the new 75-300 lens. Today it was the evil upslope drizzle - which means even when the rain stops, a fine mist continuously falls and floats around. These little droplets seek out and stick to every object in sight. Take a pressure washer and shoot it straight up into the air, and you've recreated these conditions. It's the kind of thing that you can't quite run your windshield wipers, but you can't leave them off either - constantly having to adjust the intermittent setting to keep the windshield clean.
You can't take a camera outside in these conditions without the lens immediately getting assaulted, so the new Canon has been mostly sitting idle. On my way home from business meetings today, I shot a few frames from inside my car of the ivy at my Grandmother's house in Dunbar. There are probably more rainy weather subjects to find out there, but I guess I'm not inspired enough now to go looking.
Friday, May 16, 2008 - 12:23AM
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A light at the end of the eastern trough?
GFS 500mb forecast for May 24
 To the joy of chasers across the Plains, the GFS model is finally starting to show signs of losing its argument with the ECMWF model. The European model continues to be steadfast about the return of a western trough and a good chasing pattern starting next week. It's still too early to get too overly excited, but the signs so far have been encouraging.
Slashed tour rates: With us being over the halfway mark for the 2008 chase season and with a good pattern starting to show up on the horizon, I've temporarily priced the guided tour services to sell! At the late-season rate of $20 a day, the data services alone are worth the guide fee. This pricing option won't be available next year, so if you or someone you know has considered a chase trip of their own, this is your opportunity!
Based on the current outlook, this probability table charts the chance of our trip starting on a particular date:
| 2008 Chase Expedition - Departure Date Probability as of May 16 |
| May 9-25 | 20% | |
| May 26-June 15 | 20% | |
| No trip | 60% | |
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Thursday, May 15, 2008 - 12:40PM
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HD video: Kanawha Falls after heavy rains
During my quick trip up to the Gorge on Tuesday, I stopped at Kanawha Falls and grabbed a few shots. The river was running about 2 to 3 feet higher than normal due to recent rains. Not a flood by any means, but enough to make an impressive scene. Kanawha Falls is actually a hybrid natural/man-made landmark, with a concrete low-head dam meandering along the top of the falls. This creates a reservoir that was once used to drive a small hydroelectric plant (visible in the old brick buildings on the left).
HD VIDEO: Kanawha Falls after heavy rains
 | Looks like someone is (ENJOYING) his new camera :)
- Posted by Mick from United Kingdom | |  | |
Thursday, May 15, 2008 - 10:20AM
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A tale of two models
GFS 500mb forecast for May 25
Two popular long-range forecast models I watch with regularity are the GFS and the ECMWF (the 'European' model), both with output to ten days (the GFS goes out to 14). As you've heard me say a million times, long range models are notoriously erratic the farther out you go, so much so that some meteorologists and chasers refuse to even look at them. However, if the same pattern forecast shows up over and over again each time the model is run, this consistency indicates a better probability that the forecast may actually have a chance of happening. Now - once a model is consistent over a period of days, then you compare its output to a 'competing' model. If they are in even slight agreement, then you've got an even more confident forecast (relatively speaking, as you'll rarely use the word 'confident' in any discussion of long-range forecasts).
The past few days, both the GFS and the ECMWF have been remarkably consistent in their forecasts. That's good, right? Well normally yes, but not this time - for late next week, they are (consistently) forecasting completely opposite patterns for the continental US - something I haven't seen in the time I've been chasing! The GFS wants to shut down the 2008 chase season, keeping a huge eastern trough and northwesterly flow over the Plains. The ECMWF, however, wants to bring a week of dream chase days, placing a huge western trough in a place that will ensure tornadoes happening daily somewhere in the central US.
When models are so consistent and yet so diametrically opposed to each other, there is little that a chaser can do but just wait. Eventually, one of the models will concede to the other's pattern. So which one win the battle this time? The European model is the favored one in situations like these, but such a strong signal on the GFS for the opposite to happen can't be ignored.
As for my chase plans - as you've seen, the DSLR won out this week over a trip. That will do it for my Plains chasing budget this spring, and therefore also my plans for an expedition. The tour option is still open - and therefore I'll still leave that possibility reflected in the departure probabilities.
Based on the current outlook, this probability table charts the chance of our trip starting on a particular date:
| 2008 Chase Expedition - Departure Date Probability as of May 15 |
| May 9-25 | 2% | |
| May 26-June 15 | 8% | |
| No trip | 90% | |
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| I came to the same conclusion... but I am keeping my fingers crossed for a ECMWF solution. Didn't get to go out last year and really hoping for a chase time this year.
- Posted by Brian from Atlanta | | | |
Thursday, May 15, 2008 - 9:58AM
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7-day eastern trough forecast
This is what happens with an eastern upper air trough:
Wednesday, May 14, 2008 - 8:56PM
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Van De Graaff photo session 1
Shot at ~250mm at ISO 400, F5.6, ten seconds each. These sparks are between 6 and 8 inches long and are jumping to my forearm. The generator will produce brighter, shorter sparks or longer, dimmer ones. The dimmer ones are more lightning-like, with jagged channels and extensive branching. The branching is too faint to show up on the exposures, but is visible to the eyes. (Click on each photo to enlarge)
Crop of second image above (notice radial pattern at the spark contact points, similar to what lightning does at the ground):
Wednesday, May 14, 2008 - 6:01PM
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300mm in Spring Hill Cemetery
More 300mm handheld tests from the cemetery. I haven't even started to delve into editing the RAW files yet (some of these could use some adjusting). These are just test shots that I don't feel like spending time perfecting. These are clickable for larger versions.
C-130 circling:
Tops of downtown buildings:
| Dan,
Love the new camera pictures! In case you're interested the bird perched on the tombstone is an eastern phoebe. Hope to see you soon!
- Posted by Katie from Melrose, MA | | | |
Wednesday, May 14, 2008 - 2:28PM
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Canon 12.2mp vs Fujifilm 7.1mp; and new lens
It's a good thing I went out shooting yesterday, because the sky conditions have gone to total junk around here for the next week or so (rainy and overcast). Consequently I won't be doing much outdoor shooting unless the off chance happens that we get some lightning (which I doubt at this point). One comparison test I wanted to do with my old and new cameras was with distant summer foliage. Here is a wide shot out of my living room window with my old point-and-shoot, the 7.1mp FujiFilm s700:
Not too bad, aside from the glaring chromatic abberation in the trees on the sides. But looking at the image at full resolution is where things don't look so good. This camera has had problems on the fine scale, particularly in detail-intense scenes like this. The distant foliage is rendered in an impressionist painting-like manner - with a good bit of fine detail lost. Here is a full-rez crop:
Same scene with the XSi, wide at 18mm:
Full-rez crop:
I realized yesterday in my day of test shooting that I wasn't going to be able to do without a telephoto lens of some sort, and was going to have to buy one sooner than later. So, I stopped in at Merrill's this morning to try out the Canon EF 75-300. I mainly wanted to see if I could manage handheld shots at 300mm without image stabilization (The IS 70-300 lens is about $650 new, while the non-IS EF is $179). The nice thing about camera shops, again, is that you can test drive before you buy. I went outside on Hale Street and took a few shots at the lens' full 300mm zoom length:
Satisfied with the non-IS results, I went ahead and picked it up (I wouldn't have been able to afford nor justify the IS 70-300 anyway). So the DSLR package is pretty complete now - I don't expect I'll need any more than this for a long time.
Since the weather outside is dull for the forseeable future, I may fire up the Van de Graaff generator tonight for some indoor lightning photography. I wouldn't consider doing this without the zoom lens where I can set the camera up across the room, out of the danger zone. Stay tuned for the results...
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