Tag: Lake Michigan

Time-lapse of clouds and water

February 13, 2018
cloudsenvironmenteveningfilmGreat Lakes ProjectLake MichiganLake MichiganLighthouse Beachnature photographyRichard Mack PhotographyThe Sweetwater SeasThe Sweetwater Seastime-lapsewaterwaterwaves

 

I’ve been shooting time-lapse for awhile now and am always amazed at how cool it can be when you see the final results. Working on The Sweetwater Seas – A Documentary About the Great Lakes,  I have done a fair amount of time-lapse with moving clouds, stars and the water. The other day here in Evanston it was cloudy and very windy until about an hour before sunset when the clouds started breaking apart and moving out over Lake Michigan. I ran down to Lighthouse Beach to try a time-lapse but this time using a 1 second exposure to make the waves smoother and the clouds wispy as they moved across the sky. It was a nice result which I shall use more in the future – maybe even with longer exposures of 5-10 seconds. As those who shoot either still images or time-lapse, which after-all is just a collection of still images shot at a timed interval, shooting at sunrise / sunset can be a difficult exposure challenge as the light changes. There are cable releases now that you can tie into your cellphone, tablet or laptop which can allow you to ramp the exposures along the way but I didn’t use that this time as it is new to me. I did adjust the exposures over time by 1/3 of a stop and then in Lightroom adjusted the images even more to even out the exposures even more.

The tech specs. The camera is the Canon 5D Mark IV with the 16-24 F2.8 lens. The exposures ranged from 1 second at F19 to f11. There are 538 images. Each shot was 3 seconds apart so with a 1 second exposure there is 2 seconds between shots. It took 27 minutes to shot this 20 second time-lapse which is at 24 frames er second.

One more thing about shooting a time-lapse is the perspective it gives you. Once you have set everything up and started the camera shooting it becomes your time. Instead of constantly looking for the next image you can just sit there and quietly reflect on what nature is putting in front of you. A peaceful time for me when sitting by the Great Lakes. This was no different. I also had the place almost to myself as only a few folks came down walking there dogs or at the halfway point of a run they were doing. All stopped and gazed at the sunset as well before returning to whence they had come from. People enjoy the Great Lakes – a precious resource for us all.

 

Shooting Farms in Wisconsin

June 7, 2017
Aerial PhotographyAgriculturealgae bloomsdroneenvironmentGreat Lakes ProjectLake Michigannutrient runoffRichard Mack's BlogThe Sweetwater SeasThe Sweetwater Seas

Last week we shot for our documentary The Sweetwater Seas – North America’s Great Lakes up in Wisconsin to continue our story on the nutrient runoff affecting the Great Lakes. Greenbay has an algae bloom like Saginaw Bay’s and Lake Erie’s. In Greenbay there is almost an annual dead zone where nothing grows as a result of the algal blooms. Farmers are working with the Natural Resources Conservation Services as part of the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative to mitigate the nutrient runoff. We were at Brickstead Dairy, a family-owned farm in its fifth generation that is a demonstration farm for other farmers and the public to see what types of different agricultural practices might help the situation. We were there to shoot them planting into the fields that were protected by cover crops all winter, which helps preserve the soil while improving its biology so that it more readily accepts the moisture from snow and rain. I have done a lot of farm projects over the years for CaseIH and Caterpillar Tractor, but now we were shooting video and using a drone to get the aerials we wanted. Even with 15-mile-per-hour winds the Solo drone by 3DR was rock steady in the air as we shot 4K video on a beautiful day. We also put a GoPro on the planter down low to see a different angle as the planter went through the fields of cover-crop rye.

Now to assemble all these shots into the storyline for this segment of the film. Stay tuned!

Cheers,

Richard

Blizzard Conditions on the Great Lakes

February 4, 2015
Great Lakes ProjectLake MichiganLake MichiganLighthouse BeachRichard Mack PhotographyWinter photography

Lighthouse Beach Blizzard 20150202-0001

True winter weather has hit the Chicago area finally this winter. It made me take up the camera to get some video for The Sweetwater Seas documentary I ma filming currently for both TV and a book. While I try and prepare myself for the conditions I did forget to bring along my pair of ski goggles which would have made it much easier! The wind was howling so load and fast it was difficult to keep going. I would stop for a few minutes to film and when I turned around my footprints had vanished beneath the snow. No trace of me walking out there – a true Leave No Trace afternoon. Above is a still image from the day but you can see a few of the video clips I have put together by using the link below.

http://www.mackphoto.com/Creative/video-LighthouseBeachBlizzard.php

You can also see an updated folder of still images from the Great Lakes Project The Sweetwater Seas on my website at  http://www.mackphoto.com/Creative/greatlakes.php

And see the trailer for The Sweetwater Seas on my website under the Video tab: http://www.mackphoto.com/Creative/video-Sweetwater_Seas.php

Enjoy!

Richard

Changes in the Great Lakes Water Levels

October 17, 2014
Great Lakes ProjectLake MichiganLighthouse BeachRichard Mack PhotographyThe Sweetwater SeasThe Sweetwater Seas
Lighthouse Beach Moonrise, Lake Michigan
November 2012

Over the last few years if you live along Lake Michigan or Lake Huron you’ve probably noticed a big swing in the water levels and therefore the size of the beaches. Why both of these lakes? They are the same body of water only separated by the Mackinaw Straights. And while the other lakes have also been higher than they have been since 1998 they are at different elevations from Lake Michigan and Huron.

Here is a graphic view of the changes in Lake Michigan & Huron’s water level as see at Lighthouse Beach in Evanston, Illinois. These lakes have reached their highest levels since 1998 but are still 3” lower than the average in August. In the past year and a half the lakes have gone from their low level in January 2013 to the high level in August. These images show a pretty good range in the levels using the old pier as the visual barometer.

October 2014
October 2014

As I have shot at this pier since 2003 as part of my personal work and more often as part of the Great Lakes Project The Sweetwater Seas, I have been interested in the ebb and flow of the water levels and the amount of beach I could see. As you can see there was a difference from the low in November 2012 and May 2013 (around the lowest period) where the sand stretched out about 20 feet more. The images also show you the way the water covers or doesn’t cover the old piers pilings as well. In nature nothing stays the same for very long.

Why has there been so much fluctuation? Because over the past 18 months we had a winter where close to 95% of all the surfaces on the Great Lakes were frozen over. Therefore the evaporation could not take place over the winter. And as we all know, this summer has been cooler and wetter than average. Making for a net gain in the amount of water in the Great Lakes Watershed.

Lake Michigan Water Levels

Enjoy,

Richard

The statistics came from the Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

All Images ©2014 Richard Mack.