A winter storm advisory was forecasted for this morning, and stormy weather typically is accompanied by interesting cloud formations, so I headed to the lakefront to catch the sunrise today. My favorite subject at the lakefront is the Milwaukee Art Museum, and more specifically, the addition designed by Santiago Calatrava.

Predawn Calatrava

When I first arrived, just before sunrise, the sky was a mixture of reds, yellows, and blues – with the sun below the horizon, lighting the clouds from below. There’s still enough light at this time of day that you’re not stumbling around in the dark, however exposure times still need to be fairly long, requiring a tripod for a steady shot.  This picture was shot for 1/2 second at f/11 (ISO 200).

The reds and the blues in the sky lasted for only a few minutes, however, as the sun started to rise above the horizon. They were replaced by a gray sky with yellow  and orange highlights, as seen in my second shot here.

Calatrava at Sunrise

This picture was taken at the edge of the bridge that crosses Lincoln Memorial Drive, leading to the entrance of the art museum. The sun is higher here, and because it is a backlit scene, it’s very easy to expose for the sky and not the building, leaving an underexposed subject.

For this shot, I took multiple bracketed exposures, which I combined using HDR (high dynamic range) imaging software. I’ll write about this process in a future post, but essentially it provides a well-exposed picture even when there is an extreme range between the shadows (the building) and the highlights (the sun) in scene.

Three exposures were taken (1/4 s., 1/15 s., and 1/60 s.), all at f/11 (ISO 200).