Pelican above the bluffs

Walked down to the pier on a gloomy day while my car was in the shop. People were pretty good at spreading out and wearing masks (prob. because the city started fining people back in summer).

Among other shorebirds, I saw a group of a half dozen pelicans whirling around and diving for fish.

#birds #sky #pelican #photo #gloomy

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On iNaturalist (crop)

A bright sundog next to a glass-sided building

A bright #sundog next to a glass-sided building. The sun is off to the left out of frame. The sundog had a bit more color and more of the spectrum in it as seen through my polarized sunglasses, so I kind of wish I'd taken a shot through one of the lenses, but at least you can see how bright it was. I haven't adjusted the color on this image at all - except for cropping, it's straight out of my phone. #sky #halo

A bright #sundog next to a glass-sided building. The sun is off to the left out of frame. The sundog had a bit more color and more of the spectrum in it as seen through my polarized sunglasses, so I kind of wish I'd taken a shot through one of the lenses, but at least you can see how bright it was.

I haven't adjusted the color on this image at all – except for cropping, it's straight out of my phone.

#sky #halo

On PixelFed.Social

Fragments of a circumhorizon arc

Cirrus clouds/contrails above a spiky plant, with a rainbow-colored section of cloud.

Cirrus clouds/contrails above palm trees, with two sections of cloud in rainbow-like colors.

Fragments of a #CircumhorizonArc seen on my way back from lunch today. I took some shots with my phone, because that's what I had, then remembered that I had the good camera with me and grabbed it from the office. The clouds had shifted, but not far enough to destroy the effect completely.

#halos #rainbow #clouds #sky

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On Twitter

Oh, and saturation has been enhanced on both photos to bring out the colors.

On Pixelfed.Social

Just realized: autocorrect turned “cirrus clouds” into “citrus clouds” in the image descriptions. Yes, both of them.

On Pixelfed.Social
Expanded on K2R
On Flickr: single
On Flickr: double

Some recent sun halo displays I’ve seen in the last 2 weeks

Some recent sun #halo displays I’ve seen in the last 2 weeks: An upper tangent arc (my first!), the top edges of a circumscribed and 22° circular halo, and most of a 22° circular halo (with bonus contrail shadow on the cloud layer!)

All shot on my Pixel 2 with levels adjusted.

These are all formed by reflection and refraction of light in ice crystals. (A great reference: https://www.atoptics.co.uk/halo/common.htm )

Also, all seen from Los Angeles, which isn’t freezing…at ground level.

#Photography #sky

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See-through skyscraper?

See-through skyscraper?

See-through skyscraper?

#building #reflection #sky

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On Photog.Social

Comments on Facebook:

Don Anthony
Is that close to LAX? It’s the best place for invisible buildings.

Kelson Vibber
Yeah, right on Century. Tall buildings on one side of the street, short on the other.

Ice crystals in a cirrus cloud reflect sunlight at exactly the right angle to produce …

Ice crystals in a cirrus cloud reflect sunlight at exactly the right angle to produce a feathery rainbow effect. in ideal circumstances, a circumhorizon arc can stretch all the way around the sky, parallel to the horizon, but usually it’s only seen in fragments like this. I’ve only seen a few of these, and it’s been years since I’ve seen one this intense (even without taking the photo through my polarized sunglasses).

A more commonly-seen 22 degree circular halo surrounds the sun at the top of the frame, and a contrail cuts thorough the scene

On Tumblr

eighteenbelow says:
Gorgeous photo! I have a lot of trouble photographing these kind of phenomena, so I really admire this.

Thanks!

I’m surprised it came out as well as it did. If I’d had my better camera with the zoom lens, I would have gotten some better shots of just the bright cloud – but then I wouldn’t have been carrying it with me to lunch, and the colors were gone in the time it would have taken to run back in and get it. So it’s probably just as well I stayed and watched instead.

(Also, I wasn’t sure I’d gotten the shot at all. My phone locked up and I couldn’t be sure it had saved the picture. Someone nearby who was also watching it offered to send me his picture, which ended up taking a few hours to work its way through the cell network, but by then I’d long since confirmed that my own shots had been saved.)

Sun halo fragments, clockwise from upper left…

Sun halo fragments, clockwise from upper left: A sundog to the left of the sun, part of a 22° circular halo to the right, and what I think is part of a parhelic circle in the opposite direction. I’ve seen the first two often enough, even here in #losangeles, but this is the first time I’ve seen the latter, which is a white circle that appears at the same altitude as the sun. #Halos like these are caused by reflections inside ice crystals, sometimes near the ground and sometimes in the upper atmosphere. #sky

Sun halo fragments, clockwise from upper left: A sundog to the left of the sun, part of a 22° circular halo to the right, and what I think is part of a parhelic circle in the opposite direction. I’ve seen the first two often enough, even here in #losangeles, but this is the first time I’ve seen the latter, which is a white circle that appears at the same altitude as the sun. #Halos like these are caused by reflections inside ice crystals, sometimes near the ground and sometimes in the upper atmosphere. #sky

On Instagram

Puffy clouds and reflections. The holes in the side of the building are for a major remodel. They just took down a plywood and scaffolding garbage chute that ran down the outside of the building.

Puffy clouds and reflections. The holes in the side of the building are for a major remodel. They just took down a plywood and scaffolding garbage chute that ran down the outside of the building.

Puffy clouds and reflections. The holes in the side of the building are for a major remodel. They just took down a plywood and scaffolding garbage chute that ran down the outside of the building.

On Instagram