Early on a Foggy Morning

I’ve often wanted to wake up and get out of the house early enough to capture some photos of fog.  I saw a photo that a friend took not too long ago, of a foggy wooded landscape, and that re-motivated me!  A few weeks ago, fog was predicted for the next morning on the evening weather report.  I set my alarm, woke up early, checked the weather and fog was indeed reported all over the local area.  I dressed and ran out only to find the fog dissipating in front of my eyes!  Last week, another forecast, and once again I awoke early, the fog was out there, I jumped in the car and ran out.  This time I was successful!

A foggy bog

This first photo was taken of a foggy bog on River Road in Willoughby Hills, OH.  I applied an oil painting filter to it in Photoshop, just to add some texture to an otherwise mostly gray scene.

Rays of sunlight through the lifting fog.

This second shot was taken as the fog was starting to lift.  I found this scene in the North Chagrin Reservation of the Cleveland Metroparks.

The third shot was captured on the edge of the foggy bog pictured above.  I saw a number of spider webs, mostly attached to unsightly road signs and poles.  But this one was attached to some of the vegetation and had a non-distracting background that I was able to blur by using a large aperture.

Foggy morning web.

The web was beautiful in the soft light of the foggy morning!

I found that shooting fog is an elusive subject.  It comes and goes quickly.  I passed up one scene thinking I would come back to it.  I came back and it was gone!  Carl Sandburg had it right when he wrote this poem, “Fog” in 1916:

The fog comes
on little cat feet.
It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.