I can see for miles.........

and miles and miles and miles......................

I've been looking at some old film scans, and here's one from November 1988.
On the way from Honister to Great Gable my friend Mark pauses to look along Buttermere, Crummock Water and Lowes Water, through the Vale of Lorton, across the North Cumbrian plain and the Solway Firth to the distant Scottish hills.

Please post your own 'long views'.


Regards,

Stuart

That Khaki is a perfect camouflage! Be back soon for the picture itself! What's the story? Who's is that young lady?

Asher

A powerful, and ultimately rather destructive, summer storm front rolling over Chicago's Grant Park and Monroe Harbor, Friday, June 14, 2010.

The view is looking south over Lake Shore Drive. The shower in the distance is in far south Chicago approaching the Indiana border. The bright spots in the water are some of the most powerful micro-downbursts of wind I've ever seen. I honestly thought that some of those boats would be capsized.

(Mamiya 645 AFDIII with a PhaseOne P65+)

Looking east over Lake Michigan towards Indiana as a winter storm slides overhead. The tiny puffs on the horizon are from an Indiana power station on the other side of the Lake.

(Canon 1Ds Mark III)

Here's a "long view" of a couple of Colorado's "fourteeners".
Mount Massive is center frame at 14,421 feet and to the right is Mount Elbert at 14,433 feet.
This view is from just outside Leadville Colorado.
I shot this in April 2007 while trekking through the Rockies.
A spontaneous two week adventure after a business trip to Denver.
Beautiful scenery, damned cold and tough on the lungs.

Ken I am currently away from home on business and staying in Erie, PA with nothing but my little netbook but I must say even on this small screen your thunderstorm image is magnificent. I cannot wait to get back home so I can see it larger. What a great vantage point you had.
James

Wow, some impressive long views here!


Quite humble by comparison is this view of the Illinois River floodplain in Putnam County, Illinois taken from the top of a 30 foot tall observation tower several days ago. For many years water was constantly being pumped out to make way for row crop farming, but this was stopped about six years ago. It has since returned to its natural function as floodplain, and its bird population increases every year.

On this side of the pond the nation has breathed a collective sigh of relief and things have returned to relative normality.

That Khaki is a perfect camouflage! Be back soon for the picture itself! What's the story? Who's is that young lady?

Click to expand...

Asher, I'd like to hear your opinion. No real 'story', just a shot taken at a natural stopping place to admire a great view. In those days my main goal was the walking, so photography only happened at *** breaks.
I've no idea who the older couple and young lady were. They just happened to be admiring the same view as we were. They do however add to the image in terms of the 'looker'.
In fact that's what I'd hoped for - photos of people looking at views rather than the views themselves. No matter, I've seen some great images from Ken, John and Tom which I'd not otherwise have seen.

Ken,
I love a good storm as long as it's not too close. NIMBY (not in my back yard) we say over here to describe things we approve of as long as they're not too close.

John,
Lovely shot. Yup, it looks cold. These days my knees give out before the lungs, but only just.......

Tom,
Nothing humble about that. It reminds me of me 'home' in the fen country of Cambridgeshire (east England) Flat, grass, water, a few trees and big skies.

Regards,

Stuart

*** f a g , slang for cigarette.

StuartRae said:

and miles and miles and miles......................

I've been looking at some old film scans, and here's one from November 1988.
On the way from Honister to Great Gable my friend Mark pauses to look along Buttermere, Crummock Water and Lowes Water, through the Vale of Lorton, across the North Cumbrian plain and the Solway Firth to the distant Scottish hills.

Click to expand...

I have been troubled by this picture Stuart since you posted it since I couldn't imagine that this is how it was framed. I felt that it would have been so easy to have excluded the watcher on the right or allowed space in the foreground and to the right to allow for his civil and welcome arrival to the picture frame. After all, he climbed all this way too. So I'd love you to post the original!

Asher

Hi Asher,

I have been troubled by this picture Stuart since you posted it since I couldn't imagine that this is how it was framed. I felt that it would have been so easy to have excluded the watcher on the right or allowed space in the foreground and to the right to allow for his civil and welcome arrival to the picture frame. After all, he climbed all this way too. So I'd love you to post the original!

Click to expand...

As requested in your PM, a new thread here

Regards,

Stuart

To distract myself after the football, here's another shot of an observer admiring the view.

This is Bill looking down into Langstrath from Stake Pass, taken on November 5th 1995.


You can just see where the path crosses Langstrath Beck at the footbridge 1/2 way up and 1/3 from the RHS. Having reached this you breathe a sigh of relief that the worst of the descent is over, but then realise why Langstrath means the 'long valley'. Civilisation at Stonethwaite is still some miles away, and by the time we reached the village it was dark and preparations for the bonfire night celebration were under way.

Regards,

Stuart

I can't see Russia from Alaska...

but I could see into France from my window. Honest.

Here's a long view over a lake...

This was taken in the Bavarian Alps looking back to Munich:


Best regards,
Michael

Ken Tanaka said:

A powerful, and ultimately rather destructive, summer storm front rolling over Chicago's Grant Park and Monroe Harbor, Friday, June 14, 2010.

Click to expand...

Immense sense of foreboding from that pic, reminded me of looking out of the classroom in the evening, watching the cold horrible weather roll in while 'normal' life continued unabated, the teaching oblivious to the horrific conditions we'd have to walk home in and always this sense of impending nastiness.

Ken Tanaka said:

A powerful, and ultimately rather destructive, summer storm front rolling over Chicago's Grant Park and Monroe Harbor, Friday, June 14, 2010.

The view is looking south over Lake Shore Drive. The shower in the distance is in far south Chicago approaching the Indiana border. The bright spots in the water are some of the most powerful micro-downbursts of wind I've ever seen. I honestly thought that some of those boats would be capsized.

(Mamiya 645 AFDIII with a PhaseOne P65+)

Click to expand...

Ken,

This is magnificent, Ken! We can indeed see for miles and miles. Did you happen to pass by? Or did you go there, knowing that this vantage point would be magnificent just after the storm rolled in? You took this at just 1/50th of a second. It looks great! Do you use a tripod? you 1/50 shutter speed is a tad faster than the reciprocal of the focal length, 1/35 and the image seems pretty sharp! I love that! Michael Reichman suggests that for the new 80 MP IQ 180 Phase One camera, one should go to 1/3 of the reciprocal as the density of the pixels is able to show such fine detail that can be smeared more easily.

The clouds are so detailed in the variations in tones and hues. The sharp bold hockey-stick pattern of red car lights adds a surprisingly effective balance to the already dramatic sky. Interestingly, as one goes towards the distance, the lights seem to get brighter, as I guess they are more packed in or else lots of brake lights! Could you have achieved all of this with the 1Ds Mark III or is it only the matter of the size limits to which you could print the image and have it look so good?

Ken Tanaka said:

Looking east over Lake Michigan towards Indiana as a winter storm slides overhead. The tiny puffs on the horizon are from an Indiana power station on the other side of the Lake.

(Canon 1Ds Mark III)

Click to expand...

Compared to the first picture, this is pastoral!

Asher

I wonder if you might have take pictures to either side of the first scene?

Terrific images here, and I particularly like Ben's image of Kylerhea.

Mine is taken from Dunedin in NZ looking south - next stop Antarctica!

Odille Esmonde-Morgan said:

Terrific images here, and I particularly like Ben's image of Kylerhea.

Mine is taken from Dunedin in NZ looking south - next stop Antarctica!

Bird Rock & Small's Beach pano, Dunedin, NZ by Photography by Odille, on Flickr​

Click to expand...

I'm taken back by the delicate colors you found here! How much of this is present in the original stitched image? To what extent is this derived from your imagination? It's not, here, just a matter of seeing for miles and miles, rather being entranced forever in magical pastels!

Asher

Great photos! I especially love Ken's storm clouds and Ben's shot of Skye.

long views

It's hard to top Ken's storm clouds (which were available as a print on TOP last year for a week). Pursuing Asher's question about how Ken got to this vantage point, I speculate that it was taken from a fairly tall building on the near North Side of Chicago. Ken is that a view from your apartment?

Here's a long view with the opposite feeling. Taken in Scotland in 2004 over the flat ground near the sea looking back towards England over the Solvay Firth:


and from a west-bound North Atlantic route, here is the southern transit of Greenland

scott

It's hard to top Ken's storm clouds

Click to expand...

OHHHHH yess it's hard!




(If you look carefully in the boat on the right, Nicholas says Hello!)

I'm not sure of how well this fits the theme, but here is my entry.

Taken 6-22-2009 at Interlochen, Michigan:

Well, if the theme is how far away one can see, this is the most distant object the naked human eye can detect:

[
Andromeda galaxy

(Stack of 10 images taken in my holidays with a 135mm lens and a cheap chinese equatorial mount)