It’s not always all easy and lazy, photographing cats lazying on a warm lamp or on the bed. Sometimes it takes a bit more than just pulling the camera out of the bag.
Our friends have a beautiful German Shepherd. She was quite patient and willing and jumped up and down in the snow for the most part of an hour while I tried to get the right shots, which in the end wasn’t all that easy, focusing in the dark on a moving subject… But… in the end I think I managed to get a few good ones anyway.

D700, ISO3200, 1/250 sec @ f/4, Nikkor 70-200mm, 2x SB-800 fired remotely on both sides of the dog.

D700, ISO3200, 1/250 sec @ f/4, Nikkor 70-200mm, 2x SB-800 fired remotely on both sides of the dog

So… After writing about the end of winter twice, and getting a new fresh thick pack of snow a day later, I think I can now safely say that it’s over for this year.
Last Saturday it snowed from 6 in the morning until late in the evening and we got about 15 cms of new snow. After that the temperature has gone up and it really looks like things are on the fast track towards spring.
Snow on the streets and pavements is pretty much gone and the huge piles that were shoved to the sides of the roads are almost visibly disappearing.

It’s only a matter of time now…
To wave goodbye to this year’s winter, I give you one final snowy shot. The rabbit which passed here was also on its way to spring.
How poetic…

D200, ISO100, 1/90 sec @ f/16, Tamron 28-75mm

In a previous post I wrote that Winter was on its way out.

Well… Apparently Mother Nature has changed her mind. It’s been gorgeous weather the past couple of days, but now the temperature has dropped again and there’s going to be some more slush/snow.
I love winter and snow and what it does to the landscapes, but when it gets this crappy dirty winter-aftermath I’m pretty fast fed up with it.

Let’s see how long this will last…

D200, ISO100, three exposures of 1/45 sec, 1/20 sec, and 1/10 sec @ f/11, Tamron 28-75mm, circular polarizer, HDR post-processing

D200, ISO100, 1/6 sec @ f/11, Tamron 28-75mm, circular polarizer

D200, ISO100, 1/3 sec @ f/11, Tamron 28-75mm, circular polarizer

D200, ISO100, 1/3 sec @ f/11, Tamron 28-75mm, circular polarizer

D200, ISO100, 1/30 sec @ f/11, Tamron 28-75mm

We’ve had a good amount of snow still in the past week, but temperatures are going up and it looks like -slowly- spring’s pushing its foot in the door.

It’s going to take awhile still before all the snow is gone and I’m sure I’ll get a few shots of “winter” still, but in case I might not have the time (if I get buried under a load of work or something *G*) I went out for a little shoot yesterday.
It wasn’t cold, actually it was quite pleasant to be out. I should do that more often…

D200, ISO100, 1/90 sec @ f/4.8, Tamron 28-75mm

D200, ISO100, 1/60 sec @ f/5.6, Tamron 28-75mm

D200, ISO100, 1/125 sec @ f/5, Sigma 10-20mm

Myeah… when you live up north and most of the day is dark, you get quite some opportunities to shoot during the “night”.
We went to an old part of the railway area and there’s lots of stuff to shoot. If not old wagons or other equipment, it’s old buildings.
This we ran into just before we left. Notice the train that passed in the background during the 91 sec exposure… Happy coincidence at a railway area

D200, ISO100, 91 sec @ f/27, Tamron 28-75mm

I’ve been out of town already a couple of times, and figured I’d have to change the title to “Touristing in your own country”. I probably will in time. For now it’s “area”.
Last year I happened to pass this church in Kirkkonummi. There was snow then when I passed, and of course I didn’t bring my camera. Next time I passed with camera it the snow was gone and it didn’t look half as interesting. It was a crappy winter last year and I didn’t get any other opportunity.
But you know the saying… Patience, virtue…
Now we have snow. So I give you the church of Pyhä Mikael.

D200, ISO100, 26 sec @ f/19, Tamron 28-75mm

We had it coming already for a couple of days, and after 3 weeks of pretty much non-stop rain I was really looking forward to it. SNOW!
Some slush to begin with, but last night it started seriously snowing. Now I only hope that it’ll get more and that it’ll stay until next year. Last year’s winter sucked moosepeckers. We “celebrated” my first snowless Christmas since moving to Finland.

There was a little bug on the window looking out, probably content with itself being on the inside of the window, not on the outside. It IS quite important, if you’re a one-day fly that the quality of your life is good and snowless.
Unfortunately the quality of its life wasn’t catless and Cassandra did have a protein rich breakfast… And the fly turned out to be not-quite-a-complete-one-day fly.

Enjoy the snow while you still can...