Wisconsin Winter Holidays (Madison: houses, live, moving)

[gallon]

Here is a space for your best postcard shots celebrating holidays in Wisconsin.
Lets define the span to be, loosely, any time during the snow season.
November through March.
No hard and fast rules here though, not necessary to be politically correct.
Just share your best holiday pictures.


I'll start with Christmas lights put up in Olin park in Madison. Hopefully we'll get some snow soon to go along with these.


tree cutting



santa and reindeer



packers



carollers



Badgers



milk cow


.

[artyst]

your pictures are great! go wisconsin pride!

[Wi_Girl]

Love the pictures!!! I'd love one of those helmet lights in my front yard! LOL

[dreamhunter65]

bet have the snow now!

[gallon]

Here are a few more from the Olin Park set.
I am watching for good snow shots. You know, the
great Wisconsin Victorian houses all decorated up.




pile of gifts




polar bear




balloon ride




poinsettia




village


.

[gallon]

Well, now we have snow on the ground. Cold too, it reached 10 below zero in Madison two nights ago. More serious autumn blizzards coming this weekend. And winter doesn't start for two more weeks. I love this stuff!

This is a technically difficult subject to photograph. It's twilight, it's blizzarding, it's cold, the camera fogs up, there's an impossible dynamic range in the subject. A tripod is necessary. Some of these shots took up to three seconds, with a delayed trigger. Any blurring is actually the driven snow, blurred by time. The long exposure shots, tripod mounted, would ordinarily be tack sharp.

White balance is tricky. The background light is nearly that perfect 18 percent gray. There is a cast of high pressure sodium lighting from the nearby highway. The subject itself is lit with a combination of LEDs and little incandescent lamps. Surprisingly, setting the white balance to Sunlit gives a photo most like what the eye sees.
The Nikon automatic white balance works well too. The worst, by far, is an incandescent white balance. Turns everything to blue, as you can see in my previous shots.





Santa, lifting off



milk cow in blizzard
Wisconsin cows are unlike those happy go lucky California cows, tiptoing through the tulips.
Real Wisconsin cows are out in any weather, getting the job done with professionalism.



polar bear and penguins



the holiday dragon



christmas morning


many more of these at
Wisconsin Holidays 2007 Photo Gallery by gallon at pbase.com
you can find large sizes suitable for screensavers.


It's December, there is a pile of snow on the ground, life is good.
.

[gallon]

The capital in Madison, Sunday December 9th, in the evening. Temperature about 15 degrees.
Tripod mounted, long exposure, from 2 sec all the way to 9 sec. ISO 100 for low noise, not intuitive but it works that way. Aperture of f18 for sharpness.



capital dome, east side




northeast wing



larger sizes at
Wisconsin Holidays 2007 Photo Gallery by gallon at pbase.com


seasonings!
.

[sdeweese]

Excellent pictures. Please keep them coming. I almost feel as though I am there. You folks really know how to enjoy the holidays in true winter fashion-I commend and envy you.

[Havasu]

Here is a neat picture from the air.You can see more at http://funaerialphotography.blogspot.com/

[100%Michigan]

Thats odd, a friend of mine lived in Wisconsin for about 3 years now and they explain tome that their whole year there so far ... sadly all 3 years was a blue Christmas. No white blanket, well now they are moving back over to Michigan hoping for a wintry Christmas next year. Since they dont see much in Wisconsin, ofcourse they see snow but on Christmas its no snow!