Enjoying the Boston Weather

Boston, MA 112011 Today was one of those rare warm November days in New England so I was assigned to look for "weather art." This means find someone or something which visually illustrates the kind of day Bostonians were experiencing. BEHIND THE SCENES: When you've been as a photographer for a while you develop a mental check list of places you can go visit for specific situations. The Esplanade along the Charles River, which divides the cities of Boston and Cambridge, is usually a sure thing. And my instincts didn't fail me this time either. At first I photographed runners, and bicyclists and then people with their dogs called my attention but I finally knew I had it when I saw this woman setting up a "slack line" in between two trees. I've seen these daredevils of the "low-altitude wire" do their thing before and I knew it was only a matter of waiting for moments to start occurring. The woman turned out to be the founder of the Boston Slack Line Club and she was quite adroit at this activity. Then as passersby would stop by to watch she'd asked them if they wanted to try and a great number did try indeed. The girl being guided by her dad and the slack-line expert made for a great moment. I just threw the dog jumping as a way of showing my attempt on how to photograph the mundane in an interesting manner. In this case I used a telephoto, I made sure my subjects were backlit and I waited for a moment: dog jumping. TECH STUFF: 2 cameras: a MarkIII and a MarkIV, two lenses: a 16-35mm 2.8 and a 300mm 2.8 with a 1.4TC. ISO: 200-400, speed 1/250th of a second to 1/3200th of a second. Aperture: 2.8- 22