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With the morning booked off work and a promise of mist on an otherwise fine winter's morn there was only one place for me to go for a pre-dawn photo shoot.
At 1800 feet, Moel Famau is the highest peak in the Clwydian range of mountains and commands views out over the Cheshire plain to the east, the coast to the north, Snowdonia to the west and the hills of mid-wales to the south.
A vigorous climb got me to the top in freezing conditions about an hour before sunrise, just as the sky to the east was starting to lighten and take on the delicate orange glow that heralds the sunrise.
Spread out below me was a thin layer of mist, extending from the base of the mountains all the way over the Cheshire Plain, with the orange glow of sodium street lights lighting the mist from below.
I waited a few minutes for the sky to lighten and the orange of pre-dawn to become more pronounced before capturing this image, in which the light and colour was beautifully balanced between the sky and mist.
Talk about being in the right place at the right time, and not only was I able to witness these beautiful sights, but as sunrise approached the mist thickend into an opaque layer of fog and I was also able to take a couple of thousand frames to string together into this time lapse video.
All in all, a very fruitful morning, and I was back home by 10 o'clock.
Filename - lights mist 02.jpg
Camera - Canon EOS 5D
Lens - 24-105mm zoom @ 105mm
Exposure - 30secs @ f8, ISO100
Location - Summit of Moel Famau, North Wales
This image - 800x533px JPEG
Conversion - ACR & PS-CS2
Comments - 2 stop neutral density filter used to balance exposure between sky and land.
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