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Lying in bed at 4.30am wondering if it's worth getting up.
Outside clouds scud overhead obscuring the stars that I've a mind to photograph, and there's a threat of rain in the air.
Do I or don't I? After a couple of minutes deliberation I heave myself out of my nice warm bed in the sure and certain knowledge that if I don't I'll live to regret the missed opportunity, even if the weather continues poor.
I throw on a few warm clothes and tiptoe out to the car, trying not to bang my heavy LowePro on the way out and wake up the missus. She doesn't appreciate suffering for art's sake like what I do!
Ten minutes drive sees me at one of my local 'go to' locations for photographing stars and other heavenly bodies - the Pen Barras car park on the slopes of Moel Famau, my local hill.
This is a great location for cold dark wet photographic sessions as you virually sit in the car and still take pictures - luxury compared with yomping up mountains in the rain.
Anyhow, there's not a star to be seen as heavy clouds continue to race by overhead in the freshening breeze as I sit in the car listening to the early news while watching drizzle hit the windscreen.
Directly behind me to the east the sky starts to lighten. Is that a gap on the horizon? Could be, as the sun approaches and the clouds to the east start to underlight with the first rays from the as yet unrisen sun.
Time to get the camera out and set up in default landscape mode - bolted to a substantial tripod with everything set to manual, mirror lock up enabled and cable release fitted.
To the east the storm clouds are looking really dramatic now, lit orange and mauve as the sun is almost about to break the horizon and I'm fully occupied taking shot after shot as the light show unfolds.
All of a sudden the sun clears the horizon into a gap in the clouds and sends beams of warm horizontal light like searchlights across the landscape.
The rain's starting to come down in earnest as I turn to the west to witness a complete vivid rainbow forming in the dawn light over the market town of Ruthin in the Vale of Clwyd below me.
A quick change of lens to my widest zoom and the fumbling fitting of a polariser while sheltering under my car's tailgate and I'm ready to shoot, trying to protect the camera and filter from the rain with an umbrella at the same time.
Meanwhile the rainbow just gets brighter and brighter as more of the sun clears the horizon. I'm in frenzy mode now, trying to get the best possible exposure and composition before the inevitable happens and the sun starts to climb beyond the thin sliver of clear sky and into the cloudbank above.
The peak rainbow intensity lasts for maybe a minute and then the show's over, the sun disappears into the cloud and I toss my now distinctly wet camera gear into the car and head home.
Time to change and head to the day job at my factory.
What an extraordinary and blessed life we amateur photographers live, and all that's required is the will power to get out of bed!
Filename - rainbow ruthin 01.jpg
Camera - Canon 5D
Lens - 17-40mm zoom @ 17mm
Exposure - 3.2secs @ f11, ISO100
Location - Ruthin, North Wales
This image - 800x533px JPEG
Conversion - ACR & PS-CS2
Comments - Polarising filter used to enhance rainbow
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