A few from the 4th

[Dark Cloud]

Spent the day/ night at a buddys cottage, the sunset was awesome and I got some nice pictures...

The girlfriend and I. I like the ones without flash better even though you couldnt see our faces, flash killed the backround...

And the hardest thing I ever tried to photograph - fireworks! First off we were way too close to them, then getting the setting and timeing right was a nightmare...

[finnbay]

Awesome color!

[Steve Foss]

I agree with Ken, DC. Wonderful colors there. A truly gorgeous sunset well captured.

[DMN]

Very nice sunsets.

[upnorth]

Nice sunset photos DC. The one with you are your GF, maybe you can't see faces, but I like the silhouetted against the sunset thing. Timing seems to be more of an issue with digital cameras than with old 35mm camera's. Holding the button down part way to get it to prefocus before taking the pic helps immensely, at least on the cameras I have. That seems to do away with the inherent delay.

[Duffman]

Nice work Jay, it looks like all them wildfires out west are providing the rest of the country with some awesome sunsets.

[Dbl]

Love the sunset, great colors!

[Dark Cloud]

Thanks all! Sunsets are probably my favorite thing to photograph. Within a half to a full hour you get so many changes...

Duffman - These picts were taken on Cayuga lake. If I remember right you had relatives in Ithaca?, which sits on the south end of the lake...

[fishin4fun85]

Nice pics man....a pointer...if your trying to get pics of fireworks most digital cameras have a film option where you can record mini clips....then when you go to put the pics/films on ur comp. you can just take stills from the fireworks (I know it's cheating, but who the [PoorWordUsage] can take a decent pic of a fireworks show anyway?!?!)

[wildcatcreek]

The pics of the sunset are amazing. Very serene.

[311Hemi]

Nice shots!!! I also like the colors...

My wife and I went to a short class on shooting fireworks and they recommended shooting in bulb (manual) with a remote trigger, zoom lens, tripod, and hood if other light sources around. I have the settings at home they recommended but they would hold the shutter open for as long as needed and used a black card to cover the lens in between blasts. When you saw one you wanted to capture pull the card away to expose that blast (maybe 1 sec) and then put the card back over the lens until the next one. Also needed to cover the view finder on the back of the camera.

Focus was set to infinity and then turned back a hair. ISO 800 at F4.8 (if I remember correctly.

I shot hand held and have not yet had a chance to check how things turned out. I don't have a zoom lens yet so that made things somewhat tough and I was on a boat.

[Steve Foss]

Great tips, Hemi. That's very close to how I was going to set up for the fireworks. One other tip is to put the card back over the lens before the firework burst starts to fade, if you want to eliminate the droopy tips of each streak.

I was going to post some fireworks tips the day before the fourth, but the week got away from me!

[bassNspear]

some great shots. Love the sun in the back ground.

That has to take some skill to get that fireworks shot in there.

[Dark Cloud]

Thanks all for the tips and compliments. My camera(Olympus 790SW) has a "fireworks" setting. Problem was we were right under them and by the time I got the setting figured out the couple hundred my buddy spent was burned up, lol. I'll have a DSLR eventually and will remember the tips...

[pickinupafew]

Very nice colors in the sunsets. I wish I was there right now.

Thanks for posting.