It was a dark and stormy day… as usual lately. There was a bit of a break in the mist and I thought that the clouds might look good in black and white. So, I grabbed my camera, ran out of the house and I went to this nearby park with a pond to see what I could get.

Below is my first gloomy shot of a bare little tree next to the pond with the heavy clouds for a background. I think that this picture adequately conveys the gloominess. I might have tried an ND filter and a long exposure to smooth out the water.

There are usually ducks at this park so I turned my attention to them. They where hanging around close to the park and looking for food in the water.

I don’t love how the ducks look in black and white, though it was such a gloomy, gray day that I didn’t get a lot of color out of the scene either.

I kind of thought this shot was funny as though one of the ducks was thinking “hey, where’d everybody go?”

Then there is this handsome guy who seemed to want to wander around without the other ducks. I think that he shows up well against the ground, though I could probably could have blurred the background better with a longer lens; this was 120mm, f/4.

I eventually switched to the 70-200mm telephoto to get some closer shots. The ducks began racing across the pond and I like the reflections that they were getting. It would have been better if he’d been a little more still, but he was really kicking.

And lastly, a squirrel high up in a tree, watching me intently.

This is a relatively nice little park near the house. I have been here before to shoot sunsets, though the sun is setting a bit too south on the horizon these days to get a good sunset over the pond.