Aspens and Sea Smoke

This photo was taken on a VERY cold morning in February . I think it was almost 20 below zero the morning I made this image. There was a lot of steam or "sea smoke" as people like to call it, rising off the lake. More common in early winter, it was a treat to see the steam in late February. My friend Roger and I had spent sunrise right along the water's edge taking photos of the rising sun and the ice on Grand Portage Bay.
To give you an idea of just how cold it was, while we were walking through some deep snow drifts to get to the water's edge, I tripped and fell in the snow. My tripod went right down under the snow, and was only in the snow for a few seconds. The tripod had been warm from being inside the car, and as soon as I pulled it up out of the snow it had ice on it. The snow had melted briefly when making contact with the warm tripod and as soon as I lifted the tripod up into the cold air it the melted snow that was on it froze instantly. I had a difficult time the rest of the morning adjusting my tripod legs due to the ice that now covered it.
After about 20 minutes in our first location we headed up to an overlook which looks down onto Lake Superior and Wauswaugoning Bay. From this elevated vantage point it was magical watching the sea smoke as it rose off the lake and drifted out away from shore. Roger has a Vari-ND filter which lets you block several stops of light and I thought this would be a perfect place to use it so I borrowed it for several exposures. The stationary trees and the edge of the ice combined with the moving steam made for a very compelling photo. Exposure time on this shot was 15 seconds, aperture f16, ISO 50. It was taken with my Canon EF 100-400mm lens.