One of my photography goals for this year is to create more long exposure pictures. Long exposures provide an opportunity to capture things that we can't see with our eyes. The technique can produce surreal images.

Last week, I practiced the technique at the Victory Baptist Church in Mokena, Illinois. It was a cloudy afternoon. The clouds were moving quickly across the sky in windy conditions.

Here's my first picture. It's taken with a shutter speed of 1/125th of a second--plenty of speed to freeze the clouds:

Victory Baptist ChurchVictory Baptist Church at 13550 US-6 (Southwest Highway) in Mokena, Illinois on March 8, 2016 Then, I extended the shutter speed to 104 seconds. The longer exposure provided plenty of time for the clouds to move across the frame:

Victory Baptist ChurchVictory Baptist Church at 13550 US-6 (Southwest Highway) in Mokena, Illinois on March 8, 2016 It's not that one of the photographs is necessarily better than the other. However, I find it fascinating that these two pictures look so much different despite being captured within seconds of each other--using the same camera, lens and vantage point. The only thing that changed was the shutter speed.

I will post more information in a future blog entry about how how I use neutral density filters to create long exposures. I'm relatively new to long exposure photography. With further practice, I hope to be able to more consistently create interesting results.