There’s no doubt that is the picture for which I needed a longer exposure time, about 7 hours. It was for the Sunday issue of el Periodico de Catalunya. I really wanted to make a spectacular photo so I installed my Leica M2 with a 35mm, loaded with Velvia slide film, on a tripod hidden behind a rock. I released the shutter in pose mode, leaving open the shutter that would not be closed until I pressed it again. The Calar Alto Observatory is located in the Sierra de Filabres, in Almeria,Andalousie, a desert location at 2000 meters high. I could not stay there to sleep so I got into my car with lighted position lights that formed the luminous path that appears in the photo. I drove the fifty kilometers to my hotel in Almeria and put on my alarm clock for 4 am. At that time I came back to drive through the infinity of curves to Calar Alto, which is a mountain of first category in the Tour of Spain. Fortunately, the Leica was in the same place. I pressed the cable release and I still had to wait several days ,until the lab processed my film in Barcelona, to see the final result. The bright circles are the path of the stars throughout the night, which has to be without moon.The green color of the sky is due to the reciprocity law. The picture editor, Jaume Mor, loved the photo and posted it double-page together with an explanation as how it was done.
No comments:
Post a Comment