Calm before the Storm
USS Alabama, Mobile, AL
Reenactment of the Battle of Midway
Jun, 2016Views
1147
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Awards
People's Choice in Old Times Photo Challenge
People's Choice in Playing Dress-up Photo Challenge
Peer Award
All Star
Top Choice
Magnificent Capture
Superior Skill
Absolute Masterpiece
Superb Composition
Emotions
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Behind The Lens
Location
This photo was taken at the USS Alabama in Mobile, Alabama.Time
It was about 12:30pm.Lighting
It was very cloudy but other than that nothing worth mentioning. Not a great time of day for light but I had to work with what I had to capture the reenactment.Equipment
AF-S Nikkor D810 with a 24-120 f/4G ED VR set at 120. Shutter was 1/500 at f/8 with ISO 400Inspiration
The reenactment was scheduled for 1pm so the crew was milling about doing various things and interacting with the public. The two individuals in this image were sitting on the 16-inch gun turret, #3, of the USS Alabama. I noticed that they had a December 8th, 1941 newspaper and a glass Coca-Cola bottle sitting there and thought what a great opportunity to get an image that could have been shot in that era! While there were no battleships that fought in the Battle of Midway, this reenactment had been billed as such. It was very inspiring to see just a snippet of history and what it may have been like during ship combat in the Pacific.Editing
Post-processing consisted to cropping the original, making it black and white, and hardening the edges a bit with the HDR sliders.In my camera bag
Nikon D810, with a AF-S NIKKOR 24-120mm f/4G ED VR; AF-S VR Zoom NIKKOR 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6G IF-ED; AF-S, NIKKOR 50mm f/1.8G; and a SB-910.Feedback
Keep your eyes open! I still have some trouble with that advice but I am getting better. A photo opportunity may never come along again and if you miss it, it will be lost forever. Staging an image like this one could be done but if you can capture it without staging then the spontaneity of it will be much more meaningful to you even if your audience does not know it was not staged.
