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So Cold!

The weather here (Quebec, Canada) is so cold this year. Yes, I know that global warming exists and that 95% of the planet has hotter than usual temps, it's just that currents have pushed warm air up to the arctic and their cold temps down here; so basically it's 20C warmer up north.. lol.

Here, since Xmas, the weather has always been colder than -30C when I get up in the morning, and with windchill, -42, -46C has pretty much been the norm. I am staying huddled and cuddled up at home and not going out unless really necessary!

Here a pic of the frost from my window... I think it's pretty!

frost1.jpg
 

Antonio Correia

Well-known member
minus 42 ???!!! and windy ???!!!

Terrible, terrible.
Are people going to work ? Are children going to school ? How do you shop ? How many inhabitants in town ?

This is just another of your wonderful images Maggie !

Have a nice 2018 !
Cheers ! :)
 
Nice frost photo, Maggie! It was 13 below zero Fahrenheit this morning just west of Chicago, too cold to get out and play with my brand new Canon 50 TS-E lens. I reckon the continent will warm up some time around March, and then we'll be back to setting high temperature records.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
The weather here (Quebec, Canada) is so cold this year. Yes, I know that global warming exists and that 95% of the planet has hotter than usual temps, it's just that currents have pushed warm air up to the arctic and their cold temps down here; so basically it's 20C warmer up north.. lol.

Here, since Xmas, the weather has always been colder than -30C when I get up in the morning, and with windchill, -42, -46C has pretty much been the norm. I am staying huddled and cuddled up at home and not going out unless really necessary!

Here a pic of the frost from my window... I think it's pretty!

frost1.jpg

I see breasts through the window!

Now I will read the text!

......but that's a risk as I don't want my vision to disappear!

Asher
 

Jarmo Juntunen

Well-known member
That's some serious winter weather you're going through there, Maggie! Stay warm! Nice picture, I love frost images.
 

Andy brown

Well-known member
Lovely image as always Maggie.
Those temperatures are incomprehensible to me!
As soon as the temp drops to 21c I’m in my sheepskin boots.
We’re having 28-38 degree days, 22 nights, plenty humid as well.
I’m in the sauna (and loving it), you’re in the freezer (snap freezer).
 

Andrew Stannard

pro member
Lovely image Maggie.

Reading about your weather conditions makes me wonder why a lot of England seems to grind to halt with just a couple of inches snow and temperatures only a couple of degrees below 0!

Andrew.
 
minus 42 ???!!! and windy ???!!!

Terrible, terrible.
Are people going to work ? Are children going to school ? How do you shop ? How many inhabitants in town ?

This is just another of your wonderful images Maggie !

Have a nice 2018 !
Cheers ! :)

Hi Antonio.
It helps that it's Xmas as most people are off until next week. Most students are off until next Monday at least and a few more days for those going to college and university. When it is not holidays, if the weather gets colder than -32C, (I think, it could be -35C) there is no school, but I think it is because the buses
have a hard time getting started and running.

Many offices are also closed for the holidays, but stores, hospitals, hotels, are open. These people warm up their cars 25 minutes or so before leaving so they are not driving ice blocks.. heh!

The population in my town is about 35,000. It's not a tiny village but we are 6 hours away from the nearest big city.

Weather today is better. It's 11AM and -20 feels like -27C. That's not warm, but seriously so much better!
 
Nice frost photo, Maggie! It was 13 below zero Fahrenheit this morning just west of Chicago, too cold to get out and play with my brand new Canon 50 TS-E lens. I reckon the continent will warm up some time around March, and then we'll be back to setting high temperature records.

Yes, people sometimes don't understand the weather where I live. We have hot summers (most of the time). We have heat waves and over 30C temps. I have a friend that lives in the L.A. region. Although they are going through a drought, her weather is much more middle ground and doesn't normally get anywhere as hot as here. I think winter is very pretty, but I have a hard time with the extreme cold, and somewhere around February, I'm whining and praying for spring! LOL!
 
That's some serious winter weather you're going through there, Maggie! Stay warm! Nice picture, I love frost images.

I'm sure you've seen these temps before, living in Finland and understand the temps we are going through. We usually get a couple days in January with a cold spell, but 10 days in a row in December is painful. I have been keeping warm, wearing extra clothes too. I just don't want to put my nose outside. :-D
 
Lovely image as always Maggie.
Those temperatures are incomprehensible to me!
As soon as the temp drops to 21c I’m in my sheepskin boots.
We’re having 28-38 degree days, 22 nights, plenty humid as well.
I’m in the sauna (and loving it), you’re in the freezer (snap freezer).

Yes, Andy. I like watching Aussie programs and it always makes me smile to hear people say they are
freezing and the temp is cool, but nowhere like this. They say, oh, it's 15C out... and they've got warm
hats on... but then you also have the extreme heat this time of year. To be honest I could use a short dose of what you have! LOL
 
Lovely Maggie. I could see this as a huge print.

Thank you so much, Peter. I think it would look lovely too, as it is not a crop.. and actually the exact frame of what I captured, so carries all the pixels. I (many would say) have a bad habit of shooting with composition in mind with the visual of what I see through the lens. So unless I want something to be really wide or tall, it is the size I shot it, which means that there is usually not any room to crop and keep my original composition.

I think this would look cool on acrylic with a nice white border to put the screws and studs. And right on the wall in my office - right behind my monitor... so I could look at it all the time!
 
Lovely image Maggie.

Reading about your weather conditions makes me wonder why a lot of England seems to grind to halt with just a couple of inches snow and temperatures only a couple of degrees below 0!

Andrew.

Hi Andrew :)

I think England may come to a halt as you are not as prepared for winter as we are. We expect lots of snow. We have laws to have snow tires on our cars by a certain date. We have snowplows and many people have tempos (like temporary garages) that they put up in winter. Now, they have regular garages, but usually keep the lawn mower and snowblower and shovels and any other crap they own there :-D As I was telling Andy from Australia, it is not unusual to get a few days like this in January. A cold snap that lasts 2-3 days. 10 days is freaking enough. I'm pretty tired of it.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
The weather here (Quebec, Canada) is so cold this year. Yes, I know that global warming exists and that 95% of the planet has hotter than usual temps, it's just that currents have pushed warm air up to the arctic and their cold temps down here; so basically it's 20C warmer up north.. lol.

I read that it's a consequence to the Arctic ice in the NW Passage being melted by warmer water and changing the direction of the winds.

Here, since Xmas, the weather has always been colder than -30C when I get up in the morning, and with windchill, -42, -46C has pretty much been the norm. I am staying huddled and cuddled up at home and not going out unless really necessary!


Maggie, This is aweful! I am so sorry for you and your suffering neighbors! I have lost my sense of Celcius temperatures as I used metric units for science, limited to physics and was brought up thinking in degrees Fahrenheit.

Well when I did my x 9/5 calculation and added 32, I ended up with -52 degrees F. Now that is dangerously cold! OMG, Maggie, THAT is an existential threat! What house-heating do you have? I hope it's electric or gas! Are you stocked up or was this totally unexpected?

How low did the temp go at nights last year? This is a whole new state of mind! I remember very cold days in Rochester New York and Boston Mass, but the challenge was just starting my car in the morning or clearing the driveway of several feet of snow. If one left one's car overnight, parked in the street, it could be buried by snow, blocked in by snow plows and frozen solid until the "April Thaw"!

If one drives a Tesla, (apparently, from a the manual), it's not supposed to be left out in the cold below -30 degrees C for more than 24 hours! Electric cars lose 25 to 30 percent of their mileage in these temps!

The key thing is having a supply of food and medicines to outlast the worst days. The biggest fear is for homes that depend on old fashioned oil-heating furnaces to keep warm as they can run through supplies and then one bad snow storm blocks the tankers coming down streets!

For me, I'd not undress and just snuggle into a bed with tons of layers and a thermos of hot chocolate!




Here a pic of the frost from my window... I think it's pretty!





frost1.jpg




Of course your picture is pretty. "Lady Frost" is ready for an elegant icecapade with her sisters! Jack Frost is already hidden underground!


Damn that is a beautiful shot! You suffer cold but Karma brings you beauty as a way of saying, "Sorry!" On your window.

Stay cosy,

Asher
 

nicolas claris

OPF Co-founder/Administrator
Bonjour Nicolas! Thank you so much. I'm glad you like it. You have to get in really close as it just looks like a bit of shimmer on the windows but a close up shows all the little frost spikes -- a very different world!

:) Maggie

Funny, this is what I did hesitate to ask, a more "macro" shot (not a crop!) as I guessed it is another world to discover <:)
Any chance ?
 
I read that it's a consequence to the Arctic ice in the NW Passage being melted by warmer water and changing the direction of the winds.




Maggie, This is aweful! I am so sorry for you and your suffering neighbors! I have lost my sense of Celcius temperatures as I used metric units for science, limited to physics and was brought up thinking in degrees Fahrenheit.

Well when I did my x 9/5 calculation and added 32, I ended up with -52 degrees F. Now that is dangerously cold! OMG, Maggie, THAT is an existential threat! What house-heating do you have? I hope it's electric or gas! Are you stocked up or was this totally unexpected?

How low did the temp go at nights last year? This is a whole new state of mind! I remember very cold days in Rochester New York and Boston Mass, but the challenge was just starting my car in the morning or clearing the driveway of several feet of snow. If one left one's car overnight, parked in the street, it could be buried by snow, blocked in by snow plows and frozen solid until the "April Thaw"!

If one drives a Tesla, (apparently, from a the manual), it's not supposed to be left out in the cold below -30 degrees C for more than 24 hours! Electric cars lose 25 to 30 percent of their mileage in these temps!

The key thing is having a supply of food and medicines to outlast the worst days. The biggest fear is for homes that depend on old fashioned oil-heating furnaces to keep warm as they can run through supplies and then one bad snow storm blocks the tankers coming down streets!

For me, I'd not undress and just snuggle into a bed with tons of layers and a thermos of hot chocolate!










frost1.jpg




Of course your picture is pretty. "Lady Frost" is ready for an elegant icecapade with her sisters! Jack Frost is already hidden underground!


Damn that is a beautiful shot! You suffer cold but Karma brings you beauty as a way of saying, "Sorry!" On your window.

Stay cosy,

Asher

Asher,

You will be happy to know that the cold snap has broken. Okay, it is not exactly warm.. haha, but much milder. -18/-25. It is snowing a little. When it gets to the extreme colds, it doesn't snow... we sometimes get a bit of ice crystals in the air but rarely snow.

As for heating, my house is warmed by electricity and there are electrical radiators in every room, some rooms have 2 long ones. The house is warm but the bill will be high... It won't show that much, because I have a monthly bill with the hydro, so they take what it cost in the previous year and divvy it up into 12, so I pay a bit more in the summer and less in winter and I always know in advance what it will cost.

Also, for food, in a way, it was lucky that it was the holidays and I had cooked up a storm and baked one up too, and froze many dishes so that the holidays would be stress free. I still have lasagnas, and meat pies in the freezer. I made chocolate cupcakes and raspberry cheesecake, carrot cakes etc., Of course, also, Christmas gingerbread cookies. Enough for here and some for the neighbors.

So, no worries, we are all fine and warm! :-D
 
Hi Asher,

As for flare and reflections, it was not really a problem because the sun was shining outside and I didn't get any at all.

At first I was shooting free-hand but it was very difficult to get a sharp shot so put the camera on a tripod which made things much easier.

I used a 105mm macro lens and my ISO was 800, F stop was F22 and at 1/200th of a second. I realize now that I could have lowered my ISO and put the time to 1/100th, but I was experimenting and when I put my camera on the tripod, I left the settings as they were.

I did find it a bit bright, so as post, I lowered the exposure by 0.60 and upped the contrast by +75. I was trying to get a lot of contrast to make the ice as spiky as I could.
I upped the clarity and lowered the saturation by half. I also lowered the blacks by -14 ... I felt it helped to make it pop.

Once that done, I brought into PS and did a selective sharpening where I put on a high pass filter, blending mode to soft light and then put a mask to make it completely disappear and then with a soft brush at 100% I went over the ice parts only.

There may be very slight variations between the different shots, but they are all pretty close.

Not much work actually... lol, I guess some would call me lazy, but that's alright. hehe! :-D
 
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