Every time I head to High Cliff State Park I drive past these powerlines. I always say to myself that I’ll stop at them sometime and take some pictures. Usually I’m more excited to go to High Cliff, but for some reason, this last time I decided to get my shot of these instead.

Location

The powerlines go through the south side of Appleton near a suburb called Darboy. I parked my car on a pull off for a farm field and walked about 75 yards until I was closer to the first two towers. Every year around September 20th, the sun sets directly west. The powerlines run east to west so they make a nice subject where the sun will set right in between them. I have some other shots where the sun was right in between them but chose this shot for another reason.

Composition

I was trying to get an ‘up the gut’ type shot where I intentionally composed the shot towards the center. I wanted to show the infinity effect of the powerlines. The only bad thing with the spot I was in was that the powerlines don’t go perfectly straight. Then zig-zag slightly so I didn’t get that infinity effect I was hoping for. Using my 150mm-600mm lens I zoomed in all the way on the sun to make it appear as large as possible as it approached the horizon.

One thing I did get that I was planning on was that a commercial airplane fly right by as I was snapping my pictures. I only got one photo of it, but right in the center of this one you can see the plane.

Post Processing

I did very little post processing to this shot. Really just cropped it so that it was more zoomed in on the plane and sun to make them appear bigger. I also dropped the blacks a bit to get it more of a silhouette look.

Software Used

Lightroom

Have a Question?