Again I arose in time for the sunrise. I was interested in seeing if I could improve on yesterday’s pictures of the moon setting. That was not to be; the moon, although quite visible was much higher in the sky so I couldn’t frame a good shot with something other than just sky around it. It was a great morning, clear enough for the sun to shine through but with lots of cloud to reflect the light and to provide some interesting shadows. I was rewarded with some nice alpenglow, a phenomenon which is quite common at this time of the year. Alpenglow occurs just before sunrise. Since the sun is below the horizon, there is no direct path for the light to reach the mountains. Instead, light reflects off airborne snow, water or ice particles low in the atmosphere. It is this circumstance that separates a normal sunrise or sunset from alpenglow. Although the term may be loosely applied to any sunrise or sunset light seen on the mountains, true alpenglow is not direct sunlight and is only observed after sunset or before sunrise.
The pictures were all taken from our back porch, using a telephoto lens. This first one is of Cascade Mountain, located near Banff about 23 m (14 miles) distant, just before sunrise. I zoomed out to a focal length of 100 mm to include as much of the very interesting sky as possible.
Turning southward, I was able to get the following picture of Mount Rundle. This mountain stands between Canmore and Banff and is located 9.75 km (6 miles) from our house. I zoomed in a little closer for this picture (200 mm focal length) to capture more detail of the mountain itself.
I include one final picture of Mt Rundle, zoomed out (100 mm focal length) to include more of the sky. This is my favourite of the three. I like the strong contrast between the brilliant colours and the dark shadows. You can see the nature of the alpenglow with sunlight reflecting off water vapour in the atmosphere onto the mountain peaks. Combined with the effect of the clouds casting shadows onto the mountains, nature creates a very dramatic scene.
