In Which Catherine Doesn’t Quite Get Her Glow

I had what I thought was a bright idea while biking to work Thursday morning.

Clouds were just rolling in, and a little open sky in the east made for a very pretty sunrise. As I was at the halfway mark on my commute—passing Kenwood School—there was a pretty conch shell pink glow to the eastern sky.

Which made me think of Catherine McAuley. There is a new statue of her on the Rohde Family Plaza at Mount Mercy, which I bike by most mornings. And, I thought, why not take her picture as the rising sun behind her turns the sky pink—it would sort of be an arty looking halo effect.

Well, the best laid plans of mice, men and photo bikers …

By the time I got to campus, the patch of open sky was gone. There was a solid grey ceiling to the morning. I suppose that was a blessing anyway, since I have an 8 a.m. class on Thursday and did not have time to stop to take the picture anyway.

But I had time today. However, I didn't have a mostly cloudy sky with just the right opening for the sun to turn those clouds pink.

I tried taking the picture, thinking the back-lighting sun would make it interesting. The results? In one image, Catherine’s head is glowing like she’s a special character in a D movie made for Halloween. Not exactly the look I was going for. The next picture is OK, and I like the shadow of the random student crossing the plaza, but again, not the effect I saw in my mind.

Oh well. Sometimes the challenge when taking photos for this biking blog is that the eye can see so much in more detail in more lighting conditions than the camera can. Although in this case, the camera was right—things did not work out. Well, some day when they do and I bike by, I may try, try again.

Picture 1--Catherine as a superhero shooting power ray form her eyes.

Image 2--She looks better and the I like the long shadow, but not yet the effect I wanted. Send in the clouds.