I went a little wild shooting panoramas this weekend. It wasn’t a planned thing. The weather wasn’t even close to being conducive to this type of photography. Single digit temperatures and bare hands to take 30-ish semi-overlapping images don’t mix well. My original intention was to capture the ice in the Allegheny river, preferably at sunrise. As with most of my work, I try and get shots of the city from areas that aren’t frequently seen. Everyone photographs from the observation platform at Mt. Washington. The West End Overlook is very popular as well. There is a good reason for this, but I prefer to shoot the city from all over.

Back to that cold, cold morning’s sunrise. I walked down the bank by Heinz Field and found a good spot to get the rising sun. This image below is the result of 28 images stitched together.

The next morning I went back, hoping to capture some more ice in the Ohio river from the West End Bridge. To my dismay, the Ohio was moderately clear. The sky was clouded over completely, though, and there was little hope of catching a nice sunrise. I moved along to the North Shore and parked near Allegheny Landing to photograph a favorite spot between the Sixth and Seventh street bridges. I have always liked the sculpture that is at the top of the hill, but never managed to capture a good single shot if it, so I gave it a shot as a panoramic image. The image below is the result of a 31 image stitch.

I moved down to the riverfront trail, receiving strange looks from a few joggers that were also braving the cold. I returned their glances with a smile, but I’m sure that they could see the slight head shaking that wasn’t shiver related. I shot 40 images from this spot to create the image below.

I moved along the trail, towards PNC park to get a better angle back on the city. I shot a few single shots along the way, but when the snow cleared up for a few minutes and I saw steam coming from a building across the river, I set up for one last panorama. This was was quicker, and only has 13 shots that are stitched. It was likely that my fingers were telling my brain that they were about to mutiny. I had been out for about 2 hours at this point.

I shot a quick video, panning from the Sixth Street Bridge over to the Ft. Duquesne Bridge, then headed back to the car. Here is the video, for those interested.