Dawn of another beautiful winter morning with the Fuji XF long zoom

I love crisp winter sunrises with their clear skies, There is plenty of opportunity for dramatic sky images before and just after the sun appears above the horizon. When the sky is very clear, as it is on many winter mornings, the exposure for the sun relative to the sky is often too extreme. I find it best to capture these mornings are dawn or just as the sun first appears on the horizon.

This morning I wanted to do some long telephoto shots so I mounted the Fuji 55-200mm zoom on an X-T1 and began shooting away. It always amazes me how many variations are available in such a short span of time when the sun first comes up. Below are some samples from this morning's shoot.

The compact package of the Fuji X-T1 coupled with the Fuji XF 55-200mm zoom made a comfortable package to easily grab these shots without a tripod.

I think it's going to be a good day.

Two different treatments of the dawn sky: This one cropped to include the wispy clouds against the blue part of the upper sky, and the one below a combination of three horizontal images assembled in Photoshop to make one large panorama.

These nearby, humble branches made an interesting silhouette against the pre-dawn colors. A scene is what you make it.

The high sky offers more of a pastel look as the sun reflects off the clouds from below the horizon. 

Steam from smoke stacks billow into clouds above an industrial landscape, as the hot steam meets the cold morning air.

By the time the sun gets to this point, the sky begins losing its drama and the scene melts into a rather ordinary sunrise. Time to pack up the cameras and go home.