Sunsets and Sunflowers

A mostly cloudy sky all day yielded briefly to a glimpse of a clear western horizon just before sunset as seen from Lowe Park, just north of Marion, Iowa on Saturday, August 4, 2018. Above, the setting sun is perched on the horizon at 8:16 pm CDT. At right background are ball diamond lights at Oak Ridge Middle School in Marion. This image is a 1/50 second exposure at f/5.6, ISO 200 and 55mm focal length.

8:17 pm. Sun dipping deeper. 1/80 second exposure at f/5.6, 200 ISO and 55mm focal length. Official sunset was at 8:21 pm.

8:24 pm. Large sunflowers in Lowe Park, looking west. Image is an exposure of 1/50 second at f/5.6, ISO 200 and 24mm focal length, but the foreground plants were copied to a second layer, lightened, then added to the background as a composite.

8:24 pm. Portrait version of image above it, with identical settings and procedures. Nikon D7200 DSLR camera.