Pittsburgh's 250th Anniversary Celebration: Tax Dollars Up in Smoke (Quite Literally)
 

Well, I fought traffic and drunkards down in Pittsburgh tonight to photograph the skies with some friends—which were lit up all around the Point (where the Monongahela, the Ohio, and the Allegheny converge) in what was the city's largest fireworks display... ever.

I was supposed to meet up with some friends from CMU but got there right when the bus was leaving so I had to drive down myself to the Point; no big deal, except for the fact that everyone and their brother was also down there (and drunk). Funny stuff.

Sadly, I grabbed an uncharged battery and had to suffer the indignation of it failing on me halfway through the show. I also forgot to grab a shutter release, so I had to do things by hand and go with longer exposures to minimize the effects of camera shake from the initial push of the shutter button (and the subsequent flight of my hand from said camera). Led to some pretty crazy photographs towards the middle (where my battery died).

Got back to the parking garage and had to wait an hour to escape it's glaring lights. But other than those three pesky things, which weren't that bad save the battery, it was a great evening. Had a good laugh in the elevator though; some guy was in there was enamored by my camera gear & tripod. "Wow! Look how BIG that thing is! You're really, really, really well equipped." Laughing, I said "thanks for the compliment, I'd prefer it coming from someone like your girlfriend over there, but hey, a compliment's a compliment."

I thought I was going to get hit for that one; luckily, he thought it was funny. Anyhow, straight from the camera:

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3261/...37c585.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3009/...b7e327.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3012/...d99211.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3107/...3ea5fe.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3257/...21e152.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3189/...8883e2.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3021/...1db2c0.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3104/...85100e.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3224/...d3f3e4.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3190/...867e6d.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3070/...e8f9d7.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3246/...0cc5b6.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3214/...246c29.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3102/...0e5513.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3294/...323e39.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3169/...2e845c.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3138/...6fbd6f.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3257/...111ac5.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3190/...8866ec.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3073/...e9707d.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3073/...207729.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3294/...285759.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3076/...5cb447.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3214/...8744f9.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3083/...600c5d.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3183/...deee0c.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3271/...f0af42.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3053/...50e33a.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3079/...3e2824.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3093/...be9ac6.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3094/...ccd29d.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3284/...ef41ed.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3024/...64d021.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3041/...8e99e9.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3157/...b28458.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3020/...1910d0.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3263/...8232df.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3079/...8991ae.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3038/...8b7358.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3257/...2c21c9.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3277/...ccfa7c.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3030/...g?v=1223187112

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3268/...e3b044.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3236/...8163d7.jpg?v=0

Those are friggin kick ass shots!

I loves me some fireworks!

Well done man.

shi**t photographer question: What was your camera set up to capture those shots?

tom! great shots man!

Thanks guys!

Brian, I shot everything using a D200 coupled with a 80-400mm VR—a fantastic lens (albeit slow for action shots; but that was hardly an issue here :D) that served me well last night. The VR really saved my butt for some of the shorter exposures; without it, there would have been a ton of camera shake.

As far as settings, I played around a bit :). If you go to Flickr: Bluestrike2's Photostream , click on an image, and click "more properties" on the sidebar, you'll be able to see exactly what settings I used for each image.

Thank you for sharing, Fire works are pretty nice I like to see them especially in France were they use them every two weeks in the summer.