Sunday, April 10, 2016

975 Spring Stratocumulus

From 1:30 pm April 29, 2008... Standing on the deck of the Tolton's Boathouse... looking east toward the American shore. It was about 1:30 pm and I had just returned from a paddle to Jones Creek. The temperature had warmed up to plus 11 Celsius but the brisk northwesterly winds were still chilly.

The layers of nimbostratus were still visible on the eastern horizon as warm, creamy white cloud illuminated by the sun in the western sky. A couple of bands of cirrus were also apparent along the jet stream that wrapped around the large upper low. The streets of stratocumulus were wider apart as the boundary layer had risen with the surface temperature. These streets of spring stratocumulus were on the relative warm side of the upper jet stream. Daytime heating was contributing a cumulus component to the cloud. The individual stratocumulus streets cannot be discerned due to my oblique viewing angle.

The large and relatively old cloud droplets were not efficient Mie scatterers of sunlight back to my eye in the direction that the light came from. The stratocumulus was thus rather dark compared to the smaller and more numerous cloud droplets associated with the departing nimbostratus.

The far American shore was mainly in shadow when I started to paint. There was a lot more sun by the time I was done.

The point behind this entire painting was the colours of the various elements. It was fun!

http://fineartamerica.com/featured/spring-stratocumulus-phil-chadwick.html
http://fineartamerica.com/blogs/975-spring-stratocumulus.html


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