The simple joys of simple photography

A little over a week ago I went out for some late night shooting around my neighborhood in upstate New York. After walking around for nearly an hour and only taking one photo I was about to give up on getting a really great shot, you know that shot that gives you butterflies you know it's so good—I know I can't expect that every time but I'm always hopeful. The whole night I kept noticing the moon peeking behind the clouds over the river but I didn't come across a good scene to shoot it in unless I pointed the camera skyward but that's against what I want to capture so I was patient, I knew something would reveal itself to me. As I was circling back to my house I decided to walk further up the street past my house to where the street started to ascend up a hill and there I saw it, the moon peeking behind the clouds and the trailer home of a neighbor illuminated by a street lamp. I bracketed three four minute exposures (shot with Kodak Portra 160NC), one at f11 (which was more like three minutes since I had to get out of the way of a pickup truck), one at f8 and a final exposure at f16 which I left for an additional minute, again for a passing truck but on the opposite side of the road (covered the lens with my hand). All three exposures worked but the f8 won out. I'm considering cloning out the bright orange light peeking below the trees on the left but for now I'm leaving it as-is and enjoying the fruits of pure, simple photography.