Light flickering in a Stream near Lake Michigan

There's an excuse for a Winnetka public beach on Lake Michigan with a large pipe 

that pours water into a stream which had eroded a mini-canyon through the sand. 

Because of the snow and the freezing temperature, most of the sand was frozen 

and sheets of ice covered the banks of the stream with icicles hanging over. The glint

 of the snow at noon shot sunlight into the stream, and the sunlight splattered and 

flickered across the pebbles. I carved a shallow crenel at the top of one of the walls

 of the bank and leaned my camera downwards to capture a long exposure of sunlight 

dancing through the water.

Reflections in water is the closest natural thing a photographer has to paint, in that 

if the subject is framed and exposed accordingly the result can look very expressionistic. 

Still, I would not recommend photographing a beach in the winter at noon since the 

sand is like cold concrete and the sunlight's blinding gleam on the snow can be a visual 

disadvantage.

Taken in January 2013

Winnetka