On this cold morning, hundreds of people showed up in front of the Colorado State Capitol building in Denver to show their support for the new bill that would increase tax rebate incentives for film production in Colorado from the current measly 10 percent to 20 percent. This is a big deal for the Colorado film industry, which has been lagging behind other states like New Mexico, Louisiana and Georgia (and I’m not even talking about California) in film incentives.

But, the wheels are finally turning and things are looking up.

Check out this PSA put together several weeks ago by Colorado filmmakers in support of the new bill. There has also been a PSA video campaign, consisting of 8 videos that were released every day leading up to this morning’s rally at the Capitol, explaining things in a little bit more detail.

Today, I braved the freezing 15-degree cold and joined my fellow Colorado film industry professionals, filmmakers, students and local arts and entertainment scene supporters at a rally in front of the Capitol building. This day became known in Colorado as Cinema Day.

Unfortunately, I had to leave right after the rally and miss the official proceedings as the new bill was introduced because I had a previously scheduled video shoot to attend, but it was great to see some familiar faces in the crowd. I also briefly ran into Kirk Montgomery, the 9News entertainment reporter who also covered the event (check out his video report here). I had previously worked with Kirk at the 2011 Vail Film Festival and it was nice to see him again and to say hello.

Below is a short highlights video from the footage I filmed with my little Canon PowerShot SD780IS, whilst freezing my fingers off. I felt bad for all the shooters out there with their DSLRs, Sony FS100s and ENG news cameras – they must have REALLY been freezing!

Be sure to visit Colorado Film Incentives 2012 for more information and updates about about the new film incentives bill.

Enlarged crop of the photo above that shows the meteor more clearly:

Some meteors that I captured were so faint that they weren’t visible to the naked eye and were only discovered later when I looked at the photos more closely:

I used my small LED flashlight to illuminate the tree during this 30-second exposure:

A little bit of fun with light painting:

If you look closely, you can see another faint meteor streak in the photo below on the left (in the lower-third part of the shot):

One of the beautiful things about Collegiate Peaks campground is that it is surrounded by gorgeous aspen trees and plenty of wildflowers.

On the way back, driving through Summit County, we made a short stop to admire the vast mountain meadow where a mining town used to be over a century ago.

We also made a stop at the Clinton Gulch Reservoir, which I have photographed many times before (here, here, here, here, here and here). It’s interesting to me that it always looks different, depending on the season and time of the day.

Panorama of the Clinton Gulch Reservoir stitched together from 9 images (click here to view the large-resolution copy):

The first photo below is a panorama comprised of 11 images (you can see the large-resolution photo on Flickr; warning – it’s pretty huge!)

Look at that giant sky! My car on the country road and the cows grazing in the field behind it look tiny and insignificant under it:

The fire pit:

No processing was done to the image below. This is how the light, colors and the sky really looked after a thunderstorm! Incredible. I also love my long shadow.

Sunset after the thunderstorm passed:

Watching this sunset was better than any movie :)

The image below is a 30-second exposure, taken after sundown. I didn’t bring a tripod with me, nor any remote shutter timers. I simply set my camera on a folding chair (of course, it was pitch black, so it was difficult to judge composition, which is why the angle is a bit skewed). The tent is illuminated from the inside by a single small LED flashlight. Pretty cool, isn’t it?

An attempt at a long-exposure self-portrait with a friend. I’m actually surprised at how well it came out:

Fragment of Milky Way’s galactic center:

No, the lines in the image above on the right aren’t meteors – merely a couple of planes passing by. However… Stay tuned for Part 2 of this post to get a glimpse of some real meteors caught on camera!