Recently I went to the annual hot air balloon festival that takes place in Plainville, Connecticut.  There are tons of photo opportunities at these kind of events so I was really looking forward to it.  The only part I was not looking forward to was the fact that it starts around 6:00am!  The birds were not even up yet!  Below are some pics from the event and the full online gallery can be seen by clicking HERE.

The photo above shows the first balloon to get inflated with a warm glow as it prepares for takeoff.  It is early morning at this point but you can see that the pink clouds are signaling the arrival of sunrise.

A host of balloons on the ground fill with hot air as one lone balloon quietly escapes into the early morning sky.

While walking around in the dim morning light, I happened to turn around and I spotted this guy blasting a plume of flames into the mouth of his balloon.  I was drawn like a moth to the beautiful warm light that made the balloon radiate in orange splendor.

There were lots of people of all ages (and pets too!) who came out to enjoy the balloons.

As this balloon floated overhead, it reminded me of the petals of a flower.

If you've never been up close to a hot air balloon, it can be quite humbling as they are very big.
This shot provides a good perspective of the size of the balloons as compared to the little people everywhere.

Just because I am at a balloon festival doesn't mean that balloons are the ONLY subject.  Here are a couple of balloon watchers that I found interesting for one reason or another.  Obviously it was the phrase on the man's T-shirt that first caught my attention but it is also cool to be able to see the balloon he is photographing on his LCD screen.  I found the young girl amusing as she moved her hand, body and face into all sorts of positions as she gave her best effort to capture some photos.

To change things up a bit, I saw two balloons standing side by side and I composed a "detail" shot
rather than a wide sweeping shot showing both balloons in their entirety.

Good timing was on my side for this shot.  The pilot shot flames up into the air
lighting up the lower portion of the balloon just as I started to press the shutter button.

The colorful balloon on the right was moving very slowly while the black balloon moved to right much faster.
As I watched, it reminded me of an eclipse that we usually see with the sun or the moon.
The black balloon did eventually pass directly in front of the other left it in the dust.

The last of the balloons are airborne and float off into the distance.  Have you photographed hot air balloons before.
Leave a comment and share your experience or link to your gallery for others to enjoy.