Dust Storm!

I won't call it a haboob... it wasn't that big of a deal. But look how incredibly quickly the sky changed. I took the photo below on Friday (7/17/15) at 6:45 PM. Those rocky hills in the background are the northernmost border of Joshua Tree National Park, and that thunderhead cloud was growing quickly. Thunderstorms were predicted, and hopefully rain was on the way!

Thirty minutes later (7:15 PM) I took the shot below. In this short period of time the skies had gone from blue to yellow-brown, the wind had kicked up, and although there was no immediate rain, the smell of wet creosote was in the air.

Three minutes late (7:18 PM) my phone started making a weird beeping noise. Here's the screenshot from my phone:

Like I said, it really wasn't a big deal. I didn't notice a huge amount of dust in the air, although the sky certainly looked unusual. I decided to use the strange light (the sun was almost blocked out, although the photos don't do it justice) to take some granddaughter silhouette shots.

Using a texture and Photoshop, I doctored these up a bit to give them a more eerie, otherworldly look...

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