Crazy Cloud Formations

I was hanging around with the family the evening of June 2nd, 2008 when I noticed a bizzarre cloud formation to the East. This just got bigger & bigger as the sun set to the West, but I finally grabbed my Canon 40D DSLR and took a few pictures. There is a lot of dynamic range here between the foreground in the dusk light and the bright sky/clouds - digital camera have a tough time capturing that. Your eye is better able to handle/adjust to this, so I have applied some Fill Light to better show how this actually looked. It was surreal and almost like Denver, Colorado (just SE of here) had blown up or something! ;-) These clouds eventually just dissipated - i.e. there was no extreme weather associated with 'em - not even a rainbow.

Crazy Clouds (closeup) over neighbor's house at 8:04PM - sunset is 20 minutes later

crazy clouds neighbors house

Looking down the street at the Crazy Clouds at 8:19PM

crazy clouds street

Another view down the street at 8:21PM - original unprocessed

crazy clouds street 2

Closeup of above image - this is 3 minutes before sunset

crazy clouds street 2 closeup

From my backyard at 8:23PM

crazy clouds backyard 1

One minute after sunset - sunlight is still on clouds up high

crazy clouds backyard 2