The thermometer read 6 degrees when I woke up this morning, with a sub-zero wind chill. February has been a brutal month so far, but today I bundled up and braved the cold.

The sky was flooded with color from the rising sun. A thin, slippery layer of ice covered everything in sight. A family of geese sat silently and still in the icy cold water. Chunks of ice floated down the Hudson. And there I was, lying flat on my belly on a freezing cold patch of ice, snow, and sand, trying to compose the perfect shot.