How to take great fall color pictures and UPA, The Ukrainian Resistance

Above, top to bottom: fall colors on Lychakivska Street(see below for explanation); the moon right after sunset from the Wysoki Zamok(high castle); dog owners let their bulldogs socialize in the park on a sunny day; the faithful waited in line for over 30 minutes to get holy water after Tuesday's mass, many of them drank the water, an Orthodox tradition; a woman holds a portrait of Christ to be blessed while taking part in the procession around Pokrot Church in L'viv, Ukraine on October 14th, 2008.
I was supposed to cover a pro-life event on Tuesday, the anniversary of UPA, a national holiday in Ukraine. Instead, I never found the group, took pictures of the baptism, watched Ukrainians drink the holy water, and wandered into the adjacent woods. I especially liked the one of the fall colors, and in response to some recent comments asking for photo instruction, I explain the shot below.

UPA, or the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, began as a resistance movement in the spring/summer of 1943 and developed into a guerilla force. They fought in the best interest of the Ukrainian people, according to Wikipedia, and challenged the Nazi Waffen SS, Wehrmacht, the Polish Underground Army(Armia Krajowa), and a variety of Soviet forces including the Red Army and the NKVD. They also fought with the Germans against the soviets and the poles.

Tuesday was the anniversary of its founding, and the leader of UPA, Stepan Bandera, is a huge national hero. For Ukrainians, this is like the Alamo, the Revolutionary War, and the resistance all rolled into one. I find it fascinating since my grandfather fought in the polish underground. The UPA was unique because it fought the Nazis with no foreign support, unlike most resistance movements. UPA was most active in the Carpathian mountains and in Western Ukraine, near to where I am living. Another reason why Western and Eastern Ukraine are entirely different worlds. 

In order to take a zoom photo like the one above, you need a manual zoom. I used a 17-35mm lens, but you can pick anything that isn't fixed(so no 50mm prime). Then you set it to either extreme(17mm or 35mm) and then set your exposure to somewhere around 30 sec-60 sec. It can be faster or slower than this, depending on the desired effect. The top photo was shot at 1/40, f/8, ISO 200. Before pressing the shutter, begin zooming in or out and then press the shutter button simultaneously. The camera will expose the zoom and create an effect similar to this. 

Be careful how you use it. It can be used to bring emphasis/life/action to an otherwise dull subject, but it's also disorienting. Here, I wanted to emphasize the color of the trees, not the details. Zooming helps me do that.