This Might Be the Most Stunning Photo of St. Louis You'll See This Winter

Sometimes to appreciate the beauty of St. Louis on a winter's day you need just need some perspective.

Take last Friday. It was bitterly cold — the day's high was 17 degrees — and on the ground, it was easy enough to feel depressed.

Not so from the sky.

Recent Webster graduate (and frequent RFT contributor) Braden McMakin was flying back from Las Vegas on Friday on an early morning flight that began its descent into St. Louis right around 9:30 a.m. That's when McMakin — a skilled and prolific photographer — pulled up his window shade and saw the scene captured above.

"It was actually a pretty impulsive shot," he tells us. "Since my camera was in my lap from taking pictures during takeoff, I had it handy."

Even if he didn't futz with the settings before snapping the image, he admits to doing some editing after the fact, explaining, "The original shot is brighter since I dialed in my settings pretty quickly, so I brought down the highlights and put blue tones in the shadows when I edited the photo. There's also a slight vignette around the Arch to draw our attention toward the center of the picture, too."

Still, McMakin gives all credit to the glorious clouds that appear to be parting at the actual moment he took the shot. "Honestly, I was pretty lucky to have opened my window and taken the picture the moment I did," he says.

Consider this photo a reminder of the old adage that luck favors the prepared — and also a reminder that St. Louis can be pretty darn gorgeous, even in the absolutely most frigid cold.


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