The Photographer Contemplates...

This fellow photographer ended up in a bunch of my compositions one particular evening.. he seemed so enthralled with the beautiful sunset sky that he wasn't too busy shooting. Don't know if he was thinking about his foreground setup at all either, being out there on the edge, but to each his own:)... and very nice of him to stand so still for the 8 seconds duration of this exposure.  It didn't bother me much, because I knew I could easily remove him from the scene later if necessary and I just went on undisturbed.  If there's a whole bunch of gawkers standing in the scene, that CAN get to be a problem.  I left him in here this time because I think the figure adds a bit of story to the shot. You might question my choice to render such a colorful scene in monochrome, but I have so many color versions of this already and I like it this way.. your mind's eye fills in the colors and the textures of the rocks, sea and cloud are so awesome all by themselves.  
My posts (and comments, sorry) will probably continue to be irregular for the near future.. the practicalities of life sometimes intrude on creative endeavors and that is my story for now.  In short, we are preparing to leave the city life and move full time to our house in a small village high in the southern California mountains, so life is going to change drastically, but first there is a lot to deal with here as you can imagine. More info on this as it occurs, I suppose.  In the meantime I don't have much opportunity to travel or work on new stuff, but it should all be better in the end.
You can view more beautiful skies from all over the world each week here at the SkyWatch home page.  

California Sky Watchin' - Rocky Shore and Pastel Clouds

I rarely come away empty handed when I head over to this spot late in the day.. almost every evening it's somewhere between simply beautiful and mind-blowing, especially in winter, so I try to take advantage at this time of year.
If I painted this sky, I'd probably want to start over because it almost doesn't look real, but here you go. No HDR or exposure combination necessary here, either.  This is a straightforward shot except for some very basic adjustments. (I do love the graduated filter process that was added to Camera RAW in CS4.. what a great tool and no more messing around with grad filters in the field for me.)
It was still spitting rain after a storm this day, so the rocks were even more slippery than normal.. those dark and mossy areas that you can see are like walking on pure grease or wet ice.. especially dangerous as it gets dark and if your concentration is not on your feet.  But, so far, so good for me.. only a few near-disaster pratfalls that I managed to recover from.  My wife wasn't so lucky a few months ago.. one afternoon we were just walking here enjoying the day and the waves, when she slipped and split her forearm open; we then spent the next half day at the emergency room waiting for her to get seven stitches.. luckily it wasn't bleeding at all while we were waiting. It turned out to be a very expensive afternoon stroll, however. 
Check out more great skies from all around the world each week at the SkyWatch home page.

Whoosh! Whump! Boom!... Sunset Cliffs

One of the more dramatic results from an afternoon spent watching post-storm waves crash into the rocks at probably our best local surfing/wave-watching spot.  You can't easily get down to beach level here (and wouldn't really want to on a day like this anyway), but there are some nice outcroppings where you can climb down fairly low and shoot back towards shore for a great view with reasonable safety. Amazing how tricky it can be to get the right composition to combine with the just right instant of the waves breaking.. but I sure can watch and work on it for a very long time without getting bored. 
Although the color of the waves was quite nice, I found it to be kind of distracting and decided that I preferred a monochrome approach. A few lucky people get to live right here, as you can see at the top of the frame... not a bad spot for your house, huh?

Feelin' Abstract

It's a rare day out that I don't spend at least part of my time focusing on abstract details.. sometimes just to kill time while waiting on the light, or sometimes because I find some genuinely interesting subjects. Much of it turns out to be junk of course, but every once in a while I snag one that looks just right somehow, at least to my eye. Very much a matter of personal taste; some people find the "picture" in this pure shape/color/texture and others don't react to it at all, but Mother Nature is an abstract expressionist, for sure.

A Roiling Sea

Southern California is being pummeled this week with wind, huge waves, torrential rain... and snow in the mountains. As it starts to clear for the weekend I will of course hope to find some great photographic opportunities:) It's almost always interesting during that transitional, post-storm period and I've been wanting for some time to get at some fresh snow for a change of subject, so a trip up to the mountains is probably in order for the weekend (if I can get there). 15-20 ft. waves at the shore will be around for a few more days, too... can't go wrong with that. Some of the local piers are closed for safety because the waves are actually breaking over them.

Meantime, another in my recent glut of winter-season seascapes for today's SkyWatch. Check out other beautiful skies from around the world or post your own at the SkyWatch home page.

Fire in the Sky

A photographer's dream day.. what else can I say?

It's such an advantage to be really familiar with a place before you try to photograph it. Whenever I travel, I have to rely largely on luck and instinct to be there when the conditions are right... it can be a frustrating experience as many of you know well, especially if a lot of time and expense were involved in getting somewhere. Here at home, however, I can watch the weather and the sky every day and just know when it's going to be happening. Occasionally it's a bust, other times like this, it's way better than expected.

Virtually no processing on this (yet)... just a slight exposure tweak and a bit of levels in the sky.

Be sure to visit the SkyWatch home page for other awesome skies from around the world.

The Weather is Swell... and a Winter Swell

At last an interesting day.. actually, an absolutely EPIC day, with huge waves from a winter storm far out to sea, combined with some perfect, beautiful light this past Saturday. This is the kind of day that happens once or twice a year; a situation to be out there with lots of time and all my photo gear ready at hand.

You'd better be a pretty competent surfer/swimmer to handle this stuff (even so, the lifeguards were busy all weekend)... they are the only ones that really get to experience the thrill and the power of these conditions first hand, but it's still lots of fun for the rest of us observing from shore, if nothing else.

Anyway, this day started out great and got even better, so I hope everyone is up for some ocean images:) I shot enough exposures in 3 hours to keep me busy for quite a while (the light after sunset was a jaw-dropper)... this is just a little teaser. I'll be back later in the week for SkyWatch, if not sooner.

A good photograph is one that communicates a fact, touches the heart, leaves the viewer

a changed person for having seen it. It is, in a word, effective. - Irving Penn

The Sun Sets on Another Year

Good Bye, '09... and thank you to all the various fellow artists, photographers and general outdoor lovers who stopped by to look in or leave comments in the past year. I have discovered many interesting people from all over the world and seen a lot of great work that I would otherwise never have experienced, if not for starting up this blog just over one year ago.

Sometimes when I sense a nice sunset and I have nothing else pressing to do, I drive over to the beach that is a few minutes from where we live, just to see what might happen. I usually don't bother to take my camera because I see this all the time (especially in the winter months) and there's no real "subject" per se, just the ocean and the sky in their simplicity. I did happen to have a camera a few days ago when I shot this exceptionally nice one, just for fun. It seemed like an appropriate fade out for my last post of the year. Here's hoping for good things to come in 2010.

Check out the fantastic scenes from SkyWatchers all over the world here, and see you all next year!

My Typical West Coast Evening

Very little chance this week to work on any new stuff (although I have much to go over and process from Death Valley), so back to my archives for this week's SkyWatch.

I don't produce as many seascapes as I probably should considering where I live, but whenever I have the inspiration and a prospect of some interesting weather, this is my "go to" spot, just a few minutes from home... no matter how many times I return here it always seems to look different. (I published a whole sequence from one afternoon at the same spot back in February, if any newer readers are interested and haven't seen these yet.)

Enjoy beautiful sky-oriented scenes from all over the world every Friday at the SkyWatch home page.

Photographers deal in things which are continually vanishing and when they have vanished there is no contrivance on earth which can make them come back again.

- Henri Cartier-Bresson

A Simple Seascape

My mind is kind of occupied tonight with loading up for a photo trip to Death Valley, so this is from the archives... wanted to leave something fresh to look at since I'll be out of touch until next week.

I was planning a fall color shot for today, but while searching for the one I wanted, came across a different image that I've been meaning to post anyway. Not really sure why I like this so much but I do, something about the soft light and contrast of textures; sometimes really simple images can be really satisfying.. we don't always need to think so hard. I shot this several years ago out on some cliffs in the Big Sur area, south of Carmel in central California... well after sunset, one of those "one last shot before heading for the barn" type throwaways that like to pop up fairly frequently. The old "inner eye" strikes again.

Hoping to have some interesting new desert scenery to play with when I get back:)

Bare Bones, II

Continuing with my "iPhone Chronicles".. a straightforward scenic for today. (I wouldn't contend that you should expect any very technically challenging work to succeed with such limited equipment, but knowing your limitations and working within them is always necessary no matter what you're doing, isn't it?) ... and it can still work out pretty well.

It's not unusual in this area for the coastal cloud/fog to recede off-shore during the day and slowly work its way back in the late afternoon or early evening. The sinking sun, peeking through an occasional thin spot in the cloud cover, creates a wonderful shimmering light on the waves and beach against the almost black overcast off in the distance. I kind of wish I had been prepared with my "real" gear to shoot this, but like I said, this kind of situation is not so uncommon here, and I'm very lucky to live only a few minutes away.

A Nice Little Sunset - Sky Watch #49

A sky like this is so rare around where I live, due to the mostly dry climate, that when they do occur, you just want to get out and shoot something, anything, to take advantage. This one was taken among the eroded hills above Torrey Pines State Beach, just a few miles from home. Interesting how the flowing forms of the clouds echo the similar shapes of the terrain in the foreground. Wish I could say I was considering that at the time, but if I was, it was subconsciously. As they say.. sometimes it's better to be lucky:)

Check out lots of cool sky shots from all over the globe at the Sky Watch Friday site.

An Old Tree of Character

This ancient Monterey Cypress clings all by itself to the rocky cliffs above the crashing ocean waves below. Known as the "Old Veteran", it is probably the oldest cypress on Point Lobos, a small but very beautiful rocky peninsula that lies just south of Carmel and north of Big Sur on the central California coast. These guys can live a maximum of about 300 years, so this one must really be up there in age and considering the constant rough weather, it's truly a testament to survival that it can live here for so long.

Point Lobos one of those iconic locations for photographers... Edward Weston lived the last 20 years of his life just a few miles from here and produced many famous nature abstracts and landscape images in this location. His grandkids still live, work and teach photography in the area. You can find unique rocky beaches, birds, sea otters, sea lions and thick forests all along the many trails that wind around the peninsula and it's small enough to cover it all on foot. 

I'm sure many, many photographers have this same image in their collection, but it's the one you have to get if you shoot here.. then you can move on to some more original stuff! I have many from here and will come back to it from time to time.

"Old Veteran Cypress" - Point Lobos

A Nice Day by the Ocean (part five)

Sunset and beyond. Bringing this one day sequence to an end, I was debating if I should include this top one or not since it is pretty much the same time frame as the last post and fairly similar, but I guess it's different enough to be worth a look... and the sky is rather nice. The second shot was literally an afterthought; walking back to my car to head home, I still had my camera and tripod over my shoulder and for kicks decided to stop and shoot this last view which is well after sunset. Reviewing my "digital negatives", it was a really dark exposure and I had no intent to even process it, but with some spare time the other day I started to play with it and was fairly happy in the end, if only because it puts the whole setting for the previous shots in some perspective and adds just a touch of civilization at the end. Looking north toward the settled part of La Jolla Cove... you can see some high rise condos and the lifeguard station off there in the distance.
I was also able to work on some texture studies/abstracts of the rock patterns in between these other shots, but will save those for another day and end this series here... time to move on. All in all a very productive afternoon. Wish they were all so.

A Nice Day by the Ocean (part four)

Getting to the fun part now - almost sunset, but a little darker than it would normally be due to the heavy cloud cover.  No complaints though, since a dark, ominous sky is often the ideal for this kind of scene.  If any, my gripe would be that the weather is too nice around here most of the time. The slight crack right on the horizon allowing some color to come through really makes it for me, whereas if it was all dark gray it wouldn't have been nearly as interesting. I guess I could have chosen an even longer exposure and completely softened out the ocean, but kind of like seeing a little shape left in the waves.

I've shot this area late in the day many times, but there are so many possible variables with the tide, waves, weather, etc., that it always ends up looking completely different.

A Nice Day by the Ocean (part three)

Continuing on another 30 minutes or so, what I have here is essentially two versions of the same subject in two different kinds of light. The first is very soft and low contrast while the light was being filtered through the clouds, and the second has a lot more definition as the sun managed to peak out near the horizon and create a really nice side-lighting effect and also give that beautiful russet color typical of the late afternoon. The gulls were cooperative subjects, posing nicely while I was shooting away with the light changing almost moment by moment. Still haven't decided which of these I prefer; I'll be interested in which gets the better reaction. To me, the second, besides the nice light, has more depth although I like the atmosphere of the first also.
I actually have several more decent variations on this one which I won't bore you with; eventually I'll pick the one I feel works best overall.

A Nice Day by the Ocean (part two)

Just one for today, since this image kind of stands alone in my time sequence. About 45 minutes later in the day than the two in my previous post, the sun is low enough to give the sky a bit of color now, when not covered by the clouds. The soft light gives the blues and yellows a pleasing pastel-like look. You can see from the water action that the exposure is getting longer, too. When reviewing the thumbnail images right out of the camera, as shot, I almost passed on this one as it looked kind of flat and uninteresting due to the low contrast, but with just some quick correction to the levels and a touch of saturation, it became one of my favorites of the set.

A Nice Day by the Ocean (part one)

It came to me that even though I live just a few minutes from the coast, I haven't yet posted any seascapes here, mostly because I haven't done any recently and haven't been thinking about it much. So, a Sunday afternoon with nothing else to do was the excuse I needed to head down to my favorite spot south of La Jolla Cove, especially since we were between large storms here in southern California and I hoped that some good stuff might be happening with the waves and the sky (I used to fly sailplanes for fun and you get pretty good at judging the weather when you're into soaring). Turned out that I was right... some pretty impressive breakers were riding in and the clouds were doing nice things to the light. Also, it was low tide when I got there, so was able to get out on the rocks and use them for my foreground, which is essential if you can manage it without getting soaked.

Shooting here is a much more dynamic situation than the usual landscape where everything is more or less static. The waves are changing second by second, along with the light, there are gulls flying in and out of the frame and the water flowing over the rocks actually varies the composition constantly without even moving. You have to be careful not to get dumped on by the occasional larger-than-expected wave, also.

The whole afternoon, I don't think I wandered more than 200 yards in any direction but was able to come up with at least a dozen distinct and different images. I think it might be interesting to post a series of the best ones over the next week or two as a study in how much variation lighting and framing can produce without actually changing the subject very much at all. The progression from mid-day light to sunset and beyond is pretty striking.