Pacific City

I hate to do it to the locals, but the world must know: Pacific City, Oregon is incredible. The beach is simply a wonderful place with incredible surf (point break characteristics?), and the most splendid tide pools on the planet, plus luscious dunes and caves and enormous rocks. 

I spent an afternoon there last week, and I can't wait to go back. I got to go make pictures for a wonderful family from Idaho, and everywhere I turned there was a great image waiting.

Highly recommended and totally worth whatever drive it takes to get you there.

Nikon D800, 105mm f/2.8 Macro VR lens, f/4, 1/1600s, ISO 100. Pacific City, Oregon's beach is stunning, and Lake Oswego is just a two hour drive away.

Greener Grass

You know that the grass is always greener on the other of the fence, right? "If only I could go to Yellowstone, then I could make some great pictures! Or the Grand Canyon! Oh, and Europe would really free me to create..."

Well, those places are wonderful, and I could doubtless find some wonderful (if commonplace) pictures. But I find that when I get out locally and really try to find inspiration on my side of the fence, those are the times that I find pictures that are not so commonplace and much more valuable to me. 

For this picture my family and a friend headed to the beach to beat the heat in Lake Oswego...little did we know that there was no heat at the coast. The air was 60, and the water was 50 (my elbows were numb, but I gotta take advantage!) and there was mist and clouds and beach fires adding a little something more to the atmosphere. All day long I couldn't take my eyes off of this tree at Indian Beach in Ecola State Park (which is one of the most beautiful places in the USA). It seemed like one standing on it's own and not suffering for it.

Nikon D7100, 50mm f/1.4 lens, f/8, 1/250s, ISO 400, Nik Silver Efex Pro 2. From Lake Oswego, it's only an hour or so to Ecola State Park.

Now for the geek speak.

This image is a much wider field of view than you could possibly get in a single frame with a DSLR and a 50mm lens, and that's on purpose. I know that my 50mm is wide enough to get everything in, but it's the perfect lens for landscape work because it's clear and sharp and has no distortion. In order to maximize these things, I shot this as a panorama-like image.

First, I found an exposure that let me have a little detail in the clouds and nice enough detail in the dark areas, too, and set those settings in manual mode. I chose f/8 for an aperture because I wanted to make sure that I had all the important things in focus, and f/8 on 50mm focussed that far away lets practically the whole world fall within the depth of field. So I focussed on the top of the tree (with the clouds as a backdrop I was sure it was focussed on the main tree and not something else) and switched to manual focus so it wouldn't change. Ideally, I'd have the camera on a tripod, but I was going light and fast and handheld, so I used a higher ISO to allow a fast shutter speed to freeze my shake.

I then turned the camera vertical and shot three frames along the bottom of the scene, overlapping 25%, then shot three more in a row for the middle, overlapping 25%, and one more row on top. In Lightroom I made adjustments to white balance and contrast to the center image, as well as color toning, then applied those same settings to all the other images in the grid (one click with the sync button). Then I selected all the images, and chose to merge them to a panorama in Photoshop. I made sure to click the vignette control option and pressed go. A few minutes later, after PS worked its magic, I had the composite. I hit save and cropped it in Lightroom, then opened it in Nik Silver Efex for the black and white conversion. Back in Lightroom I used my special Grape Dreamcicle toning for the slight bit of color you see. (let me know and I'll share the recipe). 

Today I just got a Gigapan Epic Pro, and it makes this sort of picture automatically and I can't wait to try it!

I sure enjoyed making it. It came out just as I envisioned while being pounded by the frigid surf.

Red, Gold, and Green

You know that song, right? It's a bit kookie, but it really sticks in your mind...and if you haven't seen the video--well, it's an early 80's British band, so be warned, but here you go.

What has it got to do with these colorless images I'm sharing with you here? You see, T.'s hair is hot red, and K.'s hair is blonde (gold?) and we were shooting on a beach in Oregon surrounded by the greenest greens on planet earth. "Karma Karma Karma Karma, Karma Chameleon..." See what I mean?

It was really a pleasure and an honor making pictures for these newlyweds. My wife and I were guests and photographers, so we were busy. We started by arriving early and scouting the beach to find the best place to have the ceremony; someplace with beautiful scenes and not too much noise from the surf. We built a walkway from heaps of drift wood for the bride to walk down on the way to the beach. This first image is shot on the same spot where the ceremony was performed.

Nikon D800, 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6 VR lens @ 98mm, f/5.6, 1/320s, ISO 800, Nik Silver Efex Pro 2.

 A serene vista for the ceremony wasn't our only goal. We also need to find the perfect places to make portraits of the bride and groom. It's true that we're on the beach, and it's early September, but this is Oregon, not Florida: it was about 60 degrees in the sun...but there was no sun. So we needed to be ready to quickly make portraits of the bride and groom before she turned into a popsicle. Plus, there was the seafood dinner awaiting us, so we needed to shoot, you know, pronto.

Nikon D800, 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6 VR lens @ 135mm, f/5.6, 1/320s, ISO 800, Nik Silver Efex Pro 2.

The bride loved this location for the lighthouse on the cliff (I think she's a Pete's Dragon fan), but she didn't know the lighthouse was closed for restoration. And in Oregon that means that it's covered top to bottom in a black tarp. Not exactly the picturesque backdrop we had imagined. Fortunately, the caretaker's house was in perfect shape and gave balance and interest to the background.

Nikon D800, 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6 VR lens @ 180mm, f/5.6, 1/320s, ISO 800, Nik Silver Efex Pro 2.

Still, it's just a background, and I'm always telling my students that backgrounds don't make good pictures: good light makes good pictures. And the thing about that house back there is that it's white, and surrounded by dark green, which really makes it pop. Add to that the sun setting behind dense diffusing fog, and it was pretty dark on that beach, and the light was totally flat. Looking at people there were no harsh shadows, but there was also no direction to the light on their faces and little light in the eyes--especially K.'s eyes which are rather deeply set. Without intervention we were doomed to pose people facing the beach to try and get a little light in their eyes, which left the highway dissecting the images in the back. 

This is where off camera flash saved my bacon. For all of these images I used a Nikon SB-900 in a 24" softbox to bring definition and contrast. It was controlled using the popup flash on the D800. The great thing about the Nikon CLS is that the brightness of that SB-900 can be controlled wirelessly from a long distance (Joe McNally recently tested it to 85 ft. is full sunlight). That means my wife can be anywhere on that beach and I can make the light brighter or darker by simply pushing some buttons on the camera. It's really a powerful tool and makes the images I have in my mind's eye possible. That first image above is totally lifeless without that flash, and the one below lacks definition without the light from behind separating K. from the trees.

Nikon D800, 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6 VR lens @ 90mm, f/5.6, 1/100s, ISO 1600, Nik Silver Efex Pro 2.

This image was the one I was most excited about making. While we were scouting I saw the road coming out of the trees and the tunnel like nature of the branches overhead. I knew that right at the edge of that tunnel there would be great light, like a porch that shields the light from overhead leaving a directional brightness. I balanced the flash to add a little kick from behind and positioned the couple with cheesy thoughts about roads to the future running through my mind. Anyway, it's the picture I envisioned while scouting and it's a real pleasure to be able to make something in your mind into something shareable.

The dinner was wonderful, and we had a lovely evening--even the cop who pulled me over was kind enough to let me go with a warning. I do love Oregon, and being there with loved ones, doing some picture making for loved ones, makes it more memorable even than those Culture Club lyrics.

Nikon D800, 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6 VR lens @ 180mm, 1/110s, ISO 1600.

Vacation Photography

Have I mentioned that I'm a really good vacation photographer? I come along with you and make artful pictures of your family on vacation--the kind of stuff you'll print and keep forever, not just post on Facebook. Let's face it, pictures of your kid at the beach beat pictures of your kid on a stool with a school photographer imploring him or her to say, "Cheese."

Nikon D700, 50mm f/1.4 lens, f/4.0, 1/8000s, ISO 400.

I have a trip to the Caribbean coming up in January, but there's lots of time between now and then, so give me a call and let's get you setup.

A Trip South

Nephew is starting first grade. My first grade teacher was Mrs. McCabe, and our team name for field day was McCabe's Monkey's. It was a real field day, with genuine gunny sacks to race in, three legged races, hundred yard dashes, and jump roping contests. And you only got a ribbon if you won, not just for participating. It was a good thing, I think. It was a whole different world at Mary Esther Elementary. That was in Fort Walton Beach, Florida. Famous (sort of) for white sandy beaches. I mean, white, like snow, literally.

Not like the beaches in Ft. Lauderdale, where I was last week. The beach there was made all of diatoms and shell fragments, and the grains were very soft and comfortable to walk in. Kind of nice. Not a bad view to wake up to in the morning, either.

I stayed at the Sheraton on the beach, and they have a restaurant in the hotel, called The Wreck (kind of a sunken ship theme) that has windows that look into the pool from below. Pretty creepy. Billy Crystal did some movie with a scene in there. Fish and Chips were okay.

My work was in Miami, however, and i did get a little time there in the afternoon one day to walk the beach front and see the beach. Very colorful place, Miami; very caribbean. 

Unfortunately, that visit was cut short when these storm clouds rolled in. It can really come down down there! So, I was left to my usual routine of shooting at night.

Tried this one on the beach. That couple was gracious enough to hold still for me, and the sea was calm under that oil tanker, too. It was a fifteen second exposure, and then some additional work in LightRoom to finish it off.

Similarly, shooting was restricted to nighttime earlier last week in Atlanta. It's a pretty nice city for night work, though, and this one turned out okay. Hot nights in the south. It was a good visit, with some good results and good people to work with. Still, I wasn't dry for nearly a week, and it's good to be home.

Shot all of these with my Canon 7D, and a 35mm f/1.4 USM L series lens. I like this lens for it's sharp renditions and super fast aperture. However, the camera is a little disappointing. I'm still working with it, but my first impression is that the Nikon D90 makes better quality images, especially at higher ISO's and/or longer exposures. I'm not giving up on it, yet, but I'm also not selling my Nikon gear (nor do I foresee that happening!). I don't mind if you love your Canon, but I've worked with both. I'm still giving it a chance, though, so don't hate me, yet.