Step Into My Ocean

I have not written any blog post so far this year. So I was busy with my real job, the one that pays the bills. Then it was the New Year, lost of photographers sharing their top ten or “13” of the year and lessons learned. Seemed like a good idea so I started sifting through the hard drive in search of my hoped for masterpieces. Ten best proved to be a high bar; ten that could have been worse just did not have the same impact. Lessons learned:

Make a lot more photos. Make better photos!

Maybe you know how it is? Easier said than done.  In hopes of not having a Groundhog Day experience when 2014 rolls around it seems like its high time for a peak at the files. 

This photograph was fun to make. I was standing in the shore break with the water rolling up to my knees struggling with the tripod to find purchase on slippery outcroppings. My feet sinking lower with every slosh. The sun was gone half an hour ago and the dogs had sought refuge from the wind curled up amidst dryer rocks. Check the focus every exposure. Manically watch the ocean, be ready to grab the rig and run if a bigger set rises out of the blue. 

A Hard Days Night

I went to the mountains to go to work. I needed stock images that someone might actually buy. So I did what I have always done, I asked my hansom and successful friend if I could tag along and learn a thing or two. A sideways glance with a skeptical “ok” and it was game on. Soon after that I hit the trail, steadily falling behind but nonetheless lugging my gear up and over the passes that guard access to the high sierra.

 It is worth mentioning that I am not an experienced backpacker. More of an urban slacker who’d searched the web thinking about what I would actually need to bring 7,000 feet up and ten or so miles back into the peaks. Well I was not going anywhere without coffee, a flask and a tent. The idea of going ultra light was never in the cards. The important decisions out of the way it was time to bring a camera and the stuff that goes with it. All that stuff being really really heavy. Added to this rudimentary fact is that all decisions about what you will have at the shoot are pretty much final after you leave the car.

Something about putting that pack on your shoulders makes you think you can do with less gear in the field than usual. I would not bring two tripods. Galen would use a rock and come back with everything. Well that’s a difference between Galen and me. I desperately struggled to make a shot come together, light fading and again my flash tumbles to the ground.

Live and learn. Two weeks later I was slogging up another series of switchbacks, this time with two tripods. I think I may have been stronger and wiser. I know I was slower.

This is one of my favorite photographs from the last few months so I will us use it as the first image for my first ever blog post. I went out for a sunrise shoot with my good friend and fellow camera owner Josh. It was very early but I had nothing to say on account of my friend having to get up a good hour before me to drive to my house. Bleary eyed we hit the road with only the faintest hope that the espresso would soon take hold. It takes about 45 minutes to drive out to Drakes beach then another 15 or so to walk down to the reef we were to stand on that morning. Everything felt pretty much miserable.  It was cold, there was fog, it was overcast with little promise. Did I mention it was cold? The low beach break was slopping over the rock as I started looking around wondering where the sun would rise. Without any warning at all it was on! The light turned great and stayed great. I made hasty compositions. Cable releases and graduated filters came out. I was afraid of the waves. Bad things have happened before, expensive things. My feet got wet it was slippery. I neglected to check my focus till after the light settled down 15 minutes later.  Was I going to cry? No, there would be no cathartic release; I was just going to have to live with it. Then for just a minute, that beautiful glow broke under the clouds and I was ready. A gift, a second chance, something to hope for at the very least. I shot it with a Nikon D300 and finished it in Lightroom 2. I hope you like it. I want to go back reshoot some blurry images that might have been really cool.