David's Images of the Day Photoblog
Travels around the world
California blue iris, a view up into the redwoods, and the John Pfeiffer homestead cabin. Images taken on the Oak Grove Trail in Big Sur State Park.
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A print of the “View Looking Up in a Redwood Forest” image won “Best in Show” and “People’s Choice” Awards at the Tampa Bay Photographic Art Society in September 2010.
The group attending the Big Sur Photography Workshop with Michael Mariant was scheduled to meet for breakfast in San Simeon. I walked down to the shore along the Pico Creek before breakfast to get some early morning images. The first is of the succulent sea fig (Carpobrotus chilensis) plant and its flower. It turns out that this is an invasive species. I then saw some tracks in the sand. I wondered if they were from a mountain lion, but since the nails were present — probably a dog. There was a lot of drift wood on the beach. Some to build a wind shelter. After breakfast, the group went to Piedras Blancas beach to view the Elephant Seals. The same place I was the previous evening. While Michael was beginning his workshop, I managed to catch a patrol of Brown Pelicans flying over in formation. Several more images of the Elephant Seals, including one with a Chipmunk on the sand. The final image includes the Piedras Blancas Rock and Lighthouse in the background (and a yawning Elephant Seal near the bottom right).
For the Afternoon, we spent time at Redwood Gulch Falls. The light levels within the forest near the falls ranged from very bright to very dark — well beyond the capability of DSLR sensors. Here I used Singh-Ray filters (to smooth out the water flow) and HDR (took 5 images under and over exposed) which were then combined using Photomatix. Later on we traveled to Sand Dollar beach. Our first exercise was to use filters at the beach to give the waves a soft ethereal effect. As the sun set over the Pacific ocean, I used HDR again to adapt to the wide range of light.
I arrived in San Simeon on the California coast the day before the Big Sur Workshop. After dinner, I drove 7 miles north to the Elephant Seal view-point on Piedras Blancas beach. There are hundreds of Elephant Seals just being lazy and making a lot of noise. The young males are mock fighting, but not doing much damage. This was an image rich environment.
Click on the image to view the whole set.
Images from Day 3 of the 2010″Yosemite in Winter: A Season of Contrast” photography workshop with Michael Mariant. Most of the day it snowed and rained in the valley. At the end of the day, several of us were working on images in the recently renovated Curry Village Lounge. Someone came in and said go outside at look at Half Dome as it was being lit up with a sunset glow. The only camera I had with me was the D3x that had been acting up with electronic problems. I had minimal control of aperture and shutter speed, but still got some amazing images.
