Iron Mountain, Poway CA

Technically speaking, I took this yesterday morning before sunrise. I thought it was Sunday - being off work has apparently messed up my internal calendar. The forecast called for clear skies all evening with light clouds around sunrise. As I stood at the trail head to Iron Mountain about a hour before sunrise...shivering...the light clouds quickly turned to angrier skies. I took advantage of that and changed my composition accordingly, making the sky the subject.

Iron Mountain, Poway CA

Processing notes: 9 exposures, -4 EV to +4 EV, tonemapped in Photomatix. Tonemapped image blended with the -1 EV exposure in Perfect Layers to maintain the cloud drama. Slight glow added in Perfect Effects. Final sharpening, contrast and definition in Aperture.

Lastly...for the few readers I have out there...this will be my last post to this blog. At least for the foreseeable future. For 2013, I'm going to try my hand at a weekly photo project on Google+. This blog has been good for me to keep making the time for photography. Some shots were hits, some misses, but the journey has been rewarding. I hope you'll check out my 2013 work. +Scott Davenport.

Morning Coffee

I've been in a funk lately....at least for my Sunday morning outings. Maybe it's because it's winter, maybe it's slowing down toward the year's end. Probably not because it's cold...I'm in San Diego after all. But it's been a real chore to drag my bones out of bed in the morning and head out for a shoot. I stayed in again this morning. However, I'd promised myself I'd make a post today. So this post is a bit different for me.

I'll have a coffee once in the morning and once in the evening. I like my coffee potent, cold, and a bit sweet. The mix I make at home is a double shot of espresso, a generous amount of vanilla syrup (sugar free), and milk over ice. I add the milk last, mainly because I like watching the swirls and patterns made as the milk mixes with the espresso.

Today, I tried capturing it in a photo. The photo came out alright - and the coffee tastes great. It's sitting on the desk next to me, nearly gone.

Setup notes: No elaborate setup. All housing lighting. Camera on a tripod, remote trigger to fire.

Processing notes: Blended two images, just so the cup pouring the milk is separated from the edge of the glass. The swirl in the coffee is not a composite. Photos blended in Perfect Layers, minor contrast added in Perfect Effects. Finishing touches in Aperture.

Windansea...Revisited

I couldn't make it out this morning for a shoot. Hopefully next week. Did get through processing another batch of images from last Sunday's outing to Windansea Beach in La Jolla.

The Tiki Hut, Windansea, La Jolla

Windansea, La Jolla

I almost gave up during the drive to Windansea beach in La Jolla this morning. As I headed toward the ocean, the fog became incredibly thick. Roughly 100 feet of visibility on the freeways, if that. I'm glad I didn't give up and just go home.

The air was clearer at the shoreline, but the fog held thick up to - and through - sunrise. Shuffling carefully down the bluffs, I tempted high tide taking long exposures close to the water's edge. Occasionally, acting as a human shield for my camera from the ocean spray. The photo below looks calm and serene, but all of that soft, white mist came from a lot of waves crashing against the rocks.

Windansea, La Jolla

Processing notes: Apple Aperture only. Single exposure on the order of 4 1/2 minutes. Definition on the rocks, a touch of vibrancy to boost the blues and greens of the ocean, sharpening to the entire image.

Mount Soledad

I've been to Mount Soledad many times, sometimes with my camera, sometimes not. It gives a great vantage of San Diego and a popular spot for sunsets. At sunrise...it's a lot quieter. The weather reports called for partly to mostly cloudy skies - I was hoping for partly. My mind's eye could already see brilliant reds and oranges as sunbeams about the breaks in the clouds.

Partly cloudy turned to mostly cloudy in short order, the sky becoming a amorphous gray mass. The only color splashes I was getting were from antennae in the distance. With the skies not cooperating, I shifted focus to the omnipresent cross. It will - as it does for most visitors - be the foreground anchor for my photo.

The cross has been a source of controversy since the late 1980s - and based on court rulings in 2012, it  may not be there much longer. While not significant to me personally as a religious icon, it's certainly been a long-standing landmark of San Diego. And for that, I'm glad I've got one capture of it to call my own.

Mount Soledad Cross

Stars & Stripes & Stars

After an unplanned hiatus, back this morning. San Diego had rain earlier in the week, which does wonders for washing the dust out of the atmosphere. Couple that with a forecast for very clear skies, I went out very early this morning for some star trail experiments. My plan was to photograph this cairn I'd found unexpectedly a few months ago as the foreground and let the universe do the rest. A short - but steep - hike to the summit of the hills nearby my home I was dismayed to find the cairn was gone.

Regroup. Changed the subject to a flag - a little more tattered than my last visit. About 45 minutes into the shooting sequence, I stopped the camera, hence the abrupt stop to the trails. Although sunrise was still nearly an hour off, the skies were brightening too much. Realizing I'm going to need to start much earlier to a more effective star trail...and I still haven't quite gotten my camera recipe down for these shots yet.

But not a total loss...here's what I came away with:

Stars & Stripes & Stars

And as a bonus, I had a great view of the sunrise. Captured a few frames of that as well. Watchy my Google+ page for one of those.

Experiments

This is a throwaway shot. Really. Other than this blog entry, it's highly likely this photo will cease to exist in my library. In fact, this blog entry is primarily a tool for me to track my own progress as a photographer.

This morning's outing was about experimenting. I set two limits on myself. One: Shoot at 50mm. Two: Play with flash.

Before leaving the house, I set the focal length to 50mm on my 18-70mm lens and promised not to touch it. Then grabbed my flash and walked the neighborhood. I didn't take many photographs - I am still struggling with what makes an interesting subject when not shooting a landscape. I settled on a garden area.

Shooting at 50mm forced me to use my feet to zoom, and in most cases necessitated getting closer to the subject. General goodness. For the flash, I brought an orange diffuser. The idea was to use the flash to simulate the early morning orange rays of the sun. In practice, that didn't work out very well, although I still think there's a sound idea in there. The above shot is without the flash. I definitely need more time working with my flash.