Picture of the week

Bean Hollow shoreline fantasy

Bizarre rock formations at Bean Hollow State Beach.  The erosional forces of the sea have created some strangely shaped geological structures at this unique area. The sedimentary rock layers here are tilted in an almost vertical arrangement, exposing them as a horizontal surface to your inspection and the surf. It is one of my favorite beaches on the California coast for photography, also being less crowded due to its more off-the-beaten path location.  There seem to be an endless number of compositional possibilities that one can find while exploring the coastline here. To capture the images shown here, I used a graduated neutral density filter to better balance the exposure between the sky and foreground.  I have both Cokin and Lee filters for this purpose, and note that in some lighting situations the Cokin can exhibit a slight color cast toward the magenta side (more than what is shown and was present naturally here).  But it is correctable in Lightroom or Photoshop with a gradient mask applied with a color adjustment layer.  The Lee filter tends to be more color neutral, but the gradient transition for me tends to not be as tight as I would prefer in some situations. Thus, I continue to keep both in my camera bag. 

I visited the San Mateo coast this last week, also staying the night at the hostel of the Pigeon Point lighthouse.  This gave me the opportunity to also photograph the lighthouse at night, capturing the beacon in motion as shown here.  This image required two exposures, one capturing the light beacon at 5 seconds at f/4 and ISO 6400, and a second at 30 seconds to better expose for the foreground.  The two captures were then merged in Photoshop, using a gradient mask and some manual tweaking of the mask with the brush tool.

Due to the big storm that California just got hit with, the surf was also unusually high with swells about 15 to 20' in height.  The action of the surf crashing against the various sea stacks on other rocky islands just off the coast was incredible to witness.  I stopped in Pacifica, photographing the seas from the public pier, enabling a side profile of these swells.  These waves looked quite intimidating, and I would fear for the life of any surfer that would want to ply these waters.

All content and images are property of Stephen Fischer Photography, copyright 2014.  Last updated: 12/14/2014   ()