Get Wild

Gear: Tokina ATX 16-28 f/2.8, Canon 24-105mm f/4, Polaroid Shutter Release

Location: Bull Run Lake, Carson Iceberg Wilderness

Prior to last weekend, I had experienced the wild once. Four years ago, I spent a few days in Botswana's Okavango Delta - the largest inland delta in the world. We navigated the endless maze of reeds via hippo paths and makuros until we reached a remote island 2 hours later. While the true wilderness of the delta begins 8 hours in, the lack of electricity, the wildlife surrounding our tents at night and the absence of other humans made our camp site more wild than anything I had ever experienced. I didn't realize how overdue I was for another wilderness excursion.

The crush of daily life is draining. We are connected with each other in such a fashion that our most meaningful connection, that with nature, struggles to exist. Living in the Bay Area makes it easy to experience nature, but what are we truly experiencing? A moment's respite, a breath of fresh air, before we plunge back into wi-fi, LTE and a barrage of emails. I wouldn't qualify that as a bonding experience with Mother Nature. So, last weekend I went one step further and backpacked into Carson Iceberg Wilderness. This area of the Sierras is part of the Stanislaus National Forest. It's a stunning area of the mountains, where massive, white stone boulders mold the landscape and solemn conifers shade your path. We hiked out roughly 5 miles by following "duckies" (rock piles that other backpackers leave to mark the trail) and our compass and were rewarded with a spectacular finish at Bull Run Lake. The lake itself was fairly small, but pristine. It lay nestled between mountains, making it the perfect hideaway. The best part of our time in the Sierra wild was the night sky. It was the first time that I had ever seen the Milky Way, and I was ready to photograph it. 

I brought the Tokina ATX 16-28 f/2.8 to try my hand at astrophotography. The wide angle was great for the night sky, and, based on my research, f/2.8 is the "golden aperture" for photographing stars. The Polaroid shutter release was essential to this process as I had to shoot in Bulb mode. Most of my exposures were ~45 seconds. I realized afterwards that I didn't actually have to make such long exposures. First, exposures longer than 40 seconds record star movement. You can see below that some of the stars appear as lines. Secondly, my favorite shot that I took was actually an accident. I released the shutter after 11 seconds, and seeing nothing significant on my LCD I moved on to the next shot. When I was fiddling with these images in Lightroom, I truly realized how powerful Canon's 6D is, as well as Adobe's ability to pull out the light that was invisible to my eyes. 

Check the photos out and I'll post again in a few weeks. I'm off to the next adventure - Peru! 

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I used Tiffen's graduated ND 0.6 filter for all day/sunset shots.

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The 50 second exposure. Feels blurry due to star movement.

The North Coast and the 35mm f/1.4

Gear: Canon 35mm f/1.4
Location: Brookings, OR

Before I write anything else, I'll say this: everyone must drive up to Northern (the technical northern) California at one point in their lifetime. Bay Area dwellers have no excuse! This past weekend was the first time that I ventured northwest past the wine valleys and into endless miles of the wild. The drought-stricken valleys of Mendocino rolled into lush glens of redwood rainforest and unbridled Pacific coastline. Driving through fog banks and hillsides carpeted in ferns made our current water crisis seem like a bad dream; instead, this Eden was our reality.

I brought Canon's 35mm f/1.4 to test it with landscapes and casual photos of friends. I'll admit that it took me a minute to adjust to its wide angle. While I have shot on wider lenses, Canon's 24mm f/2.8 for example, the 35mm isn't quite wide enough to strictly be a landscape lens, nor does it possess a focal length that makes it exceptional for portraits. Don't get me wrong, this is a fast lens that has the ability to shoot razor sharp images (just be sure to give it proper stability), but it's also wide enough that there is a ton of negative space around your subject. Personally, I don't enjoy getting uncomfortably close to my subjects or applying a significant crop in post, so I would rather start out with an 85mm. While I enjoyed how this lens photographed landscapes, I would prefer to work with an even wider lens. In the end, it was a nice, clean lens to shoot with, but ultimately not one that I would have as a regular in my kit.

“The redwoods, once seen, leave a mark or create a vision that stays with you always. No one has ever successfully painted or photographed a redwood tree. The feeling they produce is not transferable. From them comes silence and awe. It’s not only their unbelievable stature, nor the color which seems to shift and vary under your eyes, no, they are not like any trees we know, they are ambassadors from another time”

— John Steinbeck

Happy 4th of July!

Shifts

Location: San Francisco, Financial District
Gear: 24-105mm f/4

Things have been changing lately. While that's not an excuse for flying under the radar for the last couple of weeks, it is an intro to an explanation. I began this blog in an effort to continue shooting anything and everything. Working in any medium, or industry, requires routine practice and refinement, and upon realizing that I was beginning to slip away from my regimen I picked up my camera for some after work photo walks. Since then, I have focused on shooting a diverse array of content because, to me, it is better to shoot than waste time waiting for my "type" of content. If you are a portrait photographer, does that mean that you only shoot portraits? Of course not! Because whether or not you are photographing your specialty is beyond the point. As long as you are making photographs you are learning. Each time I pick up my camera I learn something; this can range from developing your intuition of your camera's functionality, to understanding how to read a histogram to basic composition. There is always more to learn.

With that being said, I have let go of my tunnel vision focus and opened up the doors to new styles of portrait photography and even testing out event photography. Sure, these images may not directly contribute to my portfolio, but in many ways they do. Just as an illustrator creates sketches prior to their pen and ink drawings, I photograph seemingly smaller side projects in order to refine my technical skills. A good mindset to maintain is an open one. After all, you never know where your next opportunity may come from :)

So, where are these ambiguous images from? A secret side project! Details to come in a later post...!

Zins, Sunshine & the 50mm f/1.4

Location: Alexander Valley & Bodega Bay

Gear: 50mm f/1.4

This last weekend was a much needed break from routine. So often we find ourselves longing for weekends, holidays, or simply just the end of the work day, only to stop and find that time has passed, our bodies are older and yet we haven't lived. The choice to live consciously can at times feel like the exact opposite of a choice - a forbidden luxury, if you will. We develop a lazy habit of enviously eyeing those living "simpler lifestyles", when really a simple life can be a choice if we choose to make the sacrifice. While I didn't make any drastic changes in my own lifestyle this past weekend, I did decide to live consciously and relish every moment of it.

Saturday morning my boyfriend and I drove up to Sebastopol to brunch with family friends and onward to Healdsburg for an afternoon full of sunshine and wine tasting. The sun was radiant and illuminated the vibrant green vines that traced the curves of the valley's rolling foothills. The laid back atmosphere of the Alexander Valley wineries was exactly what we needed to eradicate the leeching effect that florescent lighting and computer screens have on us. After sampling numerous zinfandels we drove our way through the golden afternoon and into the coastal fog where we spent the evening at the Bodega Bay Lodge. We were greeted with wine, cheese and a toasty fire, oh and Scrabble. In total, it was perfect. The next morning we spent some time wandering along the coast and found it full of life. Lush succulents and thistles crowded themselves against the road and the air was full of bird calls and barking sea lions. What a beautiful thing it is to experience nature in such force, even when you are not too far away from civilization. 

After a wonderfully misty morning we drove back into the valley heat to check out Bottle Rock. Seeing Snoop and No Doubt was nothing short of epic. Unfortunately, the "no removable lenses" policy prevented me from taking any photos at the event.

I shot everything with Canon's 50mm f/1.4. It's a great handy little lens that gets the job done when you're looking for a fast prime, but don't want to sell a kidney. While I wouldn't shoot anything intended for print on the 50mm f/1.4, it does stay quite sharp when it's completely open. If you are a beginner I highly recommend this lens as a starting point. They say every photographer should shoot on a 50mm at one point or another and I stand by that. It's a great intro to primes and a utility player focal length. Lastly, it's cheap, like $330 cheap! So you won't cry yourself to sleep if anything happens to it :).

Beginnings

Location: Gilman Railroad Tracks & Middle Harbor Shoreline Park

After several months of debating the direction of this blog, here it is. Through this blog you will find image collections from my wanderings, gear reviews (I rent a lot of gear) and everything else regarding photography and its resilience as a mainstay in my life. 

This past Memorial Day weekend I decided to check out the Sigma 85mm f/1.4 as well as a graduated Neutral Density filter, although this was definitely not the weekend to use the latter! The flat grey skies present in last weekend's forecast provided us with less than desirable conditions to shoot in, but near sunset a fog began to create a dreary, yet mesmerizing, aura about the San Francisco Bay. While the ND filter spent most of its time in its case, I did bring it out at sunset and I found that it revealed the depths and layering of the fog that was otherwise hidden. A lovely surprise on a gloomy day.

I decided to test the Sigma 85mm because of Lindsey Adler's ravings about the lens. I treat her words like gold - who doesn't? Since this was my first time using the Sigma 85mm, I had to shoot a few quick portraits of my friend. Believe me when I say this lens is SHARP. Wow. To be honest, I wasn't expecting this to beat my love affair with Canon's 85mm f/1.2L, but this Sigma might be its newest rival. The compression is fantastic and extremely flattering for portraits, but I also loved using it for other details as well. Note - the textures are amazing. 

Thanks for looking and I'll have another post soon! Sign up to receive notifications when I post in the sidebar →