Marina at Charleston, Oregon

I stayed in Charleston, Oregon on Monday, August 3, 2015, which I wrote about in my blog entry "My 2015 Vacation, Part 5 of 7". On Tuesday morning I spent some time at the marina with the hopes of getting some good nautical pictures.

I did have my bag of lenses with me but ended up loading the 50mm f/1.8 prime and that was all I used. There were a few shots I took of the other side of the bay that could have possibly used a longer lens, and there were a few shots I took on a pier that could have used a wider lens. Overall, however, I really like the simplicity of the prime lens.



Charleston Visitor Center Parking Lot

If you end up like I did, at the marina after the sun was up and only the one chance for shooting, you are immediately giving up any golden hour light. In my case there was some haze. It was NOT a clear blue sky, especially as you looked into the sun.

Since the sky was almost gray I figured I'd be getting almost perfect conditions to do black and white processing, or near that anyway. I also didn't have to worry about composition as much from the standpoint of where the light source was. It was pretty even lighting all around, as though I had a lot of soft light sources everywhere!.

That light also reduced the need for a circular polarizer to get rid of reflections from the water surface.

Because I was there kind of early (I expect for the fishermen 7:30 AM or so wasn't early) there wasn't much traffic on the water itself which should help with reflections of boat rigging. It still wasn't mirror flat on the bay, however, so ripples did affect my reflection shots.

Coming from Phoenix, Arizona, I don't have much opportunity to shoot pictures in a working marina full of fishing vessels and sail boats. This was my first attempt and I sure hoped it would work out!

Early bird gets the shell fish

I took some pictures of the mud since the tide was out. I'm not sure how picturesque they are but I kind of like the reflections. This one to the right has reflections of the fish processing building along with the low tide flats and a seagull to boot. I tried working with various lines in the pictures too (all of them, not just the mud flats).

This picture to the right purposefully has a diagonal of the sea weed starting in the lower left corner and pointing to the upper right, while the reflection and waterline kind of come from the upper left and point to the lower right. I'm not sure how effective it is but it does seem like a pleasing composition to me even if the subject isn't the best.

What I might do differently is to try it without the gull in it and use a longer exposure with an ND filter in order to smooth out the water more. I like how you can see through the water just enough but still have the reflection of the building. I did use a polarizer on the lens the morning I took these but no additional ND filters.

Seaweed flowing under bridge

This image is of seaweed flowing in the steady current (the tide was still going out) under a bridge. Again I played with the angles of the lines, which was easy for this shot because there is no obvious up or down or correct angle.

I am not sure, however, that you can really tell there is a current flowing here. Nor am I sure this is a picture that would really appeal to anyone. Perhaps if there was a crab on the sandy bottom it would be more interesting but I didn't see anything stirring on the bottom at all. I'd love to have some comments about this pic!

I do like the colors and angles though. I did pump up the saturation in this pic.

Pillars of the Bay

Here's another abstract shot that I thought was interesting at the time. I like the ship's bow between the pillars as well as the pillars themselves. I tried different crops in Adobe Lightroom but just didn't come up with anything I preferred over the full shot.

In this I tried enhancing the gold colors to try to make it look like there was some golden hour lighting going on but I think the lack of long shadows as well as not getting enough gold makes it obvious this is just a daylight picture of nothing terribly remarkable.

I took these from the end of a pier next to the fish processing building. I also shot pictures across the bay and of the boat tied to the processor's pier as they offloaded their catch.

I like this shot of a couple of boats tied up, and I like it best in this black and white treatment. What I don't like is the amount of water. I could fix that with a different crop ratio but I tend to be wary of crops like 9x16 because you just don't easily find frames for a picture like that. They do tend to be okay if you're just displaying a picture on the web, however.

But this picture shows a nice way to take advantage of the gray sky, in my opinion. It almost looks hazy which I think would really set these pictures off. I also would like to have flatter water but taking a longer exposure here would be hard since the masts would move. One solution I would try if I get back there is to take a couple of different shots, one properly exposed with a quick shutter speed to freeze the position of the masts, and a second with a long exposure (and ND filters) to smooth the water.They could then be combined in Photoshop.

Galway Bay

This is a picture of the boat tied up to the processing pier. I think a wider lens would have helped here. I could not get the bow in the picture with the pier and it just looked weird. I took some pictures with more of the pier but they showed some of this boat but not enough. They looked like they should show as much of the boat as possible and that they were accidental pictures as opposed to pictures taken on purpose with the intent to be worthy of hanging on a wall.

I didn't bother changing the lens due to my other time constraints. This still leaves me with an uneasy feeling where I hate being rushed. On the other hand it makes me realize that in all of these locations there is reason for return visits and with each visit better pictures may be envisioned and captured.

I still like this picture as it is although I wish I had the full bow or superstructure. I got more of the bow in a landscape orientation but that cut off more of the superstructure. Like I said, this picture could have used my Nikkor 16-35mm f/4 lens. Or possibly a 35mm prime.

Galway Bay and Processor

Note that I did talk to the guys on the pier and asked if it was okay if I took pictures of the boat and the activities. They said it was. That removed my feeling of "stalker" and allowed me to feel comfortable about taking pictures. I hadn't done much of that in the past but this started my asking permission often on my trip. I also think it may be a way to generate some sales in the future. I can ask permission and give them a card to my SmugMug site where they can find the pictures of themselves and possibly buy a print, and they may see a print of something else they might like enough to buy!



Piling

This shot of a piling was also from the end of the pier. Another shot that might have benefited from the wider lens which would have allowed me to show the piling from the water to the top. As it is I have a floating piling. I do like it as a "scouting" shot - it would be great to go back and shoot this in the golden hour (probably sunset since at sunrise the sun would be behind the piling - this is looking basically south east from the pier).

I moved from the pier next to the bridge over to the nearest set of docks at the marina. There was a sign that said it was okay for the public to go down on the docks so I did! I figured I was a public dude!

I took some pics from the bank first and they're okay but I really wanted to be closer to the water. I really think these look best with the black and white processing from Lightroom. It hides the gray sky, making it seem like these were taken with this processing in mind.



Waiting for the Master

Once again, to be critical, I wish the lens had allowed me to get the entire corner of the dock on the right side. Composing that way with the 50mm resulted in the stern of the boat being too close to the left edge of the image.

Stepping back caused me to start showing the shore and bank at the bottom of the picture. My final choice was to cut off part of the doc. It seemed like the least of the worst. And nothing was going to get me the reflection of the full mast.

You may also notice a sliver of a piling on the left side of the image. My choice was to include it a bit or have more of a shot that was straight down the dock and ships bows. I liked lining up the sterns more because it gave more separation between the ships masts.

There were a lot of decisions in this composition. Regardless of the resulting shot, I was very pleased with myself for noticing all of the issues in the viewfinder and trying to manage the conflicting decisions. I don't profess to be a master yet but I am certainly attempting to notice composition issues in the viewfinder and to try to solve them before committing the image to the SD card!



Fisherman's Parking Lot

 
On the way to the docks I spotted these bikes and had to get a picture. I really like this picture with both bikes but didn't notice that I'd cut off the back tire of the pink bike until I'd left the scene. Even the tire on the front bike is closer to the edge of the frame than I like. I don't remember even seeing that when I shot the picture. I don't know if I was at the limit of space and lens. 

How many times do you see a boy and girl fisher-person bike tied up together on a pier? And I cut the tires off. Some shots only come around once and you need to be prepared to get them. The boy scout in me let me down.

Out on the docs I got a few different pictures.

I got some of various smaller items such as buoys, a cleat, and a crab pot. I like these with both the color and a black and white treatment. My plan is to print them as a set of three and frame them together in a collage frame, probably as 5x7 prints.

I like the way my other collections have turned out when I've done that in the past and I'm sure this will be no exception especially since I don't get pictures like this in Arizona.

I'll likely combine them with a large print of the sailboats and their reflections giving me a nice bit of wall art.

The trick for me with all of these shots was trying to find different subjects to enable me to have a collection of at least 3 images. There was more that I could have shot but I stopped after a few items because I was also taking some pics of the boats.

I took a few shots of bows of some rugged looking boats. But what I couldn't easily do down on the docks with the 50mm was get an entire boat in the shot. Again, in retrospect, I think the 16-35mm lens would have been a better choice.

In the end, I spent about an hour total at the marina. If it was sunrise or sunset I could have easily spent that much time again. I didn't exhaust the possibilities there, meaning I have to go back! Darn the bad luck!

Misty Anne Morning

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