We had to vacate our house for a day as the “floor guy” was refinishing the floors. Our friends “Mark & Mimi” invited us to spend the night at their Treehouse in Manzanita. We couldn’t pass up the offer of a night at the beach with good friends…then as a bonus they told us they were going hiking if we could make it in time, we could join them on a hike to Cape Falcon. That put some lead in my foot and off we went. It was a gorgeous day for a hike…and a few photos…
This scene of so many people enjoying a beautiful day at the beach inspired me to make “A Day at the Beach”. In this case, it’s a cropped pano from my D3S. Even when I clicked the shutter I knew it was going to be a pano. I thought it was going to be a filler shot and little did I realize just how much I would like it when I was done…I should have done it right in the first place and done a multi-frame capture to make the pano…Lesson to self…don’t be lazy even on a casual hike!
The forest was lush and green, the clean. I breathed in deep taking in the rich smell of the forest and the tang of the salt air mixed together. I wanted to convey both the feeling of walking through the forest and the ocean in one frame…this location spoke of both to me with glimpses of the beach through the trees. I bracketed five frames at one stop each and combined them in Photomatix then finished the image using NIK and OnOne plug-ins with Photoshop CS5…
We arrived back at the trailhead tired and hungry…not a problem, lunch was waiting for us at Mops…we descended on Mops place like vultures and when we all sat back from the table there wasn’t a spec of food to be found. Thanks Mops!… Back in March we were at the beach and the light was coming through the window, Mops had on a beautiful purple outfit and I asked her to sit in her favorite chair so I could do her portrait. She’s going to use it in her campaign when she runs for another term as City Councilwoman of Manzanita…
A 4 1/2 mile hike and wonderful food with great friends at the beach…
photo opportunities along the way…a night spent relaxing in the Treehouse…life just doesn’t get any better than this!…
Images Made with Nikon D3S, AF-S 14-24mm, AF-S 24-70mm on Lexar Digital Media