405 - Scripps Pier
Ah yes, my last photoshoot in America for the next six months. Let's go, baby! On today's menu was a tasty place called Scripps Pier in San Diego.
I'd always wanted to get a shot under a pier. It's a classic California photo, and I'd spent the past month looking for the perfect opportunity. But I'd always show up, decide it's meh, then put off the shot.
Well, jump forward a few weeks, and here I am. Frantically Googling the best piers in San Diego on my last day in America.
Scripps Pier was obviously the one I chose, mainly because it looked like it had an interesting enough underbelly. Plus it wasn't too far in the middle of nowhere.
I walked out to the pier about 90 minutes before sunset, only to find the place swarmed. Fuck. I didn't realize this was such a popular tourist destination. There's an engagement photographer doing shots right under the pier, countless girls trying to get Instagram selfies, and dogs running amuck like it's goddamn Mexico.
I guess I better get used to that.
While I waited for the sun to get a bit lower, I took the opportunity to walk around Scripps campus, which was right behind it. Some type of oceanography university for oceanographers. Heh. I couldn't find anything interesting though.
Once the sun started setting, I took a big gulp and walked back to the pier. I wasn't in the mood to dance with other photographers, but you don't always have a choice. Luckily I'd never met a salty photographer, but being my last day in America, I figured it might be my luck.
Surprisingly, it was ridiculously tame. There were 3 other photographers with tripods, but NONE of them were shooting directly under the pier, which is what I was aiming for. Plus all the Instagram whores had run off. Yesssss.
I boldly set up camp right under the pier's center and waited 10 minutes for the sun to set. Somehow none of the other photographers even seemed remotely interested in shooting the underbelly of the pier. Weird. But good from me.
I really got in there and shot all sorts of angles. Landscape, portrait, long exposure, short exposure, you name it. My goal was one gallery shot and one Instagram shot. Here's the Instagram shot, because that was the easiest:
“Flow Trap”
Sony a7rIII + Tamron 17-28mm f/2.8
[ISO 100 ~ 17mm ~ f/6.3 ~ 1/25s]
(Want a Print? Get one here.)
No long exposure trickiness or anything, just a nice silhouette shot. Notice how I stranded between the pillars for maximum effect. I tried one where I was in the middle of the pier but you couldn't see me very well, and it removed the hypnotic effect of the pier.
Which leads my to my first lesson of the day: If the subject of the landscape is more interesting than you, make sure the landscape is the subject, not you. Humans should only be in the shot to compliment it, or show scale. Unless, of course, you're shooting portrait photography like a chump. For example, if I put myself in the middle of the pier, I'd be ruining the entire effect of the pier underbelly just to show my fat face.
Now this is where it got tricky. I NEEDED the gallery shot to work out, but I couldn't figure it out in post-production. I had a million shots, an narrowed it down to two in particular. One shot had perfect, silky water, but since my ND filter sucks, the pier looked like trash because of water stains on the lens. In the second photo, the pier looked amazing because I didn't use my ND filter, but the water was choppy as hell because I didn't have a long exposure.
It came down to the big decision. Good water or good pier? Well folks, I hate these type of decisions. Which is why I learned Photoshop.
Photoshop is essentially just problem solving 101. You sit down with an image right in front of you, with a million things wrong. And Photoshop has all the solutions... But they may not be the solutions that come easy, or are right off the bat.
It took me awhile to figure out the puzzle (three hours to be exact,) but I realized I could COMBINE the two images and get the best of both worlds. I just had to find two that aligned, which was probably impossible.
But it was as if the USA knew it was my final day in it's country, so it blessed me with the greatest farewell gift a photographer could ask for.
Two shots, one with perfect water and an ND filter, one with a perfect pier and no ND filter. Right next to each other, perfectly aligned. Good gravy...
I masked out the ugly pier with the silky water and landed on this bad boy:
“Underbelly Dreams”
Sony a7rIII + Zeiss 24-70mm f/4
[ISO 50 ~ 24mm ~ f/22 ~ 3.2s]
(Want a Print? Get one here.)
Goddamn. And there's my second lesson of the day. Exposure blends aren't ALWAYS for skies. Obviously, that's the most practical application, and probably why you learned how to do them in the first place. But they could be used for ANYTHING. Always take lots of photo variations, especially if you're shooting in harsh conditions, like with waves, direct sunlight, and ND filters. Just in case you need a clutch photo blend to fall back on, like today.
And with that my shoot was done. But my body was calling for one more shot. Just one more... I realized I LOVED the mesmerizing look of the center of the pier, almost like an optical illusion. But it was so plain on it's own.
Then I saw that the WAVES were popping up every once in awhile and adding an interesting foreground. So I loaded up the Sony 70-200m 2.8 GM and waited for the perfect wave to hit the foreground. Here's what I ended up with:
“Infinity Splash”
Sony a7rIII + Sony 70-200mm 2.8 GM
[ISO 3200 ~ 165mm ~ f/4 ~ 1/800s]
(Want a Print? Get one here.)
Nice little intimate scene for ya. And that's about it. Bye America, thanks for the parting gift.
SEE YA IN MEXICO, BITCHES.
I’m on a mission to explore as much as humanely possible.
Want to see my progress? Check out the Adventure Map.
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