Man vs. Sunset

In the dead of winter, my late lunch breaks allowed me to escape for sunset shoots almost daily, but as the season moved forward, my opportunities dwindled by the day.

Now, this daylight savings thing is really screwing with me. I work until 7pm, so you’d think I’d be ecstatic that sunsets are now after 7pm. Yes, this is true, but is also means I have little time to get anywhere worth shooting.

I am trapped in some sort of limbo, where I am free for sunset, but really can’t shoot it. Last night I chased it down, only to be met with a fizzling grey sky once I arrived at the coast. The sunset won.

But tonight as I was driving home on southbound Highway 1, I could see this awesome color expanding in the sky in my rear view mirror. It was glorious, the best sunset of the year! At least that’s what I was telling myself, cursing the fact that I missed it.

As I got closer to home, I could see this light spectacle was still unfolding, seemingly teasing me, telling me that, yes, this was the best sunset of the year. Well, lucky me, I live right on the beach. Take that sunset! I will capture your glory after all!

I ran down the path to the beach and made the quick decision to leave the telephoto lens on and shoot towards the lighthouse on West Cliff Drive, giving myself an iconic Santa Cruz subject to compliment the color. Tonight, I pulled it off.

Nikon D300
Nikkor 70-200mm + TC-14E II teleconverter @ 280mm
15sec @ f13, ISO 100
Tiffen .9 ND Filter
B+W Polarizer
Lee .9 and .6 Soft Stop ND Grad Filters

Single RAW file converted twice for WB on the water and sky in Capture NX 2. Picture control set to Vivid (ya think?). Just something simple, quick, and fun from tonight.