Got up this morning and headed down to the Capitola Pier to see if I could recreate any magic similar to my first time there. Nope. On to Plan B.

I drove up the coast to a little secluded beach off Laguna Road south of Davenport. I call it Laguna Beach, but it could be called Majors as that's what the Flickr map calls the area around it. Anyway...

Although this beach has a lot going on, it lacks the dramatic rock formations of Panther Beach. Still it has its charm, and it does offer some southeast views.

After killing time with a composition that just didn’t do much for me once at the ol' computer, I moved down the beach to the only rocks getting hit by the low tide and small swell. I kept the shutter speed a bit shorter in order to better capture "the rush" of water. I liked the way the incoming waves lead up to the break in the clouds and reflecting light on the beach. A lovely morning indeed.

Nikon D300
Tokina 11-16mm @ 13mm
1.3sec @ f14, ISO 160
B+W Polarizer
Lee .9 Hard and .6 Soft Stop ND Grad Filters

I prefer both. When I first starting converting images to black and white, it was (and still can) be that the colors were drab. But I’ve noticed that good black and white images can come from ones with great color, just not a large spectrum. Seeing in contrast vs. color really helps me get a good black and white.

Taking this image as an example, colors were fairly strong, albeit few. The sky had gray-blue, the sand was warm and golden, and the water even had a little color. I liked the color version. But the black and white conversion really made it pop. The contrasting colors converted very well as dark and light.

This was actually shot a few minutes before the image above. What made this image possible is that the rocks are only about six inches high, and the waves were small and rather predictable. My camera is about two feet above the sand and I angled up the beach to get more of a diagonal flow.

Nikon D300
Tokina 11-16mm @ 13mm
0.5sec @ f8, ISO 160
B+W Polarizer
Lee .9 Hard and .6 Soft Stop ND Grad Filters

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