Along the Washington and Oregon coast lines there are some classic places to take magnificent images of the coast and stacks and crashing surf. One of the more iconic places is Second Beach in Olympic National Park. A little bit of a hike through a well marked trail deposits you at this super location. Sunset being the best time to be there. I wanted my images to be different than others I saw before of this location. This was shot with an IQ180 and then processed out with one exposure to six levels at one stop increments. So I had a 3 stop over and under and one normal from one shot. The Phase One camera takes an incredible image with 12 plus stops dynamic range. So in one image I was able to hold all details in highlights and shadows. It’s quite the moment when you look at the histogram of an image like this expecting clipping on highlights and shadows and the Phase One back shows a very nice histogram with toes at both ends. This allowed me to know I had the information to produce an image like this. Then using Photomatix I processed them together to make an HDR. I made adjustments so it didn’t appear to grungy or fake. I retained enough detail in the rocks but didn’t overdue it. I decided on a gold tone cast as that is how I remembered this image. After the image was processed and saved I opened it using NIK Viveza and did some desaturation in the clouds and darkened some corners. Finally I saved it, flattened it and then did a JPEG at a smaller dimension so I could post it on my blog and FaceBook. There were number of images from this one nights shoot that were keepers and this was one. I like the rock in the foreground and texture the water makes. Hope you enjoy it. This weekend I will make a 30×40 inch print.
