Share this photo on Twitter Share this photo on Facebook

Foreboding Morning

Posted by
Don Smith (California, United States) on 4 October 2010 in Lifestyle & Culture.

UPCOMING 2010 WORKSHOPS:

Arches/Canyonlands Photo Workshop - November 3-7, 2010 (Workshop Sold Out)
Winter Big Sur Photo Workshop - Magic Light and The Pfeiffer Beach Arch - January 11-14, 2011 (2 spots remaining)
Northern Arizona Photo Workshop - Grand Canyon, Upper Antelope Canyon, Horseshoe Bend and Sedona - March 16-20, 2011 (4 spots remaining)
Spring Big Sur Workshop - 4th Annual Wildflowers and Color - April 17-20, 2011 (space available)
Springtime in Lake Tahoe and the Mokelumne Wilderness Photo Workshop - May 14-17, 2011 (space available)
Northern California - 3rd Annual Redwoods and Mendocino Photo Workshop - May 23-26, 2011 (space available)
Second Annual Garden Isle and Tropical Paradise - Kauai Photo Workshop - July 8-12, 2011 (hurry - only 5 spots remaining)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
New Article on my Website: Three Ideas for Improving Your Compositions

Join me as I am now of Facebook: Don Smith Photography on Facebook

Join me as I am now on Flickr: Don Smith Photography on Flickr

My preferred filters: Singh-Ray Filters

Books Available for Purchase on my Website:
Refined Vision: 50 Lessons Designed to Improve Your Digital Landscape Photography (e-book and printed versions - 160 pages)
The Photographer's Guide to the Big Sur Coast (e-book version - 102 pages)
On the Edge (printed version - softcover and hardcover - 120 pages)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sometimes long edits can end with a bang. After sifting through four days of shoots on the Big Island of Hawaii, I came to the end of my edit to discover this nugget! I about fell off my chair (and no I hadn't been drinking).

This looks like something right out of a movie but was really a fortuitous combination of perfect light and optimum positioning of the tour boat relative to a plume of sulphuric-acid, the result of the Kilauea lava flow entering the Pacific Ocean on the eastern side of the island, and held against a dark stormy sky. This was for all intents and purposes a simple grab shot - I really don't even remember shooting this frame. This boat kept cutting in front of our boat as we were attempting to photograph the lava flows (kind of a mine is bigger than yours scenario - I'm talking boats of course) and as the sun started to rise these guys departed - show over, got your money, let's go get some more tourists!

At this point, with the brighter illumination on the plume as the sun crested the horizon to the east, the red lava glow disappeared but the dark stormy sky to the southwest created a marvelous theatrical lighting and the boat (though bigger than ours) looked tiny in relation the the steam plume. Add in the steam rising from the ocean water and it appears these people are about to meet their demise (all we needed was for a 30-foot great white to rear out of the ocean and gobble them alive - where's Stephen Spielberg when you need him)?

The metadata looks a bit weird (ISO 640 and 1/1600th) but remember, I was really shooting towards camera right in completely different light when this must have caught my eye. This was really more of a photojournalistic moment than landscape but without the incredible low-skimming light illuminating the plume, the dark sky and the tour boat, all in perfect position, there really would not have been a picture. Kind of a nice way to end a long edit!

Canon EOS-1D Mark IV 1/1600 second F/2.8 ISO 640 43 mm

My Website: "how to" articles, 2020 WORKSHOP LISTINGS, galleries, stock photos, and more...
www.donsmithphotography.com