Cape Kiwanda Tide 1

Cape Kiwanda Tide 2

Cape Kiwanda Tide, Oregon

Back in May over the Labor Day weekend my wife and I made a trip down the Oregon coast and settled in Pacific City overnight, where we met with Flickrite Ar'alani who kindly showed us around. I've posted a couple other images from a little later that evening, but these two photos were the first ones taken at Cape Kiwanda State Park.

Cape Kiwanda is essentially a large sandstone peninsula shaped by the waves. It takes on all sorts of great shapes and while we were there got to watch the tides come in and crash overtop and flow back into the Pacific.

In the top photo the tides carried waves up a long slope in the sandstone creating a unique sloping waterfall over the facing edge. I took several photos of this trying to capture the perfect sized wave and eventual found what I was looking for. I initial disliked the framing as it's very straightforwardly centered in the frame. But once I committed to the black and white conversion I'd intended I found I was happy with it after all, as I quite like the horizontal bands.

In the second photo taken nearby I thought the shape of the rocks was great and liked the way the water flowed overtop. I wanted to frame it a little differently than I did giving it a little open room at the top, but another (braver?) photographer had found his way out onto those rocks and I didn't want him the shot. It's too bad too, because had I been able to zoom out more I might have noticed the uneven horizon.

Both black and white conversions were done similarly with a fairly neutral (minimal color-filtration) conversion with the exception of the sloping waterfall where I applied a separate color-filtering over the water to retain more detail and texture. I've been growing more and more interested in digital black and white conversions. With color photography I feel compelled to present reality. Black and white photography has always lent itself to filtration and manipulation in a way that still maintains its sense of reality and integrity. Digital conversion extends what's possible even further and I'm really enjoying digging into it more. Interestingly, I find the best source of information for these kind of conversions comes primarily from literature related to film photography (like Ansel's "The Negative") than any guide to photoshop or digital photography in general.

Nikon D90 | Nikon 18-200VR@18mm | f/9 | 5s | ISO125 | Tripod
Nikon D90 | Nikon 18-200VR@48mm | f/9 | 3s | ISO125 | Tripod

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