Large chunks of black rock on the beach at Union Bay are remnants of the area’s historic use as a coal shipping terminal between 1888 and the 1960s. Pilings are other evidence of historic industrial activity at Union Bay. I’ve lived in the Comox Valley for some time now but have never walked out into the coal waste hills at …
Geology
Boulders at Point Holmes
Six image panorama, stitched together in Photoshop CS6 and converted to black and white using Silver Efex Pro 2. These huge boulders captured my attention on the rocky beach at Point Holmes, in Comox, British Columbia. During low tide Point Holmes is excellent for marine life, but the weather was pretty awful and though the tide was low, I didn’t …
Finding the Source of Nile Creek
One often hears off-hand mentions of interesting locations that other photographers have been to: the name of a small creek, a description of an out of the way waterfall, vague directions to the location. These places are usually a little off the beaten path, but still relatively accessible and well used by locals. One of the first of many little drops …
Smith Rock State Park
View of Picnic Lunch Wall. In the early morning this entire face is nicely lit. Misery Ridge Trail rises to the right corner of this formation. If you’re looking for a stunning location to do some winter hiking think about checking out Smith Rock State Park near the town of Terrebonne just north of Redmond, Oregon. While primarily known as …
Looking for Horse Thieves
It’s easy to imagine a gang of horse thieves hiding out at Horsethief Butte—the high basalt walls form a natural fortress and there are a number of narrow entrances into the interior of the butte that would make it easy to defend from a posse of lawmen. Horsethief Butte in the warm morning sun. I visited this Washington state park …
Sandstone and Water
I returned to the Oyster River this week with a small group from the Comox Valley Camera Club “Slow Photographers SIG” to photograph the surreal landscape of rock and water on this part of the river. Again, I was limited by the fixed focal length of my Fuji X1oos (Nikon D600 still in the shop for a second servicing for …
Ice and Sandstone on the Oyster River
When I’m photographing landscapes, my tendency is to anchor the scene with a foreground object and then go wide to show the expansiveness of the land. Last weekend I was without my full-frame Nikon D600 (still with Nikon Canada being serviced a second time for oil and dust problems—looks like I’ll be without it for at least another week or …
Oyster River Bowls
Photographing moving water has been a theme for me this year and I’ve really been enjoying experimenting with neutral density filters to slow down the shutter speed and blur the flowing water. It’s also been a good excuse to get out and visit new locations. Sandstone Abstract #2 This weekend I followed up a suggestion by George Bowron and checked …
Kennedy River Cascade
Looking downstream from the rocks near the main falls on the Kennedy River. ISO 100, f/16, 1/30 sec – Nikon D600, 16mm It is a popular stopping point about half way between Port Alberni and Ucluelet/Tofino and a place to take a break before Highway 4 begins to wind its way down to Kennedy Lake. On the west side of …
Ammonite Falls
I’ve been working on slow exposures and moving water over the last couple of weeks so that was a good excuse to take a side trip out to Ammonite Falls while in Nanaimo running errands. I did a little research on the internet to figure out how to get to this “little visited” water fall that is a bit off …