October 14, 2020
Sunset by the Pier.
I got together with a few other photographers to photograph the sunset at the Santa Monica Pier. I visited the pier a few times in college(a quick ride on the Big Blue Bus from campus), but this was only my second trip there in the last 40 years(the other being at the urging of beloved commenter Baud to see what the ocean would look like in IR). I drove out to Santa Monica and arrived in town early only to make a wrong turn trying to find parking and ended up drive a couple of miles north on PCH. I doubled back and parked at the City Hall parking structure and was only a few minutes late(I wasn't the only one with trouble finding parking). We started out on the pier, just shooting whatever looked interesting as we waited for sunset and heading for the sand. I positioned my tripod and camera so that I'd have the setting sun right over the end of the pier and then moved a bit to get the sun just off the pier. After the sun set the lights(solar powered) on the attractions on the pier lit adding an accent to the orange and red skies. Most of the shots of the sunset were shot using exposure bracketing to produce a orange sun and a properly exposed foreground and combined using either exposure blending or Aurora HDR.
Read MoreI got together with a few other photographers to photograph the sunset at the Santa Monica Pier. I visited the pier a few times in college(a quick ride on the Big Blue Bus from campus), but this was only my second trip there in the last 40 years(the other being at the urging of beloved commenter Baud to see what the ocean would look like in IR). I drove out to Santa Monica and arrived in town early only to make a wrong turn trying to find parking and ended up drive a couple of miles north on PCH. I doubled back and parked at the City Hall parking structure and was only a few minutes late(I wasn't the only one with trouble finding parking). We started out on the pier, just shooting whatever looked interesting as we waited for sunset and heading for the sand. I positioned my tripod and camera so that I'd have the setting sun right over the end of the pier and then moved a bit to get the sun just off the pier. After the sun set the lights(solar powered) on the attractions on the pier lit adding an accent to the orange and red skies. Most of the shots of the sunset were shot using exposure bracketing to produce a orange sun and a properly exposed foreground and combined using either exposure blending or Aurora HDR.
