Sean Duggan Blog

Smoke Gets in Your Eyes

San Francisco in the Smoke  [Canon 5D]
June 24, 2008
(click in the image for a larger, smokier version)

As you may have seen in the news, California has a big problem with fire right now. We had a storm roll through over the weekend that brought with it a weather phenomenon that is comparatively rare for our area: dry lightning (i.e., lightning with no rainfall). Thousands of strikes all across the central and northern part of the state ignited the dry brush and timber (extra dry from low rainfall this year and a couple of recent triple-digit heat waves) into over 800 wildfires. These new fires are in addition to a few large ones that have already been burning for a while. The result this week has been some of the most unhealthy, smoky air I have ever seen here.

It is particularly bad where I live in the Sierra foothills between Sacramento and Lake Tahoe. To quote from our local paper:

“This is the worst we’ve ever seen it,” for particulate levels since the district started measuring air quality 15 years ago. "We’ve never seen the numbers this high, it’s almost 400 micrograms per cubic meter and the hazardous level is 260."

Even near the ocean in normally clear San Francisco, it was very bad this morning. The image above was taken from the northern side of the Golden Gate Bridge looking back at San Francisco. The Bay Bridge, barely visible, is on the left and the Trans America pyramid building is just to the right of center.

I stopped to take this on my way to a consulting appointment. I have a full week scheduled of one-on-one training and consulting here in San Francisco and the Bay Area. If you live in the northern California, Bay Area, or Sacramento/Tahoe regions and are interested in scheduling a private training or consulting session, drop me a line at sean(at)seanduggan.com.

Coastal Engravings

Seaweed Triptych  [Canon 5D]
California coast, near Pescadero; June 11, 2008
(click in the image to see a larger version)

On the second day we went to Bean Hollow State Beach, my daughter and I took a walk out to a low-lying rocky point in search of cool tide pools. We were the first ones on the sand that morning and as we crossed an unmarked stretch of beach, we found scores of seaweed plants that had been washed up by the earlier high tide. Since the coast here is nearly always buffeted by a strong offshore wind, the beach had been swept clean and smooth, leaving the seaweed embedded in the sand in a way that made them look as if they were engraved or etched into sandstone.

Visually I found them to be quite irresistible. They were so stark and simple and perfect, cast ashore and drawn in the sand by the wind and the waves. On the walk over to the tide pools and on the walk back I carefully sought out the most intriguing and elegant forms. Since we were the first ones to walk the beach that day, each plant was surrounded by pristine, untrampled sand. And while many are very pleasing as single images, they also work well as pairs or as triptychs. In fact, as I was photographing them, I already was envisioning them presented in this multi-image format.

The original color images were actually very close to monochromatic, possessing the hue of the sand and a faint muted green from the seaweed. My processing was all done in Lightroom and involved minor contrast adjustments, as well as grayscale conversion and a slight touch of split-toning. Other than that these are pretty much straight documentary shots of the artwork that nature offered up on the beach that day.

On the right is a color version that has only had a slight contrast adjustment applied. I like the color interpretation, too, especially since it is so subtle and muted, but at the moment I am leaning towards the sepia split toned version. That could change, however, as this is just an initial exploration of the possibilities.

I like photographing along the coast since there are always interesting shapes, textures and seascapes to be seen.Visually, I have always found the place where land and ocean meet to be a very creatively stimulating place.  My next workshop is taking place near the seashore, but on the Atlantic side along the rocky coastline of central Maine.

McCormick House

McCormick House  [Canon 5D, 53 second exposure]
Pescadero, California  June 12, 2008
(click in the image for a larger version)

Last week we spent a relaxing family vacation in Pescadero, California. Pescadero is a small farming and ranching community located near the coast between San Francisco and Santa Cruz. It is about two miles inland from one of the most beautiful stretches of coastline in northern California.

We were very fortunate that my wife discovered a wonderful country inn for us to stay at. The McCormick House is a lovely old home built in the 1880s. We had the two upstairs rooms to ourselves and it was the perfect place from which to explore the many beautiful beaches along the coast just a few miles away, and also as a base for day trips to Santa Cruz or San Francisco. One of the best things about the McCormick House were the innkeepers, Lisa and Mauro. Their kindness, generosity and good cheer made our visit a very special one and we look forward to a return trip, not only to enjoy the beauty of that part of the coast, but also to visit with them! In addition to being wonderfully hospitable innkeepers, they also create lovely assemblage sculptures of small houses from old pieces of recycled and weathered wood. You can see more of their charming "wee wood" house sculptures here.

The photograph above is a composite of two different interpretations of a single raw exposure (about 1 minute on a tripod). The lighting is a combination of moonlight, ambient spill form nearby street lights, the interior lights and a single pop from my flash unit. In order to get the sky looking the way I wanted, the bright windows became too washed out. So I processed a second copy of the file that was much darker and used a layer mask to brush in some of the darker exposure in the areas of the windows and under the balcony. As I was taking this photo (and others) barn owls flew back and forth above me, screeching and chattering in the moonlight.

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Real World Digital Photography Workshops

My next major workshop takes place in mid-August along the New England coast at the world renown Maine Photographic Workshops. Real World Digital Photography I is the perfect class if you want to get a jump start on truly understanding the controls on your digital SLR, learning good exposure technique, shooting in raw, special exposure situations (like the night photography featured in the image of the McCormick House) and making the most of your exposures back in the digital darkroom using Lightroom and Photoshop CS3. It's already filling up and is now half full so if you're interested in taking this class, don't wait until the last minute to sign up! Click the class title to learn more about this class.

A second level version of this class will be offered at the Maine Photographic Workshops Oct 5-11.

For a complete listing of my upcoming workshops, click here.

The Spring

The Spring  [Canon 10D]
May, 2004
(click in the image for a larger version)

Following the train of thought from the previous post, here is another mirrored image from a few years ago (re-discovered this past weekend while cleaning up the clutter on some older hard drives).
Natural forms work particularly well for mirroring. This was taken not far from my house on the Bear River. The other river near us is the Yuba, which is where we go swimming a bit later in the summer once the flow and water level becomes a bit safer and the water temperature a bit warmer. I feel very fortunate to to live near scenic mountain rivers that flow through sculpted, rocky channels. It's good for photography, of course, but it's also good for the spirit to just go there and hang out, watch the water and admire the beauty of it all.

Community Room

Community Room 
Multi-image collage, from 4 Canon 5D exposures
June 1, 2008
(click in the image for a larger version)

This collage came about because I recently wrote a tutorial on creating Image Mirrors for the latest issue of my free newsletter (the tutorial is currently on my website but is for subscribers only, so sign up for the newsletter if you are interested), In addition to showing how to create a basic mirror, I also wanted to show how pre-cropping an image before the mirroring process can create interesting results, and also show that image mirrors can sometimes be used quite successfully in a multi-image collage. The only problem was that I didn't have a cool collage on hand that I could use. I could have used the Leviathan collage that I posted here a few months back, but that wasn't pre-cropped. Plus, if truth be told, I was actually quite interested in using an image of a banyan tree that I had taken on a recent trip to Hawaii. It was just crying out for the mirroring process and in the end, I could not resist its siren call.

The main image of the banyan tree was mirrored and then flipped upside down to create the forest portal. Another image of banyan trees formed the tree that can be seen through the opening. The door was photographed in a small town on the coast of Maine, and an image of peeling paint from San Francisco was used to add some texture to the door. Here's the three main images used in this collage; the mirrored banyan tree is on the left (you can click in the image to see it a bit larger):

If you're interested in learning how to create your own multi-image collages, I have a class on that very topic coming up in southern New Mexico early next year, (click the class title for more info):

Creative Collage with Photoshop CS3
Mesilla Digital Imaging Workshops
at the Preston Center for Contemporary Art
Feb 19 - 22, 2009

Pool Ruin

Sutro Baths  [Canon 5D]
San Francisco  May 27, 2008
(click in the image for a larger version)

The side of one of the pools in the ruins of the old Sutro Baths, near the Cliff House.

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Featured Pinhole Photographer, June 2008

Many thanks to Chris Keeney for showcasing my pinhole photography on his Featured Pinhole Photographers page. Chris has a great collection of his own pinhole photography that's definitely worth checking out. If you're interested in pinhole photography, he also has posted an excellent Pinhole Photography Resources & Links page.

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Upcoming Workshops

My next major workshop takes place in mid-August along the New England coast at the world renown Maine Photographic Workshops. Real World Digital Photography I is the perfect class if you want to get a jump start on truly understanding the controls on your digital SLR, learning good exposure technique, shooting in raw, special exposure situations and making the most of your exposures back in the digital darkroom using Lightroom and Photoshop CS3. Click the class title to learn more about this class. A second level version of this class will be offered at the Maine Photographic Workshops Oct 5-11.

I checked the enrollment for the August RWDP 1 class yesterday and the enrollment has already passed the halfway mark, which  is a good sign this early on. So, if you're interested in taking this class, don't wait until the last minute to sign up!

Also coming up this September in northern California:

Creative Camera Raw
Sept 20, 21 Berkeley, California

Secrets of the Mask: Selections & Masking in Photoshop CS3
Sept. 26, 27  Santa Cruz, California

And in November in Central California:

The Creative Digital Darkroom
Nov. 3 - 7  Lepp Institue of Digital Imaging
Los Osos, California