After a beautiful day in the valley, I made last minute planes to jet over to the coast to capture the sunset at Heceta Head beach. The drive was only an hour away so it was easy to make it to the coast on a whim and I had not been in a while either way. I found a few interesting areas on the way over, a beautiful field and an abandoned boat. The closer I got to the coast, the more my hope for a beautiful sunset faded. It's fascinating how different the weather can be just an hour away.
When I finally made it to Heceta Head, it was fogged in, this gave me the place nearly to myself and made parking easy. I'd been to this spot many times, so I quickly hit up the usual spots and tried to decide what I wanted to do because of the fog. It was the kind of fog that just made everything grey.
I then realized that after all these times to this beach, I'd never made the short hike up to the lighthouse. So with nothing left to lose, I headed up. I was immediately pleased with the fog in the trees, and the moody feel the closer I got to the lighthouse. Once there, I quickly realized the potential of the spinning light in the lighthouse and the fog for a prolonged exposure. I ran back to the car and grabbed my tripod and made my way back. I was running out of time as the park closed soon and had a locking gate.
With only 30 minutes to spend scouting and shooting, I did my best to find a shot. I must have looked like a chicken with its head cut off running around looking for the shot and trying to shoot what I could. Once I was as close as I comfortably could get to my time constraint, I headed back. I came around a corner to an opening and took one last view of the lighthouse and saw the shot I wanted. It took me a few times to get the timing right for the light beam and my long exposer, but I'm pleased with the results.
Photography Date: 8-26-16
Writing Date: 2-26-18
