Kathy & I are enjoying a little downtime this afternoon before we pack up for the short drive up to Acadia National Park tomorrow. It’s been on and off cloudy and rainy, but still a good day for getting out with the camera. I love working with a prime lens when walking around town, and used the 35mm 1.4 for this shot. It’s pretty nice in color, but I’m excited to actually have a B&W version that works for me.
Tired of lighthouse photos yet? Not me!
When I started thinking about photographing the Maine coast, naturally the first thing I thought of was lighthouses. In anticipation of a day just like today, I purchased a variable neutral density filter. Today was my first chance to really try it out. It seems to work best on cloudy days and with long-ish lenses. It makes a mess on my wide-angle 10-24 lens except at the most gentle settings, darkening the corners dramatically. Works pretty well on the longer end of the 16-80 but works really well on the 55-200. I got a little buffeting from the gusty winds but a 3.5 second exposure like this one worked pretty well. I processed it using the Classic Chrome profile in Lightroom instead of my usual Velvia-based preset. I think it shows the raw power of the wind and surf.
We were very glad to have been on the water yesterday and on land today! Gusty winds and rough seas would have made for an unpleasant journey today!
We visited Pemaquid Point Lighthouse by land today. It’s not nearly as imposing but still pretty. Kathy stated it well when she said “from the sea you understand the context and purpose of the lighthouse and why it is there. From the land it is more about the structure itself.”
Kathy & I made a last minute choice to book a coastal cruise with Capt. Fish out of Boothbay Harbor. The cruise took us past 3 lighthouses, including this one on Pemaquid Point. It is another one of the many iconic lighthouses along the Maine coast. I think today we’re going to drive there and see the other side of it!
Another early morning, another pretty sunrise. And more boats. We’ve been in Maine less than 24 hours and it is already as beautiful as I expected.
It’s pretty easy to make a decent composition of this lighthouse, but hard to get it without people, especially during the day. I decided to not try climbing on the rocks, although I did see a number of foolish souls slipping and sliding around, perilously close to the water’s edge. Not for this guy!
I managed to haul my carcass out the door again this morning for the second time in a row. I’ve got a number of good results but will have to process them at a later date. So much to see and do here – no time to process photos. A good problem to have!
Kathy and I took a whale watch cruise this afternoon out of Gloucester, Massachusetts. We love seeing the big whales in person and were not disappointed with this trip. I have a tough time taking good photos on cruises like this, because there are so many people jockeying for position whenever a whale is spotted. I much prefer the smaller, more intimate vessels, but they are tougher to come buy and usually much more expensive. We did see some whales, and I got a few photos. Although I did decide to spring the $20 to but the photos from our naturalist/photographer on board!
I set the alarm for an early exploration of Rockport. It seems that in order to walk around town in the morning here it is a requirement to have at least one dog. I guess that’s what you do in the winter if you don’t drink whiskey. 😉
Motif #1, located on Bradley Wharf in the harbor town of Rockport, Massachusetts, is a replica of a former fishing shack well known to students of art and art history as “the most often-painted building in America.” The original structure was built in 1840 and destroyed in the Blizzard of 1978, but an exact replica was constructed that same year.
Enroute today from Hyannis to Rockport, Massachusetts, we made a stop in Plymouth to see the Mayflower II. We didn’t go aboard, but got some good views from the shore. We also saw the so-called “Plymouth Rock.”