It’s in the planning

Sadly, I shot very little on our Whistler trip. It takes a lot of planning to do landscape shots. Planning I did not do. I had no idea what I wanted to shoot. I was hoping I would just stumble upon some shots. It didn’t happen. Also, with the very long days, the sweet light hours are very late and very early. I tried to get up early but my body had nothing to do with it. I slept in past sunrise everyday.

Being in Whistler in shoulder season had its limitations.  That means it wasn’t ski season nor was it hiking season. There was mountain biking to do but with Trish’s fractured clavicle it was out of the question.  The alpine area was still covered in snow and un-accessible to hike because the peak chair was closed. I have seen some photos of the alpine in peak summer with amazing views and flowers. August would be a perfect time to visit the alpine.

Since the Whistler alpine was not available, we thought we would try a hike to view a glacier at Joffre Lake. It’s a 400m walk to the lake which is beautiful. There is a glacier to view from the lake but I wanted to hike the 5k to get up close and personal with the glacier. However, the trail took a beating from old man winter and made the hike too scrambley for Trish. We didnt want her to slip and hurt her tender shoulder. So, we turned back.

The shots that I did take from the lake were lame. The mid day sun made for a beautiful view but the hard lighting was not working with the camera. The highlights would be blown out of the shadows too dark. Perhaps, I should have set up the tripod and taken 5 shots for an HDR but I didn’t. What I learned from Darwin Wigget blog post is that maybe a Neutral Density filter would have come in handy for what I was trying to achieve.

So, the only decent shot I am relatively happy with is the one above of  Trish on the Peak 2 Peak gondola.  The SB-800 flash was mounted to the camera with a 1/4 CTO gel velcro-ed to the flash. It’s not a fine art shot that I was hoping to capture on this little trip but I like the exposure done with the flash.

What I did learn from this trip is that a real good fine art landscape shot takes a lot of planning. It’s difficult, at least for me, to get an image that I am proud of on a whim. It takes detailed planning. With my next time off of work, I will have to ensure some better planning and research on capturing images.