Passe-A-Grille Sunset

Three friends and I went to Passe-A-Grille Tuesday evening to shoot Corey Ave and the downtown district. We started out on the beach just after sunset and had so much fun there, we didn't leave enough time to photograph the town before it got too late. This is one of the after sunset photos I made.

The following article about the History of Passe-A-Grille was taken directly from the Passe-A-Grille website. You can find the website here: http://visitpassagrille.com

"For 10,000 years, Indians hunted the praires and fished the waters of what later became Pass-A-Grille. The last group of Native Americans to settle in the Pinellas County area were the Tocobagas around 1,000 - 1,700 AD. This area was first visited by Europeans in 1528 when the Spanish Explorer, Panfilo de Narvaez anchored off Pass-A-Grille pass. Afterwards, the island was used as a camp ground for fisherman to obtain fresh water and to grill their catch. According to legend, it is thought that Pass-A-Grille derives it's name from the French Passe aux Grilleurs. In 1857, John Gomez self styled 'last of the pirates', began bringing excursionists here from Tampa which gave this area the distinction of perhaps being the oldest resort on Central Florida's West Coast. Zephaniah Phillips, the first homesteader settled here in 1886 and by the turn of the Century Pass-A-Grille had it's first hotel and a ferry boat service from what is now Gulfport. The town of Pass-A-Grille Beach was incorporated into the city of St. Petersburg Beach in 1957 and in 1989 a section of Pass-A-Grille was declared a National Historic District. "

Safety Harbor Marina Sunset

This shot is for my friend, Margo. I know she misses her second home, so I'm posting this one for her.

Every Monday night, my friends and I go to the Safety Harbor Marina for our regular Meetup. With it being so hot in Florida this time of year, we've changed our regular times so we meet at the Marina, then leave for the Safety Harbor Grille a few blocks away, then go back to the Marina or walk around downtown for our regular shoot.

This photo was made 2 weeks ago tonight when we decided to change our regular times. We're rarely at the Marina for photographs around sunset except in the Winter (if you can call it a Winter in Florida) months.

I'm really enjoying the new times. Tonight, everyone chose to walk around Safety Harbor downtown for some street shots. I begged off because I'm just 2 weeks out of my Cam Boot and cast on my foot and since I have a wedding to shoot on Saturday, I don't want to chance walking around unnecessarily. A new foot injury is not what I need right now. Although, when I injured my foot, I shot a wedding on a Golf Course. It hurt like the dickens, but I made a commitment and I had to show up; broken foot or not.

Safety Harbor Sunset

I'm a sucker for a nice sunset or sunrise and this one was no exception. This was shot from the Safety Harbor Marina a couple weeks ago, while I was at our regular Monday night Meetup.

I was just getting ready to leave for dinner, when I turned around and took another look. This is what I saw. I had just put my camera away, so I dug it back out of my backpack and quickly shot this scene.

I didn't take the time to change my previous settings, but I'll give them to you anyway. ISO 200, partial metering off the sky which is what produced the silhouette of the trees, 1/125 at F16 in aperture priority with my new 90mm Macro lens because that's what I had on the camera at the time.

The color of the sky was tweaked a bit in Lightroom 2.5. Other than that, no other adjustments.

St Petersburg Skyline

My friend, Frank, and I went to The Pier in St Petersburg last week to try to capture the sunset over the St Petersburg skyline. We didn't get a lot of clouds, but the color was awesome.

This is one of our favorite haunts. We go up to the 5th floor observation deck where Cha Cha Coconuts restaurant is and shoot to our hearts content. The best thing is the wait staff will serve us out on the deck.

This is one of my favorite images from the shoot. It was shot using my Canon 20D with an 18-55mm lens. I usually don't shoot this skyline wide angle, but for some reason, I decided to give it a try and I like the results. Settings were 1/40th at F4.5 aperture, -1/3 stop eV, in aperture priority mode and average metering at ISO 400 at the 18mm focal length. I chose these settings because they're a little different from my normal settings and was looking to shoot this differently than I usually do.

I've been striving to capture images differently than what I usually see looking for the creativity in my vision. I'm very happy with the results.

Summertime at Ft Desoto

While at Ft Desoto the other evening, I saw this woman photographing something on the beach. I'm not sure if she was photographing the woman and boy walking in front of her, or just the beach in general.

For me, I saw a perfect shot with the Laughing Gulls flying all around her and the pink tinge in the clouds that can only be seen during sunset.

When photographing the sunset, we usually get mesmerized by the beauty of the sunset itself. Don't forget to turn around. You just might spot a much better image like this one. The light is warm, directional and the textures, forms and shapes are brought out like no other lighting.

For this image, the light was coming from the sun about a 90° angle to my subject which as previously mentioned, brought out the texture in the sand and sea grasses. I shot this image at 1/800 (to stop the motion of the birds in flight) at F5. Since there was a lot of light areas, I added 1 stop exposure compensation to keep the birds, skin tones and sky from being underexposed. For those of you who use point-n-shoot cameras, if you have a beach or snow mode, this would work well for this type of image. My ISO was set at 200 and I used my 55-250mm lens at 96mm. I used Aperture Priority mode and Partial metering.

Flock of Ibis

These sacred and beautiful birds were flying over the bay at the Safety Harbor Marina today just before sunset. I love how the light was hitting them as they flew overhead.

Ibis (Eudocimus albus) were considered sacred and an object of veneration in ancient Egypt. They were even mummified along with Falcons and other sacred animals.

The Ibis is also the last wildlife to take shelter before a hurricane and the first to surface after the storm has hit.

Ft Desoto Sunset and Fisherman

This was one of the most incredible sunsets I've seen in a long time--even the birds cooperated.

This was taken during a workshop with my friend, Jim Sykes, on sunsets and moon rises. We went to one of my favorite places, Ft Desoto in Tierra Verde, FL. We started at the old fort, than as soon as the sunset faded, we headed for East Beach to catch the moonrise.

East Beach is still in Ft Desoto about 3 or 4 miles to the east. We were hoping to catch the full moon rise between the spans of the Sunshine Skyway bridge, but it rose a bit to the left of the bridge. I think I'll be going back once a month to try to catch the full moon rising between the spans. With a little luck, I won't forget about it and not go.

Gary Shoots the Sunset

My club has been so active lately, it's nearly impossible to keep up. Our regular Monday night shoot this week was at Honeymoon Island in Dunedin, FL.

After walking the trails and getting eaten alive by mosquitoes, we went out on the beach to photograph the sunset. With hurricane Ike being so wide, it has caused some incredible sunsets with beautiful waves out on the Gulf.

This is one of my friends and fellow club member, Gary. He's all set up for a beautiful sunset shot. We all got some incredible shots on Monday. This is just one of them.

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Grapes and Palms

Just another experiment with HDR. This one was taken at sunset during our regular Monday Walk-Around Meetup in Safety Harbor, FL. The sky was actually this color and the clouds were just amazing.

I made several shots of these clouds and at one point there was a very faint rainbow shooting out just above these clouds. Unfortunately, it was very faint and although I tried, I just couldn't capture it.

It was really strange to see a rainbow, since there was no rain. I'm still trying to figure that out. I've never seen a rainbow appear without being precluded by rain.

The magenta sky this evening was magnificent. Florida has the most amazing clouds.

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