Pacific Northwest Coast Road Trip Part 01 – Seattle

Introduction

Welcome to part 1 of a 20 part series where I will discuss the photographic process and photography opportunities that Shelley and I had on our trip from Seattle to San Francisco along the Pacific coast in 2018. This trip gave us insight has to where we would love to go back to and spend more time. Traveling and photography exploration trips like this present their own sets of challenges. Around every corner and curve of the road, you do not fully know what to expect, no matter how much research you do in advance of the trip. These trips, at least for me, illustrate that life is a journey that must be lived and experienced. Planning helps, but plans can and often do go awry.

Shelley and I flew into Seattle to begin our trip. We planned on staying in Seattle for a couple of days and then driving to Forks, Washington to stay near Olympic National Park for a few days. My plan for Seattle was to focus on skyline photographs of this picturesque city. I was hoping against the typical weather for a photograph of the downtown skyline with Mount Rainier in the background. Knowing that Seattle weather rarely cooperates and that our time in Seattle was limited, I also planned on other locations for photographing the skyline, some of which fell off due to the amount of time that we had. From the locations that remained, I was able to create some of my favorite photographs of a city while traveling.

Seattle Skyline from Gas Works Park

Gas Works Park offered me a view of the downtown skyline with a body of water in the foreground. I was hoping for no movement on the water to get a reflection of the skyline in Union Lake, but alas it was not meant to be on this trip. However, I was given beautiful clouds to work with. From this location, I was able to create two compositions that I am more than happy with. The first one is an ultra-wide panoramic, created by shooting multiple frames zoomed to 200mm. The second was a single image shot at 24mm.

Kerry Park Overlook

Some photographers say that you should not mess with taking the known composition of a location. I feel differently from this point of view. You should go for the known composition and then look for something that makes it yours. Start by changing your angle on the main subject, find a different main subject in the composition, zoom in, go higher, go lower. You need to find a way to own the composition in the location that has been shot to death. You should start by getting the default composition; at the very least you will walk away with a shot. This is almost always the one that friends and family will want to see from your trip.

So, with these thoughts in my mind, one morning in Seattle I set out for the Kerry Park Overlook for the best-known view of the Seattle skyline. I arrived at Kerry Park and saw broken low and mid-level clouds that allowed for small patches of morning blue hour light to filter through in the sky. I was not able to see Mount Rainier in the background of the skyline. There were far too many clouds at the wrong levels in the sky between me and the mountain. I was able to create a multi-frame panoramic image by zooming my 24-70mm lens into 31mm and overshooting the scene. This gave me a sizeable RAW image to work with, thus capturing more detail and range across the overall picture.

Rivers of Light Seattle

Shelley and I, on the last morning that we were Seattle, journeyed to the Rizal Bridge, which gives a comprehensive view of the skyline. In order to create this photograph, we had to get on the road before rush hour in Seattle, head to the location, find a place to park, and finally find the composition on the skyline that worked the best for the panoramic photograph that I had in mind. I love this photograph. It worked as I had planned it before the trip. It fulfilled my intention of creating a photograph for my Rivers of Light series. For this photograph, I shot multiple images with my 24-70mm lens at 61mm. I overshot the scene and created a morning blue hour photograph that lives up to my intent.