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Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Ocean & Coast

Kelp Detail #1, Weston Beach

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Kelp Detail #1, Weston Beach
Kelp Detail #1, Weston Beach

Kelp Detail #1, Weston Beach. Point Lobos State Reserve, California. January 18, 2010. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Detail of kelp and other debris (“wrack”) washed up by winter storms at Weston Beach, Point Lobos State Reserve, California.

This is another of the close up shots of kelp washed up on the shore at Weston Beach following a winter storm. There are several things that caught my eye on this pile of washed up sea trash… ;-) First, the shapes and colors of the kelp “floats” are intriguing, and I think more photogenic during this wetter time of year. I also liked the curving steps of the plants that wind through the frame from the left and up toward the right. Mixed in with this are some larger leaves with deeply ridged texture. Underlying all of this is the faintly colored sandstone and a few odd colorful stones.

This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

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keywords: kelp, plant, rock, pebble, sea, ocean, life, nature, washed, up, storm, debris, wrack, winter, point, lobos, state, reserve, park, california, usa, monterey, carmel, peninsula, pacific, pattern, brown, red, orange, yellow, rock, sandstone, landscape, detail, close, up, stock

Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Ocean & Coast

Bird Island from Weston Beach

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Bird Island from Weston Beach
Bird Island from Weston Beach


Bird Island from Weston Beach. Point Lobos State Reserve, California. January 16, 2010. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Photograph from Weston Beach of wild winter seas near Bird Island and surrounding rocks along the California coastline at Point Lobos State Reserve as high clouds from an approaching winter storm begin to spread across the sky.

Since I decided to make this short mid-January visit to Point Lobos on the spur of the moment (after discovering that predicted rain was going to arrive later than expected) I had no idea what the tide conditions would be like. It turned out that the tide was in when I arrived and familiar locations like Weston Beach, the location from which I made this photograph, were fairly inundated by the tide and the high surf from the approaching weather front. So rather than trying to shoot the smaller details of the beach/cove – I saved that for later in the day – I decided to see what I could do with the longer views of the huge surf and the backlit haze and light fog that emphasized the rocks and bluffs receding into the distance. The light was very changeable, and the sky in this image explain why – for the most part there was a thin layer of high clouds, but there were also scattered thicker clouds that cast moving shadows across the water.

This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

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Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Ocean & Coast

Kelp Detail #2, Weston Beach

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Kelp Detail #2, Weston Beach
Kelp Detail #2, Weston Beach

Kelp Detail #2, Weston Beach. Point Lobos State Reserve, California. January 16, 2010. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Detail of kelp and other debris (“wrack”) washed up by winter storms at Weston Beach, Point Lobos State Reserve, California.

Perhaps putting more trust in the words of the weatherman than was appropriate, I slept in on this morning, having heard the night before that it was going to rain. But when I got up the sun was shining, and I realized that I should have been out shooting! After taking care of a few morning chores, I managed to get away and drive down to the coast. I didn’t have a specific plan besides “the coast,” but as I drove I kept an eye on the sky since the weather from was starting to come ashore and high clouds were beginning to diffuse the light.

As I got near Monterey I figured I might as well take a look at Point Lobos, even though it seemed like the clouds might be starting to build along the coast – I figured that if it turned out to be too cloudy there I could just come back by way of Moss Landing. At Point Lobos the seas were fairly high and very choppy and the high clouds still hadn’t thickened so much as to cut off the light – although at times it got a bit murky, in between there was soft light diffused by high, translucent clouds. I started shooting the more distant landscapes from low bluffs near Weston Beach, working in the wind and the spray from the high surf. After doing this for a while I decided that I’d head a bit south before the time for my short visit ran out. As I walked around the curve of the edge of Weston Beach (which still seems to me like it really should be called Weston Cove – there isn’t much of a “beach” there at all) I saw that a lot of seaweed and kelp debris had been washed up by earlier high surf, and I decided to wander around there for a bit looking for interesting compositions that included the sandstone rocks and the kelp.

This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

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keywords: kelp, plant, rock, pebble, sea, ocean, life, nature, washed, up, storm, debris, wrack, winter, point, lobos, state, reserve, park, california, usa, monterey, carmel, peninsula, pacific, pattern, brown, red, orange, yellow, rock, sandstone, landscape, detail, close, up, stock

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Ocean & Coast

Winter Sunset Clouds, Pigeon Point

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Winter Sunset Clouds, Pigeon Point
Winter Sunset Clouds, Pigeon Point

Winter Sunset Clouds, Pigeon Point. Pacific Ocean Coastline, California. January 9, 2010. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Winter sunset clouds at over offshore rocks and surf along the Pacific Coast at Pigeon Point, California.

I admit to still being a sucker for good sunset clouds. So, after I finished making a few photographs of the iconic Pigeon Point Lighthouse along the California coast highway between San Francisco and Santa Cruz I decided to simply point the camera out towards an interesting off-shore rock formation, include a bit of ocean, surf, and horizon at the bottom of the page, and shoot the sunset color in the clouds and sky.

This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

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