I’m going to try out a slightly different format (image first, short blurbs afterward) for my photography blog. So here goes: For those interested, the details are below the photos.
Getting There
The wreck of the Peter Iredale is located in Ft Stevens State Park, along the northern Oregon coast. From the south entrance, drive by the park’s main building (on the right) to a 4-way stop. Continue straight on Peter Iredale Road. After the road curves to the right, take a left and drive several hundred feet to a parking lot by the beach. The wreck’s just out there, and it’s like catnip for photographers. What’s nice about shooting at night is that nobody’s around–that’s pretty hard to accomplish almost any other time of day. I’ve actually shown up there at dawn to shoot and encountered 20-somethings slacklining right in the middle of the thing.
Getting the Shot
These are high ISO images shot on my new Canon 6d with the aperture either completely wide open (f/2.8) or stopped down slightly (f/4). Both are 42-second exposures. And I used my Rokinon 14mm lens for both shots.
It wasn’t until I got home that I noticed that there was some airglow (or nightglow) in many of my photos (particularly the ones facing north). It manifested as mostly greenish areas or even some greenish streaks near the horizon (not to be confused with the orangish or yellow light pollution from nearby towns or fishing vessels). For more reading on airglow, here’s wikipedia‘s take on it.
Getting There
After Ft Stevens, we drove south to Ecola State Park, where we went to Indian Beach. Just follow the twisty, turny road all the way from the park’s entrance and you can’t miss it.
Getting the Shot
Indian Beach was super dark that night after the moon went down, which is a great time for star photography. I’ve been shooting with the Canon 6d for a while now, and I love its relatively low noise in high ISO situations (such as star photography), so I really cranked the ISO for a few shots on the pitch-black beach. The noise handling was incredible. The shot above was shot at 14mm, f/4, 30 seconds at 10,000 ISO!
