The Big Island

I’m back in the Hawaiian Islands, developing a travel and landscape workshop. Right now I’m on the Big Island of Hawaii. I was just driving around, recovering from a botched flight schedule that ended up taking 26 hours, so I was not really primed for a major photo shoot. Still, I couldn’t ignore what the photo gods offered up on a silver platter.

I took the lead shot when I saw the surf pounding the shoreline and spraying this lovely tree. For the umpteenth time it reinforced for me the notion of just how resilient is life on our planet. I initially like the color rendition out of camera with a few adjustments, but as I visualized the image I felt that a B&W treatment would work better. I wanted to isolate the power of the surf and this stalwart tree and felt that the color was a distraction.

I shot this on my D810, with my brand-spanking new 80-400 Nikkor lens that I am working with. The specs are ISO 400, 1/400 @ f11, with -1/3EV at 135mm, tripod mounted. I converted it with Silver Efex Pro 2.0.

With this next image, I knew from the get-go that this would be a B&W image. The day gradually darkened as I drive to the interior. When I came across this copse of trees I liked the leading road, the grasses, the fences and the sky. Color was out of the question in my mind’s eye.

I know I’ll rework this image once I get back to the studio. I find it frustratingly difficult to work on my images on a laptop late at night while I am in a hotel room.

The specs are: D810 with 80-400 Nikkor zoom, ISO 200, 1/80 @ f11, 112mm, and -1.3 EV, tripod mounted and converted with Silver Efex Pro 2.0.