Point Lobos State Natural Reserve is a relatively big place and you can easily spend couple of the days exploring distinctive sections of the park. It also has 15 different trials and each one provides unique opportunities for travel and landscape photographers.
The Cypress Grove Trail is by far my favorite one. It loops through the cypress forest along the beautiful rocky coast. I’ve already featured Cypress Grove Trail twice on my blog (Point Lobos Magic Forest and Path to the Magic Forest) and after visiting Point Lobos again in the beginning of 2015 I will definitely do it once more.
The featured photo displays the view from Cypress Grove Trail on Cypress Cove and Carmel Bay.
Shooting and Processing
The only challenge with the shooting was to find enough place to setup the tripod. The spot looks much bigger on the photograph because I used wide angle lens (10mm) and it tends to exaggerate the distances and the sizes, especially in the foreground elements. In total, I took 5 bracketed shots (-2, -1, 0, +1, +2).
I used standard HDR processing technique in Lightroom, Photomatix and Photoshop (check my tutorial Before & After – HDR With Photomatix).
California. Big Sur. Point Lobos
Loc: 36.523464, -121.952609
Deconstructing Featured Photo
Camera: Canon 60D
Lens: Sigma 10-20mm
Focal Length: 10mm
ISO: 100
Aperture: F8
Bracketing: 5 shots (-2, -1, 0, +1, +2)
Tripod: FEISOL Tournament CT-3442 – Check my FEISOL Tournament CT-3442 Review.
Ballhead: FEISOL CB-40D
PROCESSING: HDR PROCESSED IN PHOTOMATIX
Lightroom: import, tagging, color balance, export to Photomatix
Photomatix: I used 5 bracketed shots to merge image to HDR (-2, -1, 0, +1, +2 ), 16-bit tiff image was exported to Lightroom. (check my tutorial Before & After – HDR With Photomatix)
Lightroom: straightening, cropping, export as PSD image
Photoshop: I used the Stamp Tool to remove distractions in the foreground (part of the tree, rocks)
- Topaz DeNoise was used to reduce digital noise.
- Topaz Clarity was used to enhance details and boost colors.
