Posts in Category: harbor
Safe Harbor
Cape Porpoise Harbor, Cape Porpoise Maine
“If your eye is generous, your whole being is full of light.” Jesus
Yesterday was one of those gray fall days in Maine along the coast. Just enough rain falling to dampen, skies heavy overhead, sea agitated…almost angry on the rocky shore. And yet, it was day to enjoy…a day of joy in being alive. In Cape Porpoise the lobster boats were mostly anchored, and the dock was quiet, under the eye of the lighthouse on Goat Island. We ate the excellent clam chowder at the Chowder House, and watched Eiders catching crabs, and Gulls stealing them. The sign on the wall announced the end of the season and begged our patience since all the summer help was gone back to college and school. We were warm on the inside and the outside by the time we left, with a the deep quiet of the end of season day settling in us, still at our centers as the boats floating the harbor…anchored by our faith in a loving creator and wrapped in the light, of the fellowship of Christ. Our safe harbor, our guiding light, no matter what comes in wind and rain, or how the waves beat against the shore…no matter the end of seasons, or even the end of days. We know where our harbor lies…we know the light within and look at the world of weather and change with generous eyes.
Happy Sunday! May you know safe harbor today.
Cape Porpoise Chowder House: Happy Sunday!
Cape Porpoise Harbor, Cape Porpoise Maine
“If your eye is generous, your whole being is full of light!” Jesus.
I went out yesterday in search of falling water and fallen leaves. I wanted to photograph the small falls along the Batson River in Emmon’s Preserve with the autumn accumulation of leaves covering the rocks and lining the water channels. I did that, and some of the pics will be featured in today’s Love of landscape (on Facebook and Google+). However, since I was out that way, and the sun was breaking through high clouds in interesting ways, I decided to swing out to Cape Porpoise to see how the harbor looked. I knew it might be chancy getting a parking place on the Cape on a Saturday morning, but slid into the last place in the public parking. The cloud bank off-shore was blocking direct sun on the harbor, but since I was parked I decided to wait it out. I could see sun on the point to the south, and on the water behind the lighthouse, and I knew it was only a matter of time before the clouds slid far enough out to sea for the harbor and the foliage behind it to be in full sun.
When the couple in the corner of the image brought their cups of chowder out on the deck that just about decided it, but then the sun finally broke though and I hustled over to get this shot. Okay! Then I did go into the Chowder House for my bowl, brought it out to the deck, and sat and enjoyed the play of the light over the water, the boats, the village and the autumn colors behind.
While I was eating and watching, a group of three people joined me on the deck. Two were sporting cameras. I overheard the third say, “It is so pretty. Thank you for forcing me to play tourist in my own town today. I never get out here.” I assume she was showing off the sights to weekend visitors in her home. And I thought, there it is. We need to play tourist in our own towns. We need to visit the lighthouse and the harbor at Cape Porpoise often. We need to sit in the autumn sun (or summer, or spring) on the deck of the Chowder House, eating some of the best clam chowder I have ever had, and enjoying the play of light on the harbor and the village. We need to turn a generous eye on the places where we live…as though they were new to us…as though we were just visiting. What wonders we might find.
I have had the privilege these past few years to do just that. To be out as often as I like and really enjoy the place where I live. To play tourist in my own town…and to share much of what I find with a growing group of friends. When you turn a generous eye on the place where you live you find that it is, indeed, full of light…full of wonder…full of joy. What a gift! What a God! Happy Sunday!
Postcard from Rockport MA
Rockport Massachusetts, on the tip of Cape Anne, north of Gloucester, is such just about your archetypal picturesque New England fishing village: there are postcard views just about where ever you look. This is one of the fishing piers and lobster boat basins just of the main street. It would have been easy to drive right by it, but we were looking for ducks in any likely spot, so we turned in. How could anyone resist taking a photo here?
Sony NEX 3NL with 16-50mm zoom. 24mm equivalent. ISO 200 @ 1/250th @ f16. Processed for HDR effect in Snapseed and Photo Editor by dev.macgyver on the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 2014. Because the lens distortions were distracting (at least to me), I used Perspective correction in Photo Editor to pull the buildings on the side back up straight. 🙂
Lelystsd Haven Yellow
The hotel we stay at for the Dutch Bird Fair is across a narrow brick road from Lelystad Haven, an upscale yacht and boat basin on this inland sea. The Haven boasts everything from the most modern (and expensive) yachts to genuine Dutch canal boats in various stages of renovation. While white is the predominant color of the yachts, the canal boats tend to verge toward the brighter hues 🙂
This old boat is a case in point. The classic worn black hull is set off by the flaming yellow of the apparently freshly painted dinghy. Samsung Smart Camera in Rich Tone mode (HDR). Processed in PicSay Pro on the Google Nexus 7.
3/17/2012: Champlain Layers, Burlington VT
Another shot from our short trip to Burlington Vermont this week. Among the attractions of Burlington is a series of beaches and parks in towntown Burlington along the shore of Lake Champlain. This marina would be full in another season…it will in fact fill up quickly over the next 6-8 weeks, but for now it is a study in graphic design, with the lighthouse on its breakwater forming a middle ground and the layered mountains behind. It stretches the eye and challenges our sense of space but I think it works exactly because of that.
Canon SX40HS. Program with iContrast and -1/3EV exposure compensation. 90mm equivalent field of view. f4 @ 1/1250th @ ISO 100.
Processed in Lightroom for intensity, clarity and sharpness.
12/31/2011: Cape Porpoise Harbor in Green
The final pictures for 2011.
When I was about to leave Cape Porpoise the other day on my Snowy Owl prowl, I turned to see that a shaft of sun had come in under the cloud over to light up the harbor and the town. It was not the usual warm low sun shaft that sometimes leaks under the cloud cover at sunset, but a shaft of mid-day winter light…it turned the water of the harbor bright green, and picked out every detail in the boats and houses of the village. It was stunning. I hurried across the parking lot and out on to the deck at the (closed for the winter) clam shack to catch a few shots before the clouds closed in and shut off the light. This shot is zoomed in to frame the village and the church.
Canon SX40HS at 112mm equivalent field of view. f4.5 @ 1/500th @ ISO 160. Program with iContrast and –1/3EV exposure compensation.
And here is the side shot (24mm equivalent).
Processed in Lightroom for Intensity and Sharpness. Auto color temperature adjustment to match the green in the two shots. Some extra Recovery and some exposure and brightness adjustment in the second shot to tame the highlights.
7/4/2011: Tide’s Out. Happy July 4th
Okay…except for its quintessential summerness, this shot has noting to do with July 4th. It is another from my late evening loop down by the ocean Saturday, which happened to be at extreme low tide. You can see, from the anchor cable on the boat on the right, just how deep the water is in this little cove at high tide.
Though deceptively simple, there is actually lots going on in this shot. It is mostly about layers, lines, and light…with the bright yellow of the center boat anchoring it. To really see the textures that form the lines you need to view it lager in the Smugmug lightbox by clicking it.
Nikon Coolpix P500 @ 130mm equivalent field of view, f5 @ 1/320th @ ISO 160. Programmed auto, with Active D-Lighting and Normal Image Optimization.
I experimented with the Nikon’s in camera post processing on this image…applying Quick Retouch…which apparently adds some dynamic range (D-Lighting), sharpens, and adjusts the blackpoint or contrast slightly…before taking it into Lightroom for final processing. I have been surprised to find that on some shots the Nikon’s in camera post processing can improve the result while introducing less noise than achieving the same effects in Lightroom. Not all images…but some.
And I pray that your July 4th (whether it is a holiday for you or not) will be blessed.
5/23/2011: Primary Colors in the Fog, with Loon
We made a quick trip to Machias and Bar Harbor on Friday, chauffeuring a daughter from college to summer job. It was a cold, rainy day, only letting up toward evening, and then the fog persisted over the water. Still, with a few hours in Bar Harbor, while we waited for a second daughter to get out work so we could take them both to dinner, I had to find something to photograph. 🙂
So this shot is primarily about color. I took several versions at different zoom lengths for different framing, but only in this one is graced by a loon.
Nikon Coolpix P500 at 215mm equivalent field of view, f5.6 @ 1/500th @ ISO 160. Program with Active D-Lighting and Vivid Image Optimization.
Processed for Clarity and Sharpness in Lightroom.
4/23/2011: Kennebunkport Panorama
I am beginning to have doubts that the new camera is going to work for me…I am seeing too many digital processing artifacts in the images. They look fine…even great…at screen resolution…but they would not make a good print. Still, there is no doubt that Sweep Panorama is an amazing feature! You just set the shot up in camera, choosing the direction and angle (120 to 360 degrees), press the shutter release and turn in a circle until the camera has captured the full swing. The camera does all the stitching, evens out the exposure where needed and produces a seamless panorama. Since the camera takes a lot more exposures than are needed for overlap, and certainly way more than any human would attempt, it can do a pretty amazing job of building the pano. View this one at full monitor width by clicking on it to open the window in Smugmug.
What we have here is the sweep from the point at Cape Ann, on the left, all the way around to the breakwater at Kennebunkport harbor, on the right.
Fujifilm HS20 EXR. Unknown number of exposures, processed to pano in camera. Nominally f8 @ 1/500th @ ISO 200.
Processed very lightly (the Fuji does not require much and will take even less…really heavy artifacts appear with the kind of processing I used for my Canon SX20IS).
3/29/2011: Cape Porpoise, ME
If you stand on the fishing pier at Cape Porpoise, Maine and look back down the harbor toward town, this is what you see. Certainly one of the classic Maine fishing village vistas, with the white church steeple and the white clapboard houses, the lobster boats floating on a ultra-blue sea under a spring blue sky. And, in this hard spring light, if you turn right around and look out to sea, you are confronted by the Goat Island Light on the stone ledge that guards the entrance to the harbor and the extensive shallows.
All together classic for Maine. These views make Cape Porpoise, otherwise a sort of sleepy neighbor to far more touristy Kennebunk and Kennebunkport, just about as well visited in the summer. It is still spring here, and I was all but alone out there last Saturday. And look what they all missed!
Canon SX20IS at 1) 125mm equivalent field of view @ f4.5 @ 1/640th @ ISO 80, Landscape Mode, and 2) 150mm equivalent @ f4.5 @ 1/1250 @ ISO 80, Landscape Mode.
Processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom.