Olympic Peninsula
I finally manged to process another photo from the olympic national park. While visiting Sol Duc falls some beautiful light was filtering through the trees and it blended in nicely with the falls.
Hope you like it!
- Bhumibol Adulyadej.
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One of our absolute favorite places from the Washington trip is the Hoh rainforest. It was a pain to reach as the entry point to the forest is located all the way on the other side of the peninsula from Port Angeles. This made the drive to the forest brutal and so we had to limit our hikes to the small trails. But once we started the hike, we realized how amazing this enchanted forest can be. We were in love with the greenery around us and rejuvenated just wandering around.
This panorama shot was one of my favorite shots from our short incursion into the forest.
- Aesop.
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Sunrises are hard for me to shoot. As early as I can remember, I have always been a night owl and never a morning person. In fact, I still vividly remember my first sunrise experience, I was maybe 4 or 5 years old when we visited the pointy bottom end of India. This spot (Kanyakumari) has a lot of religious and cultural importance in India as a place where three oceans meet. So my parents were very excited about waking up early for sunrise, me not so much. There I was, groggy and irritated, on a rooftop being battered by cold morning breeze and the sun broke the horizon. To put it mildly, I was wide immediately wide awake, I have not before seen something that beautiful when warm golden light lit the rocky shore of the coast in perfect light. I’d say I got addicted to sunrise that day and since then never had any issues waking up super early for sunrise.
This shot was taken on our trip to Washington last summer, I miscalculated my distances and it took forever to get back to our hotel after sunset at the second beach. We were late to wake up for sunrise at hurricane ridge. As we were driving up the predawn light start to color the skies. I made a call to jump out and get a shot, even though there was no good view. Thankfully we came across a spot on the road where there was a gap in tree cover. I was specific to expose this shot just for the colors in the sky and wanted to silhouette the trees on either side of the composition.
A view from behind the waterfalls. The light made it possible to get a good photo from this side. Else the contrast at the edge of the falls would have been to harsh and the drop of to abrupt.
I used some manual blending here for dynamic range and then my usual postprocessing for colors and contrast. Came out quite well I think :-)
- Blaise Pascal.
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COLOR version of this image
One of the coolest places we got to visit during our road trip to Washington was the hall of Mosses trail at the Hoh rainforest. The trail is pretty short and even but the trees are quite magnificent and at the same time little intimidating. We were there on an afternoon and pretty much had the whole section of the trail to ourselves.
One of the challenges in my photography is taking compelling images of trees. I have precious few images in my stream where single trees are the mail subject. As I was at the Hall of Moses trail and among some of the most majestic old temperate trees including bigleaf maples and Sitka spruces, I had pretty much no idea regarding how to capture them.
This image is a stitch panorama shot of about 3 images that were later cropped to a square crop. While I was processing the image, I noticed that the image felt rather bland with strong green tones overpowering every other visual element in the image. So just for kicks, I desaturated the image completely and I felt instantly great about the shot. Add in some minor contrast adjustment and I feel like the image looks way better than the original. I am curious to know what everyone else thinks about the image.
- Lao Tzu.
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Another shot from our recent summer roadtrip through the beautiful state of Washington. This one was taken at Hurrican ridge of Olympic National park. I didn’t take this shot just a bit after we completed the short hike around the ridgeline. We were actually about head back when I noticed that there was still some color in the mountains and the clouds. To add to that we had some deer that were grazing by the horizon, so I quickly set up a panorama shot of the Olympic mountains and the beautiful meadows in the foreground.
Ferns cover the forest floor, the moss covers everything else. The Hoh Rainforest is an enchanted place.
Sol Duc, Olympic National Park
Long exposure of the morning clouds hugging and kissing the ridge at the Olympic National Park
Sol Duc Forest – Olympic National Park
Although photographed at least ten years ago, this image remains one of my personal favorite captures. While...
- Sydney J. Harris.
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One of the most magical places in the USA from all our travels so far is the emperate rain forests of the Olympic Peninula. And I believe one of the vest ties to visit is early summer or late spring when the water is abundant in the rivers and streams and the forest canopy wears the most verdant of greens. The best part about the forest was the mahical light rays the sun creates in the forest when it briefly escapes the cloud cover.
We encountered this beautiful little stream while on our way back from the stunning Sol Duc Falls. As we passed it I noticed the wonderful light that was falling to the right of the falls and the amazing lush greenery of the scene and decided to set up and take a shot of the whole scene. It was a challenging scene to frame as there just too many interesting elemts to distract in the frame. I had to wait for 15 minutes to get the light again on the moss to the top right of the frame but I think the wait was well worth it.
- Henry David Thoreau.
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Another shot of the beautiful Sol Duc Falls in the Olympic rainforest. This was one of my favorite shots at this location because the view from this nook included the falls and the bridge across the Sol Duc River.
A long time ago while I was a budding landscape photographer one of the senior photogs I met at a location advised me to not take out the camera immediately when you reach a new location. He suggested that you walk around the locations and try to get as much understanding regarding the place and how light is affecting the view you have. Check to see how the shadows are and projection of regarding the path of the given light source. Following that advise netted me this little spot and this viewpoint.
I had to drop down to the edge of the falls and affix the tripod at a very odd angle to stabilize it and then wait for the clouds to diffuse the light all while crouching inside the roots of a giant tree by the edge of the river. Let's just say I am very thankful that both my Nikon's now have tilted screens on their backs.
- Honore de Balzac.
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One more shot of the wonderful Sol Duc Falls at Olympic National Park. This one is a more straight on shot of the falls. As we were walking around I saw some amazing beam of light on the leaves above the falls and set up my tripod to compose for a shot. I had to wait a bit for the clouds to pass through and diffuse the light a bit and the water spray at this location was brutal on the camera but very refreshing after the hike. After about 5 minutes of waiting the clouds obliged and blocked the sun for enough time to take the shot. This is actually one of my favorite shot from this location.
- H. Jackson Brown, Jr.
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One of the reasons for me to include the Olympic Peninsula into this road trip was my desire to visit the stunning Sol Duc valley and the falls that carries the same name. This roughly one-mile long trip traverses through some old growth rainforests and on a cloudy overcast day provides some stunning scenery. The trail is very well maintained, and the trailhead is easy to find.
The falls was actually much bigger than expected, creating a thunderous fall as it drops over a cliff straight into a chasm. The amount of water spray is unbelievable especially at the classic viewpoint. Hope you all like this image.
- Charles Dickens.
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One of the key attractions of the Olympic Peninsula is the wonderful Hoh rain forest and the stunning loop trails that allow you to explore this amazing ecosystem. Growing up near a Tropical rainforest this was my first experience with a temperate rainforest and I was excited to check out the similarities and differences.
The NPS offer three well maintained trails here that can be taken to explore the rainforest at your own pace, due to the time constraints we took the Hall of mosses train which is about a mile long. There are two other trails, the Spruce Trail which is about 1.2 miles long and the Hoh River Trail which is about 17 miles long. We really hope to come back and do the other two trails someday.
I underestimated the distance we will have to cover to get to the entrance of the forest to our hotel room in Port Angeles and this was the first spot during the trip where we seriously wished for an RV as the next day we had planned to go for sunrise at hurricane ridge. So, we had to cancel our plans for a sunset at Ruby beach and head back early to get some shut-eye.
- Henry David Thoreau.
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One of the main reasons why we included the Olympic Peninsula into this road trip was the beautiful location of Hurricane Ridge. There is quite an unparalleled view of the stunning Olympic mountains from the visitor center itself. Another added attraction is that the meadows which make the ridge famous are usually carpeted with wildflowers in summer. From my past experiences I have learned that sunrise and early morning is usually the best time if stillness is an important factor in your photos.
So after visiting the Hoh rainforest and abandoning a sunset venture at Ruby beach, we headed back to Port Angeles to get a little shut-eye before waking at 4 am for the 30 min drive to Hurricane Ridge. We were the only people there and I was truly excited thinking about finding my prime wildflower shot before anyone else joined us. But unfortunately, I realized soon that the reason why it was not crowded was because the wildflowers have not yet started blooming. So, all I had was a beautiful meadow in the for ground and a part of orange flowers close to the horizon if squint and zoom.
I still came back happy because the light was just gorgeous, and we have quite many elk and deer’s that were grazing by the meadow. Some even come close and checked us out. This is a must-see place if you are in the Olympic Peninsula or the beautiful towns of Port Angeles or Sequim.
I have just returned from an awesome 2 week trip to the west coast of the USA. We started in the Olympic National Park and then went down all the way to San Francisco. So there are a lot of photos I'll have to show you over the next weeks.
I'll start with a picture I took in the Hoh Rainforest. Well I expected a lot of this place and it is really beautiful. But during sunshine it's just awefully hard to capture it's magic. I had hoped for some rain there but got only clear blue skies. What made this even worse was the fog at the coast. We were staying in La Push since I wanted to shoot the awesome seascapes of the olympic national park, especially second beach. From the morning of day two fog rolled in and had the whole coast there in it's grasp.
I was fooled twice by the thick cloud cover and headed to the Hoh just to arrive there for the sun to blast all fog and clouds away, leaving only clear blue skies and harsh direct light. This photo I took in the 5-10 Minutes of shade we had there. I used some condensation technique on the polarizer to further emphasize the dreamy look of that place. Soon after the sun ruined all further photography.
If you are ever at the olympic peninsula and want to shoot the hoh make sure to go there early in the morning. Don't get fooled by fog or clouds at the coast, this all changes very fast further inland.
Hope you like it anyway :-)
cheers
I was staying in Forks (Olympic N.P, Washington State), 20 km from the coast and two evenings i stood on La Push beach to make some sunset pictures....
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Olympic National Park, Washington
Olympic National Park, Washington
- John Muir.
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When we planned our trip through some of the wonderful landscapes of Washington, I was especially interested in including the Olympic Peninsula into our trip as it had one of the rare examples of a rainforest in the northern hemisphere. As I am originally from the western ghats of India, my home is less than 20 miles away from the Malabar coast rainforests. So, I was fascinated to see another type of rainforests, especially one that thrives in cooler temperatures. Also, when you live in SoCal any type of green spot is a happy relief.
I had marked the beautiful Sol Duc falls as one of the top spots that we need to hit. It requires a 2-mile hike through some magnificent forests. We really enjoyed this mild hike through the wet ecosystem and the small streams and many waterfalls that adorn the trail. Hope I managed to convey the beauty of the scene with this image.
- African Proverb.
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Another shot from the beautiful Hoh Rainforest and the hall of mosses trail. The trail starts innocently enough until you come across the old big leaf maple trees that’s covered in moss and provide the visitor with some otherworldly visuals. The mosses on the trees do not damage the trees. However, the trees can fall by the winds in storms because of their shorter roots due to the abundance of nutrients and water in the forest. Many trees and mosses grow from and over the fallen tree trunks.
Along the trail there is a side path of 200 feet that leads to a grove of maple trees covered with epiphytic spikemoss (Source: Wikipedia). While planningvise this location was hard to reach I think my wife and I agree that we would need to come here again and allocate more time to this stunning rainforest to do it more justice.
- David Douglas.
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Today's photo is from Washington’s Olympic Peninsula. This shot was taken while hiking to the Sol Duc falls along the hiking trail. The forest there is just enchanting with the amazing old trees with moss hanging all over them. I was so focused on finally getting a shot of the Sol Duc falls that I concentrated on keeping my pace up to get to the falls and getting the shots I came for. On our way back from the falls, we took a more leisurely pace and I started to notice how wonderful the forest is and started to take some shots of the many interesting views.
- Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel.
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When we were planning our trip to Washington, I knew that I had to keep Olympic peninsula as a must have location. And along with Hoh Rainforest and the Sol Duc falls, sunrise at the wildflower meadows of Hurricane Ridge was going to be the star attraction of the vast peninsula. As we started more realistic planning we knew that we had to drop some spots if we wanted to stick to the one-week plan and decided to drop the north cascades section of Washington and they were mostly snow covered in early June.
So, I was really excited to wake up at 4 am in the morning and drag my very sleepy wife on to a drive to the beautiful wildflower meadows of Hurricane Ridge. Unfortunately, it turned out to be an masterclass in one of the follies of landscape travel photography. We were there on time for sunrise but not the wildflowers. My best guess calculations were off by about a week according to one of the park rangers we met. These were the only patch of wildflowers that we on the entire meadow.
- Confucius.
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As we were coming out of the parking lot for the Hoh rainforest, I noticed this little lake that looked like a flooded meadow. There were remnants of old trees that were sticking out from the incredibly still and clear water. I knew it was rare to get that level of stillness in the water at sunset, so we parked the car by the roadside and I tried my best to get a good picture of the rotting tree that fascinated me. We didn’t have much time as the sunlight was fading fast and I wanted to bring the vividness to the image.
Another of my tilt shift panorama images from my short visit to the Hoh Rain Forest in Olympic National Park. It was such a wonderful place to...
I was staying in Forks (Olympic N.P, Washington State), 20 km from the coast and two evenings i stood on La Push beach to make some sunset pictures....
Before bushwhacking down to the lower creek, I took this shot of a drop right below Murhut Falls in the Olympic Peninsula. I've always had a...
Long Exposure photography of the the lake at the olympic park
Thanks to all Phoide contributors to Olympic Peninsula!
Most notably Sandeep Thomas, Michael and Yi Jiang.