Don't tell me you haven't done it too.

OK, I know I'm not the only one.  Confession time!  Who has also done it?  Arrived at a great spot inspired and excited that not only are you there, but the conditions and light look fabulous - maybe not magic but close to it.  What's more, you have the time (and your tripod) to enjoy some great moments.

So this is it.  I was down the south coast for a couple of days and managed to find a little time all by myself to head out and check out the beach.  It was late afternoon.  The sky was rich, the waves were magic and the place was reasonably deserted save for a few die hard surfers.  As I mentioned already, I actually had my tripod.  It was cold and I was ready for it.  Even had some gumboots to help getting over the rockpools.

Out they all came. Tripod, camera bag, gumboots ... spare battery, extra CF cards ... extra scarf even ... a couple of cloths to help with the conditions .... camera (no!  it wasn't the camera!) ...

Here I was at the beach, all ready and all I had in the camera bag was one lens!!!!  Not the wide angle or the next best thing even.  All I had was my damn 105mm macro!  This was not going to be a macro moment.  It was not going to be a 100mm moment!!!  It was supposed to be at the very least about a 40mm opportunity!!!  I'd also left my bag of filters back at the hotel!!!

Light is fading quickly.  My calculations were that by the time I returned and reorganised my kit the time would have passed.  So, needed to make the most of it....  At the beginning this also meant working hard to find some settings that allowed me to do something with the water.  I had no polarizer and no ND filter so initially all I could do was to work with my manual settings.  As the time moved on and the light was less intense this became easier.

What I'm including below is a few of the images I caught.  Quite honestly it was hard to remain irritated in this beautiful light so after a while it seemed like it was meant to be.  Just me, my trusty macro 105, a surfer guy who was also a photographer out shooting his mates with a towel over his gear and some glorious waves ....

Oh, and I realised a couple of other things.  My sensor is disgustingly dirty so off to Canon next week.  I'm working with Nik as a plug in to Lightroom at the moment and I haven't worked out why my workflow of removing dustspots in L/R first is not working.  So, double handling of the dust spot dilemna at the moment.  No prizes for spotting ones I've missed!

Enjoy!!!

Who said a macro lens can't do landscape???  Imagine how it could have looked with a nice wide angle!

The surfer guy photographer (above)

Just loved the late sun on the stone edges of the pool (above)

Yes, and there was a rainbow!  Who could expect anything less on a day like this? (above and below)