Jerusalem Dories

Jerusalem Dories

This image is a good example of why a photographer needs to avoid the pitfalls of tunnel vision from too much pre-planning. Because I still shoot film, I extensively pre-plan exactly what I want to achieve before I set out to shoot (film is less forgiving than digital and it's expensive). Most of my locations are pre-chosen via scouting and I visit these places when I know the tide and sunset (or sunrise) will be aligned along with when the weather is right. I had set out to shoot a beach scene this particular evening and after accomplishing that, decided to head off and get some dinner.

I knew I wouldn't have an opportunity to shoot again because the sun was just about down so I completely packed my gear up and drove off from the first location. Instead of heading straight to the restaurant I took the long route just for purposes of sight seeing when I came upon this scene about a mile down the road. This is where the tunnel vision mentality comes into play. I had it set in my mind that not only would I not have enough light to shoot again but I also hadn't considered shooting anything that didn't show the sky (above the horizon that is). Finally, even when I saw this scene unfolding, I didn't think I would be able to balance the brightness of the reflections of the sky with the ambient light-but that wouldn't be revealed until I got the film back from the lab. I hesitated to shoot, partly because I deemed it a lost cause technically, but also because I didn't foresee how it would look in the end and thus wasn't prepared to consider creating something so different from what I had set out to accomplish.

I literally parked the car in the middle of the road with the hazard lights on (it's a very slow neighborhood there), pulled my backpack out, mounted the camera on the tripod and shot four frames after making a judgement call on the focus and exposure. The dim light died halfway through the 4th exposure.