[/caption] A picture perfect view of Seattle, Washington with all of the necessary subjects that make Seattle one of the most photogenic cities in the world….Mt. Rainier, Elliot Bay, Space Needle, towering sky scrapers and the industrial cranes that keep Seattle one of the top industrialized cities on the planet. This photo was obviously taken from Kerry Park and I made sure to set up during the later part of the afternoon in order to take advantage of the flawless blue skies. I made sure to use my tripod and bubble level and attach my CIR-PL and warming filter on my 17-77mm lens. I set the camera at normal and had the aperture set at F-5.7 and the shutter speed at 1/100 second. I set the ISO at 100 and increased the white balance to +0.3 in order to avoid too much glare from the sun but also wanted to be sure and avoid any under exposed photos due to the filters and setting that I was using.
Tag Archives: Kerry Park
Elliot Bay in Seattle, WA
[/caption] Kerry Park isn’t just known for offering stunning views of downtown Seattle and the Space Needle. While waiting for the sun to set, there are several opportunities to photograph Elliot Bay. Kerry Park offers stunning views of West Seattle, Elliot Bay and Bainbridge Island. This photo clearly shows just how beautiful and colorful this part of Seattle really is. The houses in the foreground have some of the best views in the city. You can watch the boats motor along the bay as well as dream about owning one of the condos that stretch along West Seattle and Alki Beach. I felt very lucky to get this photo since I wasn’t even thinking about aiming my camera in this direction since I was so content on photographing downtown Seattle as the sun was lowering in the west. I finally decided to take this shot when I noticed the last of the suns rays were shinning perfectly over the building and ship in the foreground. The entire scene is almost perfectly cast in the sunset with no real flaws in the lighting. The shadows and sun lit scenery is almost in perfect harmony with one another. Since the lighting was low I made sure to use my tripod, bubble level and remote switch in order to avoid any camera shake or blur. I attached my CIR-PL, warming and UV filter in order to saturate the sky and bring out the colors of the sun soaked buildings and boats in the bay. I was using my Sigma 17-70mm lens and set the focal length at 70mm. The camera was in Program/Normal mode and I set the ISO at 100 and reduced the white balance to -1.7. The aperture was automatically set at F-4.6 and the shutter speed at 1/128 second. This photo really shows the benefits of using the automatic setting rather than the manual setting since the sensor set the perfect aperture and reduced the stop down to 1/128 second. This photo was taken on 7/10/11 at about 8:45pm. I highly recommend spending several hours at Kerry Park and plan on thinking outside the box since there are so many photographic options that don’t only include downtown Seattle. However, you will find it really difficult leaving the park after sunset without taking a minimum of 150 photos of the city skyline.
Moon over Seattle, WA
[/caption] I was amazed to have the opportunity to photograph the Seattle skyline with the moon looming over the city. Too make things even better is that the clouds were amazing and Mt. Rainier looked spectacular. I couldn’t have picked a better day to photograph the sunset at Kerry Park. I was using my Sigma 17-70mm lens and attached my CIR-PL and warming filter in order to soften the scene and saturate the sky. I took this picture just minutes before sunset and set the ISO to 100 and the white balance at 0 in order to create the best possible exposure. Since I had the camera in Normal/Program mode the aperture was automatically set at F-4 and the shutter speed at 1/60 second. I made sure to use my tripod, bubble level and remote switch in order to avoid any camera shake. I had the focal length at 23mm in order to create a large landscape but didn’t want to make the city look too far away. I lost count of the amount of tripods and cameras crowded along tiny Kerry Park. I also believe there were two wedding photo shoots going on as well as several modeling photo shoots. Even though its a very popular place to photograph the city it’s hardly difficult to see why.