james wang photography - wangjam's photostream  

Finally back online! Came back from some commission work for The Cape on Bowen Development Ltd in Vancouver, Canada, I had the opportunity to photograph some of the gorgeous soon to be private beaches at the southern end of the island. Bowen Island is the quintessential island that offers a ton of outdoor activities and beauties while it is only a 20 minute ferry ride away. It’s got a quaint little town with beautiful lush green forests and an unique coastal line with intimate coves and beaches. This is a view from one of the beachfront lots that faces south. The sky in Vancouver is nothing short of drama, the moisture and the storms that roll into the pacific northwest really make it dynamic, powerful and simply inspiring and most importantly the light it creates is simply beautiful. You could see how it’s blue sky on one side and rain clouds cover the other side with some sunlight peaking through them.

This image is a 3 exposure blend to achieve or get close to dynamic range of what an human eye can see, ie. how I saw it :) Each exposure was taken with the Singh Ray 3 stop reverse ND grad filter. Hope you have a great upcoming week!

Trees are just difficult subjects to photograph in my opinion. I haven’t had the opportunity finding a nice field of aspens until I went to the North lake area near the town of Aspendell in the eastern sierras. In the summer you could literally drive up to the North Lake however they gated it off a mile or so down the road in the winter time so I hiked up a bit. I spotted these nice naked aspens covered in snow along the way and the lighting was just right at that time.

This is a 2 exposure blend to recover some blown highlights. Hope you have a great week ahead and may you find “it”!

I’ve always wanted to check out Bowling Ball Beach just a bit south of the coastal town of Point Arena. All these little towns along hwy 1 are just so fun to explore. When I arrived there, it took me a while to find the bowling balls since I got off to the wrong beach. Once I found them, it was an amazing thing to see these big rounded smooth rocks all lined up nicely next to each other. The condition wasn’t ideal since the tide was way low at 3pm. The tide started to come in by 5:30pm and the water started to fill around the rocks for a nice beautiful sunset.

This image is a 3 exposure blend. Each one is taken with a Singh Ray 3 stop reverse ND grad filter and a LEE 2 stop SE ND grad filter. Hope you had a great long weekend and hope you got some good light.

I ventured out to Garrapata SP in Big Sur this past weekend now that my family is in Vancouver, BC leaving me here by myself. It was a very cloudy day with big swells and the tides were definitely in and pounding on the rocks. I walked down this beach and man is it an early start to the flower season, it’s only February and it feels like spring time. I saw a bunch of Calla lilies at this drainage and they were screaming “please photograph me!” I went to the beach and scouted it out more then when I saw the sun was about to break through the clouds and I ran back to where those lilies were, it was definitely a very nice view and the clouds day provided soft enough light to photograph these beautiful flowers. Happy Valentine’s to my lovely wife and the 2 kids, can’t wait to see you guys soon!

This is a 4 exposure blend. The first 2 exposures were focused at 0.5 to 1 foot away for the lilies, the rest 2 exposures were focused at infinity for the sky and hills. Happy Valentine’s day everyone, I’m having dinner by myself now :)

Yan, her friend and I did a quick weekend warrior trip to Death Valley, CA. The original plan didn’t include the photographers’ paradise Race Track, but they are such a cool bunch and spontaneous that given the condition, the best option was the race track. That place is simply magical and simply one of a kind on this planet. We should’ve known that it is freakin’ cold at night. We were sitting outside at 20 degrees doing star trails and milky-way, I couldn’t feel my toes and my nose was hurting like a mofo :) Not to mention my almost frost bitten hands.

This is a 2 exposure blend. Here is how it’s done:

The exposure for the sky was taken at 4am just right after the moon had gone down and sun was still sleeping. It was taken at iso3200, f/2.8 at just under 30 secs so that the stars don’t drag.

The 2nd exposure is for the foreground and it was taken 2 hours later at f/16, iso100 for about 10 secs.

The two exposures were blended in post and here it is and hope you have a great weekend ahead.