Sol Duc Falls

dseidman

Ron and I took the six-mile loop trail hike to this location. The scenery along the way was beautiful and we hadn't seen another person since leaving the parking lot. We each thought it was great that we got such an early start and that we'd have the place all to ourselves. Upon our arrival we were relieved to see only two other hikers who had arrived before us. However, that changed almost instantly. Just as we were getting set up, a continuous stream of people poured into the area and it didn't let up for our entire stay at the falls. Fortunately, from this vantage point it would be impossible for someone to get in the frame (that is unless they decided to jump from the bridge that crosses the gorge just above the top of this frame). Since people couldn't get in the photo they looked for other ways to mess my shots up (as they always do), particularly by throwing huge rocks down from the aforementioned bridge.

Some would say this isn't optimal light for waterfall shots but they must know that the awesome rainbow would be impossible if it weren't for that sun shining through!

Canon 5D Mark II
Canon 17-40L

thapamd

Very nice, Danny! I have a shot from this perspective also, sans the rainbow. The light on the back part of the waterfall is a little strong on my monitor. Did you bracket this scene? It may be worth while to decrease the highlights a tad. Just my $0.02.

dseidman

Thanks for the input. I did bracket and I was careful with the blend. According to the histogram, the falls is not blown out. I had to mess with it a lot because it was looking really unnatural when I darkened it even slightly. Maybe I'll go in and give it another try.

Tharhawk

Cool shot! I love the rainbow.

dlplumer

Great shot Danny. Love the fg

coscorrosa

I think you did real well considering the difficult mid way exposure. I might bring up the exposure just a touch on the rocks in the right foreground, otherwise I think it's perfect. I like how you can see the sculpted rocks in the foreground, we obviously didn't see the river at peak volume, which must be impressive considering the size of the some of the fallen trees it moved downstream.