It’s almost more than your senses can accept – visions of redwood forests and their towering, living giants that assail your imagination; the quiet woodlands made mute by morning mist and fog and the dense growth and soft mulched floor underfoot; and the perfumed ocean breeze that fills you’re your nose and saturates your tongue. This is Northern California’s Redwood Coast – glorious, fabled and welcoming for the photographer who is ready to meet the challenge.
(Motivation: Learn more about photographing Redwoods here)
Many trails wind through Del Norte Coast Redwoods State Park located just south of Crescent City off Route 101. Take the Hobbs-Wall Trail to where the ancient coastal redwood giants are waiting, as they have for centuries. Your photographic challenge is more than composition; you must concentrate and calculate carefully to determine the precise exposures to render balanced tonal qualities in the low light under dense canopies.
Walk the Saddler Skyline Trail and discover the California woodlands of thimbleberry, huckleberry, redwood sorrel, wild ginger, false Solomon’s seal and California blackberry. Not only do they provide you with an opportunity for an interesting photographic plant study, but also attract many birds and smaller wildlife, so you can add these images to your Northern California Redwood Coast portfolio.
(Image Credit: Justin Black)
Following the rugged Damnation Creek Trail with its 1,000-foot change in elevation, through the redwoods, down the bluff and to the edge of the Pacific. Images captured during early morning, midday and at sunset create unique contrasts of light, wave structure and the textural qualities of the sand, rock and driftwood. Each period of the day will present you with new compositional challenges, pushing the limits of your creativity beyond what you thought you could achieve.
To the east of Crescent City, the 2.6 miles of the Leiffer-Ellsworth Loop Trail in the Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park reveal the dynamic and harmonious nature of a climax forest. Late spring is the season to find and photograph rhododendrons, clintonia, western burning bush, red huckleberry and western trillium that carpet the forest floor in color. California bay and tanoak are their immediate companions while high above, old-growth redwoods stand vigil over this pristine environment.
The Simpson-Reed Trail provides a quite different presentation of the ancient forest. The grove you’ll find here of 1,000-year-old redwoods has a sparkling stream meandering among the tree roots. It is crisscrossed with fallen timbers that have created staircases and pools for aquatic creatures and all others nurtured by these clean waters. Even during the dry summer months, the redwoods help to sustain the moist environment beneath their canopy, so red-legged frogs, rough-skinned newts and other amphibians can thrive.
(Image Credit: Justin Black)
The Hiouchi Trail leads you along the Smith River, one of the few California rivers that are totally unbound. Known for its outstanding angling adventures, the Smith is also a riparian wonderland for the photographer. The views are spectacular, featuring old-growth redwoods as well as California bay, tanoak, Douglas fir and Pacific madrone.
Dawn and dusk in these forests is when a grand Roosevelt elk or a doe and her fawns may saunter into your viewfinder. With patience and perseverance, you’ll be able to combine all the elements of light, sky and forest to create a near-perfect image of these primary woodland mammals.
Traveling to the northwest corner of California and wandering its forests, woodlands and seashores with your camera are not particularly difficult, but you’ll learn so much more, photograph the best and rarest and translate your visions into pure creativity when you join Visionary Wild’s Redwood Coast Creative Core Workshop. From June 1–5, 2015, you’ll be 1 of just 12 photographers under the guidance and tutelage of photographers Jeff Foott and Jerry Dodrill.
(Image Credit: Justin Black)
From a lifetime of natural science studies and working at the forefront of species preservation, Jeff has created and produced 45 films for broadcast on National Geographic, PBS, BBC and many other TV channels, nature venues and educational programs throughout the world. Jerry’s landscape and adventure photography has not only been widely published in Vanity Fair, Men’s Journal, Outside and Climbing magazines, but also he shares his visions in fine gallery exhibitions. He is also an educator at Visionary Wild and other workshops, including Sierra Nevada College and Pacific Union College.
Together, Jeff and Jerry will provide hands-on instruction to help you find and reveal the essence of a natural scene; understand and correctly use the special light of the Redwood Coast; and lead you through the essentials of post-processing and digital workflow during midday classroom sessions.
You must act fast, however, as the Visionary Wild Redwood Coast Creative Core Workshop is almost sold out. Even if you miss this exciting Visionary Wild adventure, the 2015 and 2016 calendars are filled with other workshops throughout North America and the world.
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