I've written about this before but it needs to be talked about a lot. There are too many people in these venues and they are causing lots of problems. This is pertinent to my image today because this particular falls, in the Colombia River Gorge, is literally overrun with people. They come by car and by bus and it's getting more and more difficult to take pictures with them all over the place. The bridge in this picture was constantly filled with people and their presence spoils the mood I'm trying to create. I'll talk more about this later but I do want to make some points now. First, there is a striking lack of reverence toward the venues being visited. This is particularly a problem with foreign visitors, many who show absolutely no respect for either the venue or the other people who are there to see it. They swarm the place like ants, talking loudly, standing in front of the other photographers and just making asses of themselves. Some just can't resist vamping for pictures which is disrespectful in the extreme. I remember last year when I was in Arches NP, at Delicate Arch, and there was this woman who insisted on dancing in the middle of the arch with a huge purple scarf while her husband/boyfriend took pictures. Delicate Arch is a very special place and this stupid behavior was not right. Certain nationalities seem to have this idea that the venue is nothing more than a backdrop for their selfies. They are in every picture, hogging the spaces where serious photographers need to set up and take their images. I've had confrontations with these people on several occasions and it's really irritating. This leads to the second point which is just about volume. My generation, unfortunately, has this idea that the ideal retirement involves a huge RV and driving all over the country. These monstrosities take up lots of space and are very noisy. I use generators for my computers but I always respect the hours posted as I know how irritating it is to listen to a noisy generator when you are trying to sleep. But I've had that happen all too often when people park next to my truck in the middle of the night and fire up their generators. They literally don't care if it bothers you. This last trip was especially bad for some reason. I've almost always been able to find a campsite in the national parks but this last trip I had major problems finding places. When you look at the campgrounds all you see is these big RVs and camp trailers. They have satellite dishes and ATVs ... hell, one guy even projected movies on a screen and invited everyone to come watch. All the comforts of home. But the bedlam they create is hard on everyone around them including the animals. I don't have an answer unfortunately. They have the right to do whatever they want but the impact on these places in major.
Multnomah Falls
I'm sure most of you have seen a picture of this waterfall. It's part of the Colombia River Gorge NP. What an amazing place. Because it's so popular there is a major issue with crowds. I talked about this above so I'll keep it short. Too many people spoils the mood of a place like this. You really want to just stand quietly and drink in the beauty and serenity of this location. Almost impossible because too many loud, obnoxious people are swirling around. The parking lot was almost full. And because this is a popular spot there are signs everywhere about taking your valuables with you so no one can steal them. I always laugh at that because my truck is filled to overflowing with valuables and there's no way I can take even 10% with me. I have a suggestion for the local authorities ... if this is such a big problem, why not station law enforcement around the lots to keep people from breaking in. You make a lot of money off this traffic and maybe you should spend some of that on keeping people's valuables safe. Maybe?
Anyway, there's always a problem with photographing such a venue. It's been shot millions of times, often by professional photographers and the basic image is well known. How do you shoot a place like this in such a way as to be different? No photographer wants to take a "me too" shot. Well, in my case I wanted to really capture the serenity of this place. That's best done without people. People spoil the shot. I also wanted to take a very long exposure so the water took on a soft, almost dreamy quality. That required me to use a 10 stop neutral density filter and that lead to exposures of 3 minutes or more. Keeping the bridge empty for 3 minutes was almost impossible so I had to take many shots of the same scene, hoping at least one would be sans people. I got lucky with this one shot.
This is a single exposure of almost 3 minutes. I ran it through Lightroom to bring out the colors and that's about it. There's very little done to "fix" this image. I really like how it came out. I understand why this place is so special. It just grabs you and won't let go. It's on my bucket list for another visit, early in the morning before the crowds arrive. I just want to shoot this place over and over. It's that special.
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| Multnomah Falls - 35mm,f/18,151 seconds,ISO 100, license CC BY-NC 4.0 |
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