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I just got back from our vacation – we had a wonderful time. I’ve barely had time to get my photos off the camera, let alone edit them, so to the three photos you see in this entry are SOOC (Straight Out of Camera), with the exception of converting them from RAW.

On Thursday, I did something I’ve never done before – I woke up at 6:00 AM and I drove down to the beach to photograph the sunrise. And so I have some quick tips for you if you ever decide to do this yourself. Some of them might be obvious, but I’m sharing them anyway.

Visit your Site the Day Before

The day before, we had been driving around the park and I decided I either wanted to go down to the water near where the lodge was, or I wanted to go to the beach. Long story short, I decided on the beach – but I hadn’t been there yet. Let me tell you something. It is DARK before the sunrise. And in this case, it was also extremely foggy.

If I had been to the beach the day before, I would have known the parking lot was huge. I would have known that you could turn into the parking lot long before the end of the road. I would have known that if you wait until the end of the road, you’ll end up parking as far away from the beach as possible. I would have known that there were a lot of great photo ops on the beach – none of which I saw in the dark pre-morning fog.

Even if you’ve been there before, if it’s been awhile since you’ve been there, I’d still recommend a quick stop by – make sure it’s exactly what you’re picturing in your mind. Plus, there’s this park near my house that I’ve been to a billion times, but I tried going there recently for one of my weekly photowalks only to discover that the road there was under construction and I couldn’t find a detour that would take me to the park entrance. What a bummer that would have been if I had gotten up at 6AM and then couldn’t get to the park in time for the sunrise!

Bring Something to Put Stuff On

Stuff includes you, too. It’s wet in the morning. Fog and dew and sometimes rain from overnight. I didn’t think to bring anything to sit on (and was wearing the only pair of jeans I brought with me on the trip, so I wasn’t too keen on getting them all wet and dirty), so I had to stand the entire time I was out there. I also wished I had something relatively clean (other than, ya know, a wet sandy beach) to put my stuff on – lenses, etc.

Bring a Variety of Lenses

Speaking of changing lenses, I suggest bringing more than one. I almost brought only my wide angle lens, because I thought that was all I’d need, and I was thinking a light load would be nice. However, as I was taking my wide angle photos, I heard some birds to my left and turned around to see a few birds eating in the shallow water. I knew if I got closer, they would fly away, so I pulled out my 55-250mm lens (it’s a really cheap lens, and the quality reflects that, but I rarely need that focal length, so I don’t mind that I cheaped out on that lens) and zoomed in on the birds to get the photo you see above. I’m so glad I was able to capture that moment, and I wouldn’t have been able to if I had brought just the one lens.

Bring Something to Eat & Do

This might just be one for me to keep in mind, and not you, but when I wake up at 6 AM, my stomach isn’t quite ready yet for food. Of course, by the time I got to the site and set up my camera, my stomach started growling. Luckily, I thought ahead and had some granola bars in my bag.

After that, I realized that taking photos of the sunrise is rather slow-paced, and I get easily bored. Cell phone to the rescue, as I played games on it between shots.

Wear Layers

Yeah, so, apparently it’s cold before the sun comes up, and warm after. Who knew?

Don’t be Disappointed

The sunrise wasn’t what I expected. With all the fog, I couldn’t actually see the sun. All I saw was blue fog change into white fog. I had to mess with the white balance to make the white fog look warmer. At first, I was really bummed that I didn’t get what I wanted – The actual sun, perahps with some rays bursting through the clouds and reflecting off the water. But then I realized I still got some photos that I wouldn’t have gotten otherwise. And some of them weren’t half bad! Plus, even without any photos, it really was a great experience. It’s very rare that you really feel like you’re all alone surrounded by beautiful things, in complete silence with only some chirping birds in the distance. It really was amazing.

If you haven’t yet, you should try it sometime!

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