Digital Double Exposures

I don't shoot film very often, but I've always wanted to try double exposures. I just recently read about a photographer who used long exposures and photo slideshows to create digital double exposures. Phillip Maisel, who was inspired by the influx of photos on facebook, decided to shoot his computer screen while scrolling through different friends' photo albums. If you're curious, you can see the project titled "A More Open Place" here. I knew there were photoshop tricks like "layering" that can mimic a film double exposure, but I never thought to actually use a digital camera. Given how easy this sounded, I had to try it. Here are a few random photos I decided to turn into digital double exposures.

I loved the eerie vibe of one of the photos and had to use it more than once, but it was a little trickier than I expected. Maybe it's common sense, but I didn't think to use photos that had similar lighting until I did a few randomly paired pictures and found them severely overexposed. Either way, it was a fun exercise. I love websites like DPS and Photojojo that introduce me to these things.

An Oldie but Goodie

Lover's Point

On Thursday morning, my sisters and I drove out to Lover's Point in Pacific Grove. Our main goal was to get their before sunrise since it's one of the only spots on the west coast where you can see the sun rise over the ocean. I guess Lover's Point (formerly known as "Lover's of Jesus Point") has a unique east-facing location, and the rocks kind of cut out into the ocean, making the sun appear to rise over the water. Well, we made it on time, but unfortunately it was one of the foggiest mornings of the entire week and we weren't able to see anything. We still had some fun climbing the rocks and relaxing to the sound of the morning waves, and I had a chance to experiment with long exposures (something I've wanted to do for awhile). I love the motion and "airy-ness" (yes, I just made up a word) a long exposure can create in a photo. I was really hoping to catch the clouds moving and wonderfully blurred colors from the sun, but the fog made this impossible for an amateur like myself. Instead, I came up with these:

The mist in the photos is actually the waves crashing against the rocks. I almost lost my camera, tripod and self while hiking up and down these rocks but luckily, we all made it out safely. All of these photos, except the last, were 25-35 second exposures, so it was actually very dark while I was taking them. Ah, the magic of photography :)

*My sister was snapping iPhone pics of me with my gear as I tried my best not to plummet to my death

I definitely need to go back to Lover's Point when the weather is more permissible!