Cape Zanpa has got to be one of Okinawa’s most visited locations. The lighthouse sits atop an incredible field of hard rock and what I think is Volcanic deposits. I know one thing, to get to many of the locations I have found for new compositions in that area my best investment has been a pair of felt bottomed dive boots. After just six months of use they are looking tattered and torn, bearing testament to just how perilous this area is to navigate on foot. Now whilst it seems there are just a few standard shots of the region I’ve made it my quest of late to find new and exciting compositions of the region.
Most of this is journey is down to my sponsorship from the Kani Optics distributors here in Japan. In my drive to generate marketing and promotional imagery using the photography filters that they supply me with mixed with the fact that Okinawa is actually quite a small island in the gist of things means I’ve taken to delving deeper into each location I visit to find more potential compositions. For the Cape Zanpa region I now have no fewer than nine locations around the Lighthouse, and a few more yet to be discovered for sure. The Cape Zanpa region is exposed to the true ferocity of Mother nature especially when Summer storms and Typhoons roll through Okinawa between April through November. That said, the Ocean around the region tends to be ‘agitated’ at the best of times.
With large swells and waves constantly interacting with the surrounding cliffs and rocks of the coastline the Cape Zanpa region lends itself perfectly to shooting long exposure photography. Given then the support from Kani it allows me to experiment until my heart is content with any number of combinations of filters.
The featured image of this post for example was shot at low tide with a slight swell interacting with the rocky plateau from which I was shooting from. At middle to high tide this area can be treacherous so good planning and spatial awareness are key to shoot from here. To accomplish this shot I opted to shoot on a slightly cloudy day with intermittent sunshine at midday for the maximum contrast. I was able to shoot on my Canon EOS5DSr using a LAOWA 12mm f2.8 using the Kani adapter ring for that lens and their proprietary 100mm filter holder. As I had elected to use three filters I needed to plan my composition for the potential of vignetting, dark corners and potentially sides to my image, given the extreme field of view afforded by the lens. With this done I then shot using a Premium Soft Grad0.9 mixed with an 8.5 stop ND400 stacked with a 7 stop ND128 for a whopping ND51,200 or 59.5 stops of light.
Camera settings: f16 at ISO100 for 300sec (5min).
If you want a closer view of this image simply click that opposing arrows icon you see in the top right hand corner of this page. Along with other images this can also now be purchased directly from this website at the Ocean Prints page where I have recently installed the fotomoto shopping engine. Failing a purchase you can also send it as a free eCard to friends and family! Check it out. All sales and revenue from these galleries goes towards my filming adventure planned for the island of Iriomote. Crazy beans.
The hunt for compositions continues…
