Here's another photo from my trip to San Francisco earlier this year. I had high hopes for this location in Oakland, known as Grizzly Peak, as it commands an uninterrupted view over the bay to San Francisco and beyond.
Unfortunately, the haze during my trip in June was extremely heavy for most of the time I was there. This made a lot of the photos I hoped to take rather tricky, but is especially problematic for long distance views, as the distortion caused by the movement of the air robs all sharpness from the image. As I drove up to the viewpoint I could already tell that I wasn't going to get the photo I hoped for, as the city lights, almost 18 kilometres away, were shimmering and twinkling as if viewed through a fishbowl!
The resulting shot is (just about!) sharp enough for viewing on the web, but unfortunately would not stand up to a large print or even use in my calendar this year -- the lights turn into bigger and bigger splodges the further away they are, creating what looks almost like a mild tilt-shift effect, and only the foreground buildings are tolerably sharp. This is definitely a location I need to visit again in more photographically favourable conditions!
In the foreground are some of the buildings on the Berkeley shoreline, with the Berkeley Marina on the peninsula at the bottom of the photo. The bright white tower in the middle of the photo is the new tower of the eastern span of the Bay Bridge, which I posted a close-up shot of last month. The more traditionally-designed western span of the Bay Bridge can be seen on the other side of Yerba Buena Island, leading into downtown San Francisco. The Transamerica Pyramid can be seen about a third of the way in from the right of the shot. The structure with the red lights in the distance is the Sutro Tower.
I'm a British software developer and photographer living in Vancouver, BC. I mainly photograph landscapes, cityscapes, night scenes, and water.
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Well it definitely looks sharp enough here, it's stunning Alexis. Will have to check this out when I visit SF next month so thanks for the detailed write up.
