Manchester state park is located maybe 10 minutes away from my house. It’s one of those places that’s so close it’s not somewhere I ever bother with. It has a few old bunkers and abandoned buildings, but not as good as Port Townsend. It has a view of Rainier, but not as good at Gig Harbor. It has beach access and nice hiking trails, but so do a lot of other places. So why would I go here when I have an entire day off of work? Honestly, I just wanted to kill and hour and go play with my camera for some actual practice. So what the hell, right? I suppose trying to take interesting photos of a fairly uninteresting place counts as much as anything.
I grabbed my 90mm macro lens for this photo walk because I figured it would be a fairly uninspiring location. I was mostly correct and the macro lens let me focus on the small details that make it interesting. An ultra wide lens would have included way too much distracting “extra” that added no value. This was also an exercise in post processing due to the harsh, dappled lighting coming through the trees. I suppose that’s the lesson for the day: there are good photos to be had in any location, even if you have to dig to get them. Ironically I just finished reading an article about portrait photography in shitty locations on diyphotography. Check it out.