Golden Gate Bridge at Noon

The golden hour which produces that magic light after sunrise and before sunset is great for making photographs out in the landscape. Sometimes the light is so good, you almost can’t go wrong with a shot. In contrast, high noon is a hard time to make good landscape photographs. It’s really easy to just look at a scene in the clear noon-time sun and then just punt and either wait it out till late afternoon or skip the opportunity altogether.

Lately, I’ve found myself trying to push back against the demons of mid-day photography. For example, I was up in the Marin Headlands last week just before noon looking south onto the Golden Gate Bridge. The orientation of subject to light meant that the rich red of the bridge and blue of the water were blasted into pale oblivion. My first instinct was to leave the camera in the car and just enjoy the view.

For some reason, this time I resisted the urge to do nothing. Instead, I mentally shifted gears and instead of despairing for what wasn’t there—color, saturation, and the like—I focused on what I might be able to do with what was there. The highlights on the water. The form of the bridge. The shadow on the water. The atmospheric effects on the hills in the background. Using those components, I set out to make the black and white image you see here.

I’m still pondering how much I like the result. I’m so used to seeing the Golden Gate Bridge in color and in the evening light and the fog. Working the scene in full noon light is a bit like being in a foreign land. I alternate between liking my result and wishing I had tried any of a dozen different compositions. I am, however, very glad that I resisted the urge to just punt this time and instead decided to experiment and learn something from the process. The next step, I think, will be to print the image and live with it for a bit and see what happens.