I am fortunate enough to have traveled to many exotic locations. Still, the biggest thrill is when the plane slowly makes its way around the bay area and settles into a slow approach over the San Francisco Bay towards the San Francisco Airport. The bigger the bird, the slower it is in its approach.
As we float over the bay, approaching from the Southern end of the Bay Area, occasionally, I find myself sitting on the window seat on the plane’s right side. My vantage point gives me a view of the San Mateo bridge and the salt ponds that have been part of the bay since the California Gold Rush. The 16,500-acre ponds once were part of the wetlands.
Almost every single time, I marvel at these ponds’ colors and the minimal beauty of their geometric shapes. Recently, I snapped a few photos with the new iPhone 14 Pro Max, and the long reach of its telephoto lens allowed me to focus on a few elements in each photo. And since I was using Halide’s app, the RAW files gave me enough data to manipulate in Photoshop. I was quite amazed by the details captured by the new iPhone camera. The reflections of the clouds were very clear and added a nice texture to the photos. Using Topaz’s software, I was able to clean up the files. After that, it was just a matter of applying my custom presets and playing around with saturation and contrast.
As the holiday break approaches, I plan to find a way to fly over the bay and do a proper ariel photo session over these ponds. I want to see what my “pro” grade camera and lenses can help me achieve in this most fascinating of landscapes. That said, the iPhone 14’s camera rig is pretty darn good — as you can see in these three photos.
November 30, 2022. San Francisco
