Goose Creek Grass Hey Everyone! Hope you had a great week. This week I want to talk about a trip I took last weekend. It was a spontaneous trip for me. Which is unusual. I woke up Saturday morning and wanted to shoot some new to me lenses I had just got and was thinking where to go. I decided that I wanted to shoot a sunrise and the best way to do it where I wanted to go was to camp out and wake up early and head to the site. I got on the inner web and made a reservation at Goose Creek State Park. The reservation was for a more primitive campsite but you could still drive there. Me and Forrest the Wonder dog were going to go camping.  About 10 min. after I made the reservation my Photography Goose Creek Driftwood Wingman Robert sent me a message and was wondering what to do. So I asked him to join me. He said yes. This is a big yes for him he doesn't go camping much or at all. Camping to him is staying at a Motel 6. LOL He even went out and got a tent. I met him at his house and we headed out to the State Park. He was excited and geared up for the trip. He only brought a GoPro with him and he was planning all kinds of stuff. Like a astro shoot which I didn't even think about. But I was game.   We made it to our campsite and set up camp.  He was putting this tent up for the first time and struggled a little but managed to get it set up .  We went for a little walk to a dock that was near by and decided that's where we were going to do the night shooting. He had the Photo Pills app out and knew where the Milky way was going to be and what time.  We made our way back to the camp and cooked or heated up some Chili that he brought and had a good meal. We cleaned up and waited for the sun to go down.  After it got good and dark we headed to the dock with Forrest leading the way.  We got there and he set up and started with the shoot.  I struggled a little trying to get good focus.  I had forgot all about astro photography I haven't done it in a while and I was doing everything wrong and struggling .  I should have had my camera all set up and ready to go before we went to the dock. But I got some shots but no winners with tac sharp stars. They were a little blurry.  But I couldn't tell until I got home and put them on the big screen.  We sat around waiting for his GoPro do do its thing and we saw all of the stars the Milky way and airplanes flying across the sky. Even saw some shooting stars.  It was very cool.

We made it back to camp and hit the hay we had to get up early in the morning and then go to the place that we were going to shoot the sunrise.  I woke up early as usual and went outside and made some coffee and then. Drip, Drip, Drip and more drops and the sound got louder and it was raining! It Rained for about an hour or so I got in my truck and just looked at my phone until it stopped. Robert got up and before too much longer it stopped raining. We headed to the spot that I had picked out. The first photo of this blog was taken there a few years ago. When we got there the sun had not crested the horizon yet but it was hidden by clouds and you could see the lights of a town across the sound where we were at. It was very pretty with Spanish moss hanging from the Live Oak trees were silhouetted with the water sparkling with the lights of the town.  I got my camera out and started shooting. I had Forrest attached by a leash to my belt loop and he was tugging me quite a bit. I tried to put that out of my mind and kept shooting.  I make lots of shots and had fun shooting.  Robert filmed us with his go pro and made a time lapse of the sun rising but you couldn't see the sun much.  After the shoot we went back to the campsite and packed up and drove home. Fun was had by all.

When I got home I downloaded my photo's and looked at them closely. My astro shots were not quite sharp enough I tried running them through a sharpening program but they were too far gone .  My sunrise shots were sharp and well exposed but the compositions just didn't work. I really didn't get any keepers from the shoot. So was it a failure? Maybe in some people's eyes.  But I got to go camping, See the milky way, and witness another sunrise with Forrest. The photo's didn't turn out the way I wanted but you can't be successful all of the time. Failing is part of learning, so what did I learn. Photographically I didn't prepare as much as I did for the camping part of the trip. Being Spontaneous  doesn't always work for me. I sometimes need a little of time to think and prepare. But I did have fun with a Friend and Forrest the Wonder Dog.  So over all a win! Just remember your not always going to have winners and that's Okay.  If you get out and experience life that's the most important thing. So until Next week Get out and Shoot!