Hedgie Photography

Following the Crowd

I went for a hike/ski/photography trip out past Coleman Pinnacle yesterday. On the way back, I saw a large group of people crowded around a popular picture-taking spot on Picture Lake. While I normally abhore a crowd, I decided to go over to see what the fuss was about. There were about a dozen folks with camera mounted on tripods, all facing Mount Shuksan. Being in a follower mind, I set my tripod up and took a few shots of the mountain. Nothing spectacular, nothing I hadn’t seen before. After about a half dozen shots, I realized nobody else was taking photographs. Satisfied that everything was set up, I waited with them, wordlessly.

After about ten minutes, I hear someone shout “It’s starting!” and everybody jumps up and starts clicking away with their cameras. Dutifully, I start taking photographs as well. I got about five shots off before I realized what we were photographing — the moonrise over the mountain. Sometimes it pays to follow the crowd.

Sometimes, however, it pays to leave the crowds behind. Artist Point is, on a weekend, one of the most crowded vistas in Washington State. Arriving around 11AM on a Saturday, I couldn’t park anywhere near the vista, and had to pull off the road onto gravel several hundred yards from the trailhead. A short five mile hike later, however, I found my only company were a few hardcore skiers spending the weekend camped in the wilderness, and a few goats:

When you see a large group of people taking pictures, it’s just stupid to not stop and take a picture of whatever interests them. But if you stick to the large groups, you’ll never get any unique shots. While I don’t believe the below shot is unique, at least there weren’t a dozen people taking the same shot at the same time. The full version is 31.8 megapixels, a monster image that will look great printed.