Plate No. 03. Marine layer inversion sunset, Cape Foulweather, Oregon — panoramic view above the cloud line.
Vol 04 · Plate 03
INVERSION SUNSET
Driving over Cape Foulweather, I came across this scene.
Inversion layer sunsets are some of my favorites and they're hard to make on the Oregon Coast because most of the time you aren't high enough. Cape Foulweather is one of the few places that puts you above the right altitude when the conditions land.
I was driving north over the cape, not particularly looking to make a photograph. The sun was setting. I came around a curve and the entire ocean was gone. Below me was a smooth white sea of cloud, level as a calm bay, stretching west to the horizon. The actual Pacific was somewhere under it. The sun was setting into the cloud layer rather than into the water, which gave the light a different quality — softer, more diffused, with the horizon line being the top of the marine layer rather than the actual horizon.
I pulled over. The composition was already there — the spruce branch on the left edge framing the scene, the inversion layer running flat across the lower frame, the warm gradient of the sky above it, the sun just kissing the top of the cloud as it dropped.
This is a panoramic format because the geometry of an inversion layer is inherently horizontal. You can't crop it tight without losing what makes it remarkable — the sense of an entire ocean replaced by a flat field of cloud, stretching as far as you can see. The photograph wants to be wide.
Inversion sunsets are among my favorites. They happen rarely enough on this coast that each one feels like a gift. You don't plan to be on top of one. You drive over a cape at the right time of evening and find yourself above the weather.
"You don't plan to be on top of one."
An entire ocean replaced by a flat field of cloud.
