Beach Atmosphere

The photographs that make up this image were taken about a week after Spring Break, a popular holiday among students in the US.

I drove from Corpus Christi on Highway 358, also known as South Padre Island Drive, SPID for short, over the John F. Kennedy (JFK) Causeway onto Padre Island, turned left onto Highway 361, over the Packery Channel and onto Mustang Island, hoping to photograph the beach atmosphere because the clouds were low and thick.

I was surprised, the atmosphere on this beach on Mustang Island was festive, even though the waters of the Gulf of Mexico were cold, in the high sixties, and the air was foggy and cool, in the mid seventies.

The image is interactive, click and drag around with your mouse. Don't forget to look up and down too.

Notice that vehicles are allowed on the beaches here in Texas.

See the lady huddled in a towel next to her truck? Look in the water for the kite boarder kite boarding and the surfer surfing. There aren't many swimmers at this time of day, mainly due to the cool water and weather.

The beach today is full of sea weed and sadly, even litter. Look down, do you see the Blue Bottle (Portuguese Man-of-War)?

USA-Canada / USA-Texas

Lat: 27° 37' 2.44" N
Long: 98° 13' 5.23" W

Elevation: 1

→ maps.google.com [EXT]

Precision is: High. Pinpoints the exact spot.

Equipment: For this immersive image, I used:

• Nikon D70 DSLR

• Nikkor 10.5mm f/2.8 lens @ f/8 and 1/750 sec exposure

• Gitzo G2220 tripod

• Manfrotto 303 SPH panorama head

• Photoshop CS2

• PTGui

• Peter Nyfeler's Photoshop Nadir Action

• Pano2QTVR