Shooting The Wave With The Sony A7r & Zeiss 35mm

I finally had a chance to go to The Wave this month. We actually did the lottery and won on our second try. Lucky us, I guess. Some people have tried 9 times with no luck. 

I never really thought The Wave was all that cool from pictures I’ve seen, but really, once I was there, it was a lot cooler than I was expecting. It is also a lot smaller than I was expecting. 

But ultimately, hands down, the best part about going to the wave is the amazing three-mile hike you have to take to get there. Shooting this raw wilderness along the way is an experience I’ll never forget.

I’m not a huge fan of shooting the photo tourism spots and getting the same shot as three million other photographers, so the wave was less interesting to shoot than everything else we found along the way.

For the hike, I mostly stuck with my prime Sony Zeiss 35mm Sonnar lens, which was awesome to shoot. It’s very light on the Sony A7r and the perfect focal length for this type of hiking/shooting landscape work.

I’ve recently updated my review of the Zeiss 35mm Sonnar, which you can find here.

Untouched wilderness. It could be a really cool place to shoot sunset photography if you don’t mind hiking back three miles in the pitch black.

The hike is about three miles in each direction through untouched wilderness. Twenty people are allowed to enter a day, which I feel is too many as the wave is small—about an acre. When you fill one acre with twenty people, it feels busy.

The lines and colors of The Wave are amazing. From what I understand, the colors come from iron in the ground.

Here is the terrain. The ground below you is about 200 million years old, and you can even find tracks of dinosaurs and ancient lizards.

This is one of those locations I have to come to again. But next time I’ll be more prepared. I’ve been working on a bad knee, so these types of hikes are still tough for me. I wish I had a lighter backpack, this Lowpro was a bit too heavy and I didn’t need the weather sealing it comes with.

I didn’t even bring a tripod because of weight reasons. I only brought three lenses: my Canon 24-70mm f2.8, 16-35mm f2.8 II, and my Sony Zeiss 35mm, which I kept in my pocket when not used.

I shot this particular shot of the girls with my trusty Canon 24-70mm f2.8L. You can see my wife helping me with the load. 🙂

Some small sand dunes form. They can be fun to explore.

If you ever consider exploring the wave, I recommend trying to get on the hike before sunrise. There is so much untouched wilderness that you could get some amazing photos with the sunrise. If you want to shoot sunset, you’re putting yourself at risk. Hiking back in the pitch-black might be a challenge. It’s also very windy and sanding, so having weather- and dust-sealed gear is a must. Three days later, I’m still picking sand out of my hair and ears.