Lighthouse, New Brighton

Lighthouse, New Brighton was taken in - well, I'll let you hazard a wild guess where it was taken - during the "blue hour" on an October evening.  The tide was coming in rather rapidly, so each exposure was a race between composing the shot and seeing the tripod sink slowly into the sand!  As with Wharfedale Hillside I knew that I'd want to lighten the image and print it on a soft, textured art paper.  In fact, the processing of this image is pretty well identical to the other one, with the obvious exception that there weren't any trees growing in the the River Mersey...

This is the original image straight out of the camera.  Photoshop was used to level the horizon and clone out the lights from shipping and the Liverpool side of the river.  The image was then blended with a lightened, softened copy of itself before adding grain and fixing the tonal balance in Nik Colour Efex Pro.  A small amount of dodging and burning was used to emphasise the texture in the sky and the water, and to bring out details in the lighthouse itself.  Canon 5DmkII, EF 24-105/4L, 37s @ f/22, ISO 100.

#NikSoftware #ColorEfexPro

What a Difference a Day Makes

Returning to our trip up to New Brighton in October, the Sunday morning dawned sunny and bright.  For those who were up early enough (not me) there was a beautiful sunrise - apparently - but the light was still pretty special by the time I managed to haul my bones out of bed and into gear.

Even the Travelodge looked attractive...

A bit of Natural History (and other wildlife) for those who are fed up of lighthouses and Victorian shelters.

Liverpool looked very impressive with the sun behind it, although it was incredibly windy with a gale whistling up the Mersey.

Follow the next exciting instalment as our intrepid band heads through the Mersey tunnel to the Big Smoke.

It's that Lighthouse again...

After a day stuck inside a converted indoor running track at the PAGB Print Championships, knowing that the weather outside was rather pleasant, it was frustrating to be turfed out at 5pm when the rain was just starting.  After returning to New Brighton from Connah's Quay, the rain had virtually stopped so we ventured out onto the beach to photograph the lighthouse.  By this time it was almost dark, and - to be fair - we must have had almost half an hour without any water falling from the sky.  In that time I managed to take about half a dozen pictures of the lighthouse, only two of which were sharp.

There's less than 15 minutes between the two pictures, but the difference in colour balance is quite astonishing.

Oh - and thank you for asking - Cambridge Camera Club managed to reach the Championship final, and ended up 8th out of 38.  Not bad for a "normal" club...

New Brighton Rocks?

I am currently staying in New Brighton (The Wirral) as tomorrow sees the PAGB Print Championships at Connah's Quay where Cambridge Camera Club are competing.  Being on a photographic outing, we decided to brave the weather and do some night shots along the promenade.  All I can say is that my new super-duper Storm Jacket "professional" camera cover - a recent birthday present - was well and truly inaugurated, as the rain decided to dampen our endeavours.  In fact, the camera stayed significantly drier than I did!  Anyhow, here are a few of the pictures I managed to take before we all decided that enough was enough and headed for a bite to eat.

The rather shady looking characters in the shot below were fellow members of CCC who were not in possession of the aforementioned "Storm Jacket pro..." (or simply had more sense).

New Brighton

After the PAGB Championships, we headed to New Brighton to photograph the lighthouse as the sun went down.  I've tried processing the pictures in various ways, but I'm not sure which I prefer yet.

It isn't often I get the opportunity to take pictures as the sun goes down, so I'd forgotten how magical it was photographing in twilight.  The following pictures range from 30 seconds to 5 minute exposures.

 

The only downside of our trip to New Brighton was that the Fish & Chip shop was closed by the time we got there.  Tedious people...