We explore a reflection of Portland Head Light in Cape Elizabeth, Maine, captured in 2009.
This week we’re definitely going a bit less traditional in the interpretation of ‘Window’ in the strictest sense. In this image from 2009 we get to see what happens when we walk around and notice things.
Here’s the take…
Window into the Light
This reflection is of the top (window) part of Portland Head light on Cape Elizabeth in Maine. As I had just taken some beauty shots of the lighthouse with lovely blooming bushes in the foreground, I was sauntering. When I’m in that mode, I always look in multiple directions to see what’s there.
For me, it’s also interesting to think that nowadays I would take this shot very differently. I know that I took this handheld with a shutter speed of 1/50s and a focal length of 105mm. These days I would slow down a bit and set up a tripod for this shot.
This is my mid-week contribution to the Monday Window thread, a creation of Ludwig Keck. To read more about Ludwig, check this page.
Come join us on Cape Neddick to admire Nubble Light in the snow. A beautiful, albeit chilly day along the Maine coast.
A rather fresh image for today! Yesterday, my wife and I took a drive up to Maine to do some shopping for our upcoming trip. We both had the day off, so it was nice to get away and not have either weekend or summer crowds. On the way back, I suggested we stop by York Beach, as I wanted to see how the snow looked.
As it was a gorgeous day, I found this…
Nubble Light in Snow
With this beautiful, although chilly day, the blues looked stunning with the relatively calm sea surrounding the lighthouse.
And yes, my wife was much more successful in her shopping than I was!
A photo from 2009, featuring Nobska Lighthouse in Cape Cod.
This week, I’m going back even further than last week with an image from 2009. In December I took a drive out to Cape Cod for a bit of photo exploration. As I started working my way back, I went by a rather charming lighthouse.
Here’s one of the images of this lighthouse…
Nobska Light
On this trip I simply took a couple of quick shots from the road, and looking back it reminds me to go back there. There are a number of lovely angles that I didn’t explore that day and I can give the light a better treatment.
Consider this one added to my list of places, and I will share updated images when I catch them!
Nubble Lighthouse in Maine is a highly photographed landmark. During the holidays it is illuminated beautifully.
Nubble Lighthouse on Cape Neddick in Maine is one of the most photographed lighthouse in the area. I have seen so many great photos of this gorgeous location that I felt not qualified to photograph it for years; the reason was simply that I didn’t see anything in the location and structure that I hadn’t see before and I felt that I couldn’t add anything to its portfolio of images that exists everywhere.
This all changed on a June day in 2013, when something clicked in my head and I came up with a vision that I hadn’t seen before (see my post on Editing Mood to see what was different). Since then I have photographed it a number of times, but still only when I see something that is not just another pretty image, such as this…
Nubble Light at Night
The keeper and crew do a wonderful job each holiday season to light up the entire complex on the island upon which Nubble Light sits; it is gorgeous and a sight to behold.
I set up well before sunset for this shoot to find a location that was closer to the water level and framed some of the foreground rocks and water to capture enough of the reflection. Using a longer exposure of 45 seconds smoothed the water and allowed enough of the buildings to show up in the image while keeping the sky just dark enough. It’s not fully dark yet, which makes for a bit of magic in the juxtaposition between sea, rocks and sky vs the lighthouse complex.
New England’s winter approaches with the photographic opportunities that it provides. An example is this March 2019 shot of Portland Head at sunrise.
Here in New England it is beginning to feel more like winter, as temperatures have dropped by a good margin over the past week and the forecast looks chilly! There won’t be any complaint about it from me, as it is a season that I enjoy with the photographic opportunities that it provides.
You’ve seen some of those captures (Wednesday’s Wintry Wonder) and I think that part of what attracts me to photographing during winter is the sense of solitude that a cold frozen landscape provides. The landscape almost becomes otherworldly in its expression of the environment around us.
Portland Head Sunrise
This image was a late winter shot, as it is from March 7, 2019, but there is not a single hint of springtime weather yet; I still remember the bitter cold of this morning as there was a good breeze and temperatures were well below freezing. This shot was taken at 6 am as part of a series of exposures to try and capture the ever-changing light around dawn.
With the light still in the blue hour period, the snow and lighthouse show the cold while a bit of hope is on the horizon as the sun’s light is beginning to warm up the day.
This post is the first in a series of window images, emphasizing their unique role as an interface between a building’s interior and exterior. Today we highlight the Svörtuloft Lighthouse on Snaefellsnes, known for its striking orange color and square shape, situated on a hazardous promontory.
This will be the first in a series of window images that I have captured over the years. Windows are always an interesting subject, as they provide the interface for any building between the interior and exterior. They provide a function of at the same time keeping the elements out and letting part of the elements in, a juxtaposition of functionality.
Let’s kick things off with something rather colorful…
Svörtuloft
The Svörtuloft Lighthouse stands out in the landscape on the Snaefellsnes Peninsula’s landscape, where it sits on a westernmost promontory. Its square shape and orange color contrasts with the black rock upon which it is situated. Built around 1913 its name translates loosely to Black Sky (literal: black air), and it sits in an area that was known for its many shipwrecks, as both the sea and cliffs are treacherous and difficult to navigate.
This spectacular building is well worth a visit on a nice day; during winter months it might be very difficult to get to (I tried and failed in my attempt).
Sometimes on a nice sunny day with an interesting cloud cover, you see a scene in front of you and photograph it. However, in your mind’s eye, you know there’s more to this landscape that you just captured than what you saw on that day.
If this ever happened to you, we have that in common, as it’s occurred numerous times to me. An example is this shot of Nubble Light on Cape Neddick, Maine, back in June of 2013.
Nubble Light
This lighthouse has been photographed by many, which had caused me to not ever shoot it until this day; the simple reason was that I hadn’t seen anything different from what I’d seen in all the wonderful photograph created by others of this lighthouse. That day, I felt that there was something a little different, so I got clambered down the rocks to get a lower vantage point and shot several exposure bracketed sequences. Overall, not a bad shot, but nothing especially outstanding.
It really was a nice day, as my mother and sister were visiting us from the Netherlands and we were showing them some of the sights in the area. When we got home that evening, I offloaded the images and took a quick look at them.
Over the next couple of weeks, there were a couple of times that I thought about editing the shots, but every time I started I got stuck, as I didn’t quite ‘feel’ it. Approximately 6 weeks after I took the shot, I finally sat down to create the following end result…
Nubble Brooding
What was different about this editing session? For one, I was in a somewhat darker mood, which allowed me to connect to a heavier cloud cover and the idea of a roiling sea; also, at that point my mind’s view of what the image could hold, had time to articulate itself. The resultant image is one that after almost 10 years, I still enjoy seeing, and I have resisted the temptation to re-edit it to make it ‘better’ (as our skills improve and we learn new software, this temptation is real).
The lesson I learned at that time was to allow myself to recognize when it’s not the right moment and/or mood to edit a certain image, as our creative selves may need some hidden inspiration.
The images were captured using a Canon EOS 5D Mk III and a Canon EF 24-105mm f/4L IS USM lens. Back in 2013 I used Photomatix Pro for my HDR processing.
Yes, kids of all ages, it is that time of year!! Everyone will be watching the flightpath of a certain jolly old elf, as he departs from his workshop on the North Pole to make a trip around this globe of ours…
He’s on the way!
A little bit of fun with editing to create this image. The base image is a 131 second exposure at 100 ISO that I took back in 2014 with a Canon EOS 5D Mk III and a Canon EF 24-105mm L IS USM lens. The flying Santa background is thanks to Skylum, who provided this for their Luminar customers.
Have a wonderful weekend, and I hope that you’re enjoying the holiday season!
In this second post in the Thursday sunrise/sunset series, we experience quite the contrast over last week’s post. Whereas the weather in Bar Harbor in June was rather pleasant, this morning in March of 2019 was a little colder…
A Cold Sunrise at the Lighthouse
For this photoshoot, a number of us hardy souls met at Portland Head lighthouse in Cape Elizabeth, Maine. On this early March morning the temperature was about 4F at the time of this capture (6:00 am).
I vividly remember wearing several bulky layers to stay warm and wearing my woolen flip-top mittens, so that I could expose my fingers for the shortest possible amount of time. I was happy that there was barely the lightest breeze, as any significant wind would have been brutal.
At this location, I took my first pre-dawn shots at 5:32 am and the last ones at 6:44 am; for each I took a series of 3 exposure-bracketed shots, so that I could process them for HDR. This series centered at ISO 320 F/10 and 1/60s using a Canon EOS 5D Mark III with a Canon EF 17-40mm F/4L USM lens.
Processing for HDR was done using Skylum’s Luminar Neo; I then made use of a template that I have created for Skylum’s Luminar AI software for color adjustments and structure; after that I used Adobe Photoshop to add a bit of soft light, contrast, final crop and text.
As we follow the coastline of Snæfellsnes peninsula toward its westernmost point, we reach Svörtuloft (Black Sky) where we find a 4-kilometer long cliff and a wonderful lighthouse. It’s a slow, bumpy ride over the gravel road to get to this spot, but it’s worth the ride!
Svörtuloftaviti Lighthouse
The lighthouse at Svörtuloft strikes a strong figure as its 12.8m height towers over the cliffs and its yellow-orange hue stands against the blue of the sky. The lighthouse was brought into use in 1931, as sailing by this western tip of Iceland has always been rather daunting. Over the centuries many ships have stranded here, which usually resulted in the ship’s hull being broken into piece on the sharp, black lava cliffs.
Lava cliffs at Svörtuloft
The cliffs upon which the lighthouse is built present their origin in the black foundation: lava. Grasses and mosses find fertile ground here and are not easily discouraged by the stormy weather and fearsome seasons, which gives a much softer feeling to the landscape. Do not be fooled, as the edges of the lava are sharp and hard, which also makes for rather uneven footing.
Easy walks and a picnic area.
Luckily, Iceland provides a welcoming feeling to all tourists and easy trails and even a picnic area are available to get around the lighthouse here at Svörtuloft. Thanks to this German traveler for posing in this image.
Sturdy windows are important!
Construction of any lighthouse puts a premium on sturdiness, as the elements will wreak havoc with any point of weakness. For this reason, the windows in Svörtuloftaviti lighthouse are small and set strong in their concrete surroundings.
Svörtuloft Halo
In all, it was wonderful to visit this location, and it definitely made me look back as we were getting ready to leave. That allowed me to capture the Sun at just the appropriate location to light up this tower of strength, which, in turn, lights up to warn travelers of the dangers that are on its shores.
After this, our fourth stop of this day of arriving on the Snæfellsnes peninsula from Reykjavik, it was time to go in the direction of Hellissandur to find our lodging and a chance of dinner. Not a bad way to start our tour!
The images in this post are taken with my iPhone 13 Pro Max and Canon EOS EOS R5 using a Canon RF24-105mm F4 L IS USM lens. First level processing of the images was done using Skylum’s Luminar AI software; for these images, I created a template based on the Backlit Clouds template that is part of the Overcast collection of templates. Touch up processing was done in Photoshop.
