Mat & I got up rediculously early yesterday morning (5am) as Mat had to go on a two day job down south. I wasn’t particularly looking forward to it as he would be staying away overnight and it would be our first night apart since I got to Australia. However, Mat said it would be a good character building exercise (lol) and practice for when he goes on a lads’ off roading “no girls allowed” weekend. Hmm, I’m not so sure about that but I did decide to make the most of the early start by going down to the beach before work and catching the sunrise.
I have found a nice little cul-de-sac off the main road where I can park and either sit in the car and watch the waves if it’s raining or go for a stroll along the sand. This has now replaced Leckhampton Hill which I used to use for my early morning stroll and chill out before work back in the UK.
I have always had an interest in photography and just recently I have been newly inspired and motivated by Nico, at work. He is a very keen and accomplished photographer and has kindly been giving me some hints and tips, the main one being “practice, practice, practice”. So relishing the opportunity to take some seascape photos I was on the sand of Narrabeen Beach by 6am, a rich orange glow just starting to rise over the sea.
To cut a long story short I spent half an hour taking photos (95 in total) and then got to work an hour early so I could download them and inspect the results. Most of them were useless but there were a couple that had potential and Nico, who was also in early, kindly suggested that I picked my favourite and he would post-process it for me. Now I know one can use Photoshop or the like to edit photos but I didn’t realise until recently that it is an important part of the photographic process. Nico spent just ten minutes performing his jiggery pokery and here is the result:
Before:
After:
The main things done were cropping to improve the composition, lighting adjustment and sharpening. I am pretty chuffed with the results and although it is obviously better to take a great photo to start with it’s good to know certain things can be adjusted afterwards. I can’t wait to learn the process and then maybe I can improve some of my other shots.
Anyway, I have now added a “photography” category within this blog so I can log my ongoing progress.
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Hi, Alex! Your photo looks great! I am not an expert in photography at all, but I slightly prefer your original version. The crop might have improved the composition, but it also lost a beautiful piece of sky. The sharpening option normally deserves its praise; however, in this instance the photo looses that feel of yearly morning haziness.
Thank you for your comment Irina
It just goes to show how photography can really be down to individual taste. I’m trying to learn the “conventional” methods first and then I can play around with different looks.