Sandbanks Bay and Poole Park

The weather has been fantastic recently in the UK for landscape photography.  The sky is generally a cheerful blue with a few wispy clouds to give some interest, and the sunsets are fairly colourful.  I've been getting out a fair bit recently in the evenings - sunset is around 21:15 so to be out with the camera at least an hour either side of that give an opportunity to capture a wide range of lighting conditions in the shots.

Holes Bay Boat

The shot above probably deserves separate discussion as it's actually at Holes Bay and not either of the places I mentioned in the title, and it's also an HDR shot.  I don't do many HDR pictures, but I've seen some great examples of natural looking images recently which just present a great range of light and contrast.  I noticed this boat in the bay as I drove past a few days before taking it, and this was actually the focus of the evening when I came out to get the shot.  It involved a 10 minutes walk from the nearest point to park the car, then clambering over rocks and walking precariously on crusty mud which could give way at any moment, but I managed to select this viewpoint and get about 9 different exposures.  This image is actually composed of 5 exposures, and I deliberately went for the effect of enhancing the foreground while still having sky detail, rather than anything too extreme.

Sandbanks

Sandbanks is a spit of land extending into Poole harbour (see here) , with sea either side.  The area regularly features in the top 5 most expensive places to live in the world, and with sea views on both sides, and a glorious golden sandy beach it's not difficult to see the appeal!

Boats at Sandbanks

As you drive along towards the end of the visible "spit" of Sandbanks, there are flats and houses on the left side obscuring most of the views of the beach, but on the right it opens out to the big bay with Brownsea Island dominant.  The tide varies quite a lot here - from being completely in against the wall that runs around the bay, to being so far out you can walk a fair distance on the mud.  On this evening, the tide was mostly in, and the shot above shows the boats in the bay as the sun hovers above the horizon in the distance.  On the left is a structure jutting into the sea which I believe is the back of a restaurant.

5 Minute Sunset at Sandbanks

One of my intentions on this evening was to get some shots with my 10 stop ND filter.  The image above was a 5 minute exposure, starting with the sun above the horizon and finishing a little after it had gone down.  Notice how smooth the sea is - over 5 minutes, there is no chance of any particular waves standing out so it melts into velvet.

Pale

The shot above is an attempt at something a little more abstract.  The sun had gone down at this point, and I wanted to capture the buildings and hills on the horizon as a very thin strip of interest in a generally monotone picture.  I'm not sure it really works as I feel like there's too much detail in the foreground water (the exposure should have been longer - this was without any filter and around 20 seconds), but it's always good to experiment with these ideas, analayse what you think would make it better and get out and try again.

Poole Park

On the drive home, I took the "scenic" route and went through Poole Park.  This is a park I visit quite a lot with the children during the day, but it's not often you get to see these sort of places after the sun has set.  I was quite impressed with how much effort had gone into some areas to make them look nice at night.  The shot below is of the Mezza Luna restaurant from the edge of the lake.  The narrow aperture creates the star effect on the lights of the restaurant, and the longer exposure captures the reflections of the pinpoints of light in the water.

Mezza Luna - Poole Park

Another enjoyable evening out with the camera.  I'm trying to make the most of the weather and late summer evening sunsets at the moment - it won't be long before it's getting dark much earlier (then I can get out for lots of night shots!).