Outdoors at Night

I coud have combined this exercise with the one that asked for rain shots. Every time I decided to venture forth it seemed that it began to rain. Having said that it made for some good opportunities as the light drizzle partially diffused the strong lighting, say of street lights, leading to some interesting effects. (see, in particular the Cromer pier scene).

This first image and the four following were taken on a club outing to Great Yarmouth to photograph the lights (the hope was for a sort of mini Blackpool). Unfortunately the very few that had been put up were being taken down on the night we were there which, added to the bitterly cold wind, did very little to improve our mood. The general opinion was that it had been a waste of time but interestingly many of those that went got some memorable images. The lesson learnt here was that there are photographic opportunities even in in the most unprepossessing situations.

This is a general shot of Great Yarmouth sea front taken from the pier. The sky is attractive with the last light of dusk providing the pink/violet colouring to the clouds. The foreground provides enough information to 'set the scene' without being intrusive. The lights of the sea front are vivid and eye catching and are linked to the sky by the two buildings in the background whilst the foreground is linked by the reflected light.

I have included this image because of the dramatic sky which is the dominant feature in the image. I did consider cropping the image to reduce the foreground which does not, of itself, add a great deal as there is not a lot of detail. However I decided that it balanced the rest of the picture by providing a contrast to the main part of the image.

Having taken a large number of general shots of the sea front I looked for something that, for me, summed up Great Yarmouth and what it has to offer the visitor.  Both of these shots show the dominating use of neon lighting. In the first image 'The Mint' I concentrated the shot on the facia although one is able to see the slot machines that is the entertainment provided. In the second the 'BING' clearly is the first part of the word Bingo. The second shot was composed to take in the length of the street giving a hint of what the whole strip has to offer. The fortuitous inclusion of the lone figure sums up the success of the advertising glitz.

The final image from the Great Yarmouth series is of seating that has been included in an area that is going through a period of transition as efforts are made to upgrade the image of the town. Here the recent rainfall has offered the opportunity to take advantage of the reflections both in the seating and on the ground.

Keeping with the seaside theme the following 5 photographs were taken in Cromer. These are the ones taken in a steady but light drizzle which, I think, provides the effects on the street lights.

This picture was taken from the top of the high ground as you are leaving Cromer heading toward Sheringham. Almost inevitably it includes the pier that must be one of the most photographed piers in the Country because it is accessible from all sides apart from the seaward. However the attraction for me was the line of the railings that were glistening in the wet and the line of lights along the promenade. There is an argument for cropping the image so that the beginning of the rails is in the left lower corner of the image but I decided that I wanted to include the waves that added another line of sight and try to emphasise the unusual colour of the sky.

Rather than repeat the Great Yarmouth exercise I decided to go for the shopping area in Cromer using the lit windows as the area of interest. I am not sure that this image works. Whilst the large window offers interest having looked at the whole image again I wonder if it would have been more powerful to have cropped it at the right hand side of the door rather than include the next window that is distracting. My original thinking was to include it to give a sense of continuity.

This image of the 'Cromer Shopping Centre' provides a sense of perspective that leads the eye into the picture. The eye is prevented from going outside the image by the building at the right of the picture.  I included the road and pavement to emphasise the apparent desertion of the town.

Cromer church floodlit. Here the problem was to reduce the amount of street furniture that surrounds the church to a minimum. Signs tend to be lit more strongly than the floodlit church so that the exposure necessary to get a good shot of the church blows out the signs.

As a change and to show that I do go to other places than the seaside I include this shot of Tower Bridge.

I was standing on the deck of a Paddle Steamer moored at the Tower Pier when I took this photograph.  The lighting gives the towers a yellowish hue but if the image is corrected to a true white balance it becomes very 'cold' in appearance and oddly looks wrong.

Staying nearer home The following two images were taken on a footbridge that crosses the A14 at Bury St Edmunds. They were taken about 7.30.p.m. and the traffic was surprisingly light. the camera was mounted on a tripod and set to an aperture value of 9 with an ISO of 800. 'Bulb' was used for the shutter and the rest was judgement (is that the same as guesswork?).

I prefer this image because of the limited amount of lights and therefore its clarity.

Here there was more traffic particularly oncoming traffic so that the trails are more obvious.

I am not a great fan of  car trail photography. Only occasionally does it work successfully and I generally  find them a distraction.

General conclusion - I had done very little photography at night so my knowledge of how to do it and getting the best from the camera settings was limited. At the end of the exercise I am much more aware of the opportunities offered and how my camera works best in such conditions. I found the most difficult part was linking my perception of the scene with that captured by the camera. The most obvious case is the car trails where the human eye separates the changes in position of any individual car or cars. However the colours, say, of tungsten or fluorescent lighting are not evident in what we 'see' and this leads to somer interesting results.