Winter Sundays
The Sunday before Christmas was slipping by unnoticed. It's a bad habit I have, which occurs all too often in winter. For example it's almost lunchtime as I'm writing, yet breakfast was less than an hour ago and I'm typing the tale of this latest adventure in my jimjams. Shameful I agree, but the last two days have seen outings in foul conditions whereby the camera needed to be energetically towel dried after coming in from the rain. As I look out of the living room window into the already darkening sky, I suspect more of the same will follow later. It might be an idea to stop indoors and watch a film for a change. It is Christmas after all.
There had been a very loose plan to head out before Christmas and the increased lockdown restrictions that were set to follow a day later. So loose in fact that when Lee texted to discuss plans I confessed I hadn't even had lunch yet. It was almost 2pm already. In the urgent excitement of preparing my bacon and mushroom toasted sandwich I managed to smash a glass bottle extravagantly across the kitchen floor. With glass everywhere, the camera bag unpacked and Lee already heading in my direction I decided to concentrate on the sandwich first. It's hard to enjoy a sandwich when the clock is ticking and you're surrounded by broken glass.
Eventually, a swept kitchen floor and a hastily assembled camera bag later, somewhere just after 3pm, and only a little more than an hour before sunset we arrived at Gwithian beach. As we gathered our kit from the back of my car our eyes were caught by a huge yellow blaze of sunlit clouds over Carbis Bay to the west. It was one of those skies where you don't worry about blown highlights on your histogram in your eagerness to shoot it; the sort of sky that fills both idle daydreams and an unused space on your living room wall if you're quick enough. It was also the sort of sky that you know won't last for long. We hurried over the dunes towards the light and the edge of the water as fast as our middle aged legs could carry us.
Needless to say we were too late and the bright yellow wash of sky retreated, to be replaced by a dark and vigorous squall as we set our tripods up. At moments like this you always hope to be rewarded by a wondrous sky, just for braving the rain, but of course there are no guarantees. Those magical colours failed to return and we were left with the reminder that we should arrive on location a lot earlier in winter as it's so much easier to shoot throughout the day. Although we tried that at Porthleven yesterday and only succeeded in getting soaked again, with no reward to show for it. It was my fourth consecutive adventure where heavy rain arrived to greet me as I took the camera out of the pack. I'm already looking through the television schedule for this afternoon. There's always tomorrow after all.
Still - you can always have a back up plan ready, and reflected silhouettes on the beach at low tide - what's not to love about that? Thank goodness people need to walk their dogs, whatever the weather brings.
Winter Sundays
The Sunday before Christmas was slipping by unnoticed. It's a bad habit I have, which occurs all too often in winter. For example it's almost lunchtime as I'm writing, yet breakfast was less than an hour ago and I'm typing the tale of this latest adventure in my jimjams. Shameful I agree, but the last two days have seen outings in foul conditions whereby the camera needed to be energetically towel dried after coming in from the rain. As I look out of the living room window into the already darkening sky, I suspect more of the same will follow later. It might be an idea to stop indoors and watch a film for a change. It is Christmas after all.
There had been a very loose plan to head out before Christmas and the increased lockdown restrictions that were set to follow a day later. So loose in fact that when Lee texted to discuss plans I confessed I hadn't even had lunch yet. It was almost 2pm already. In the urgent excitement of preparing my bacon and mushroom toasted sandwich I managed to smash a glass bottle extravagantly across the kitchen floor. With glass everywhere, the camera bag unpacked and Lee already heading in my direction I decided to concentrate on the sandwich first. It's hard to enjoy a sandwich when the clock is ticking and you're surrounded by broken glass.
Eventually, a swept kitchen floor and a hastily assembled camera bag later, somewhere just after 3pm, and only a little more than an hour before sunset we arrived at Gwithian beach. As we gathered our kit from the back of my car our eyes were caught by a huge yellow blaze of sunlit clouds over Carbis Bay to the west. It was one of those skies where you don't worry about blown highlights on your histogram in your eagerness to shoot it; the sort of sky that fills both idle daydreams and an unused space on your living room wall if you're quick enough. It was also the sort of sky that you know won't last for long. We hurried over the dunes towards the light and the edge of the water as fast as our middle aged legs could carry us.
Needless to say we were too late and the bright yellow wash of sky retreated, to be replaced by a dark and vigorous squall as we set our tripods up. At moments like this you always hope to be rewarded by a wondrous sky, just for braving the rain, but of course there are no guarantees. Those magical colours failed to return and we were left with the reminder that we should arrive on location a lot earlier in winter as it's so much easier to shoot throughout the day. Although we tried that at Porthleven yesterday and only succeeded in getting soaked again, with no reward to show for it. It was my fourth consecutive adventure where heavy rain arrived to greet me as I took the camera out of the pack. I'm already looking through the television schedule for this afternoon. There's always tomorrow after all.
Still - you can always have a back up plan ready, and reflected silhouettes on the beach at low tide - what's not to love about that? Thank goodness people need to walk their dogs, whatever the weather brings.