When the rocks glow
Explore #8 08/09/16
A recent trip to the phenomenal Isle of Skye, it's so hard to pick what to shoot here and when, purely because there is so much variety and also because you may well not get the right weather, one location could be poor weather - you could spend a week revisting the same location or nail it the first time, ok if you live nearby, maybe not if you live 500 miles away..., a week was nowhere near enough.
This location I last visited 4 years ago and was captivated by it, whatever I did on this trip this would be one location that was getting done again, and this time for sunset, I was camping well over an hour away so a failed trip would be a pain.
I arrived about 3pm in some very mixed weather from the South of the island including some enormous black clouds and rain, I took a boat out to Coruisk to explore the lady at the boat hire said it had been glorious here all day and was surprised that I had seen cloud, let alone rain, she also said the previous night had been a crazy sunset and expected tonight to be good too, that was it, tonight was the night then.
After the (absolutely superb) Coruisk trip I got back about 1830, got the stuff out the car and set off to find a spot in plenty of time, a few places looked ok but something was missing, eventually I happened across this place and that was it, sold. I had about 3 hours here in all and loved every single minute of it in my midge net getting eaten alive (ok maybe not that bit but they aren't as bad as Glencoe midgies), the wall of rock on the right, as well as providing a great lead in to the scene was catching the warm light so well on occasion it was just a joy, when the sun went behind the cloud it was hard to imagine you were looking at the same set of rocks, of course, light is everything, and it certainly appeared this evening.
Check out the seemingly perfectly spherical rock in the foreground, no doubt shaped by it's position on the shoreline and 2 tides a day washing over it for countless years.
I've another image from here to post yet after the sun had set and I don't know which I prefer, all I know is this is one of the most amazing places in the UK, even if you come and don't get anything, it's just a real pleasure being here, it was a nightmare driving back to Portree as the cloud / mist had dropped and hit the roads in the dark, didn't stop me smiling though all the way back. This really is why I do this.
A funny thing happened a week or so after I got home, I was reading one of Joe Cornish's landscape photography books 'first light' as I had been for months, I closed the book to put it away, on the front cover was this exact location! hairs standing up the back of your neck moment... had I picked this location subconsciously after seeing it or just a coincidence? I'm not sure, but I bet he enjoyed it as much as I did.
When the rocks glow
Explore #8 08/09/16
A recent trip to the phenomenal Isle of Skye, it's so hard to pick what to shoot here and when, purely because there is so much variety and also because you may well not get the right weather, one location could be poor weather - you could spend a week revisting the same location or nail it the first time, ok if you live nearby, maybe not if you live 500 miles away..., a week was nowhere near enough.
This location I last visited 4 years ago and was captivated by it, whatever I did on this trip this would be one location that was getting done again, and this time for sunset, I was camping well over an hour away so a failed trip would be a pain.
I arrived about 3pm in some very mixed weather from the South of the island including some enormous black clouds and rain, I took a boat out to Coruisk to explore the lady at the boat hire said it had been glorious here all day and was surprised that I had seen cloud, let alone rain, she also said the previous night had been a crazy sunset and expected tonight to be good too, that was it, tonight was the night then.
After the (absolutely superb) Coruisk trip I got back about 1830, got the stuff out the car and set off to find a spot in plenty of time, a few places looked ok but something was missing, eventually I happened across this place and that was it, sold. I had about 3 hours here in all and loved every single minute of it in my midge net getting eaten alive (ok maybe not that bit but they aren't as bad as Glencoe midgies), the wall of rock on the right, as well as providing a great lead in to the scene was catching the warm light so well on occasion it was just a joy, when the sun went behind the cloud it was hard to imagine you were looking at the same set of rocks, of course, light is everything, and it certainly appeared this evening.
Check out the seemingly perfectly spherical rock in the foreground, no doubt shaped by it's position on the shoreline and 2 tides a day washing over it for countless years.
I've another image from here to post yet after the sun had set and I don't know which I prefer, all I know is this is one of the most amazing places in the UK, even if you come and don't get anything, it's just a real pleasure being here, it was a nightmare driving back to Portree as the cloud / mist had dropped and hit the roads in the dark, didn't stop me smiling though all the way back. This really is why I do this.
A funny thing happened a week or so after I got home, I was reading one of Joe Cornish's landscape photography books 'first light' as I had been for months, I closed the book to put it away, on the front cover was this exact location! hairs standing up the back of your neck moment... had I picked this location subconsciously after seeing it or just a coincidence? I'm not sure, but I bet he enjoyed it as much as I did.