Despite a ropey looking forecast, and a pre 5am get up, I agreed to meet another photographer at Caister-on-Sea for sunrise.
The forecast showed rain but with a dry spell for an hour after sunrise. I had my doubts, and it was a gamble but don’t go, don’t get I think was the order of the day.
Part of the gamble is the effort of getting up early, in this instance, at 04:50.
We arrived and made our way to the zigzags which are now on show. There’s a smaller visible zigzag with a danger signpost, and a larger zigzag more exposed and stretching further back towards the dunes.
We both began shooting at the danger signpost zigzag.
I started trying to emulate a scene I’ve done before where the light across the sky is a lightning bolt.
I needed to be careful as previously I’ve blown out the lightning bolt aspect, and a critique evening judge didn’t get the danger title and story I was trying to convey.
The sky wasn’t as good today as previously but it have helped add to the moody scene, and avoid any blowouts in the sky.
The shot above is 0.5s shutter to retain detail in the sea.
I shot another version at a much slower shutter speed of 30s.
My fellow photographer had gone over to the other zigzag and I decided to stay put, firstly because I was enjoying where I was, and secondly because I didn’t want to copy what he was doing.
I realised at this point I was just shooting the “same old, same old”, so decided to divert my attention to some ICM.
My current small obsession with the work of Mark Cornick meant I was straight in with a handheld ICM of the beach and sea.
I tried one with the zigzag in view but I should’ve known it wasn’t going to work.
There was a small time window where it felt like it was going to rain down on us but it held and passed.
A quick chat with my friend on what we had captured so far was interesting. They had captured a really nice low and close up shot of some of the metallic posts on the zigzag.
We both then took some images of this zigzag, and in post-production, I decided to give it a high-key look.
I’m not totally convinced the high key effect works as I think perhaps it’s made the scene dull, but you’ve got to try these things, right? Also, we had little colour in the sky to work with so there you go.
The sunlight had started to make an appearance so for a few final shots, I got thr long lens out and grabbed some images of the wind turbines.
And that was a wrap.
Back at the car for coffee and debrief and we were heading home.
We had only just left Caister when the rain came tumbling down in torrential fashion. Our gamble had paid off, and we’d got away with it.
The magnetic Golden Arches were ignored on the way home. Given the early start, I wanted to get home and go back to bed.
Onwards and upwards…