We chose Corton for this week’s pre-Christmas sunrise shoot.
Is it Corton or Gunton? I wrote about this in my last blog post about this location back in October 2023. Well everyone (or at least fellow landscapers) call it Corton, but I shall refer to it as the maps show it, as Gunton!
Driving through a very narrow pair of concrete blocks to get to the large car park, we met at 07:00 with sunrise at just before 08:10.
The shortest day has passed us now so we can enjoy quite reasonable get up and meet times for a few more weeks before the sunrises get really early.
We wandered down to the beach and unlike last time, beared right and headed straight for the first groyne.
We were all lined up taking shots for a while waiting for the early morning light to emerge. Since the light was limited, I could take a slow exposure without the need for filters.
Once the light improved, I started trying to get a shot with some water movement and textures.
Some of the guys then went back from where we came to take a closer look at the broken up pillbox and concrete sea defences near to the car park. I’ve seen some good shots taken there from that morning so must check it out next time.
For those that missed the last trip, they carried on North to explore the groynes where some of us had done that last time, so we continued up the beach towards Lowestoft.
I liked the look of this scene with an exposed part of the former concrete wall and the groyne although it was a challenge to compose.
I spent quite a bit of time here and overall during this shoot, I had shot around 220 images because I’m trying to time the exposure to achieve the image I want.
The next shot may well be my best of the morning. I’m on a quest to bag some better images, and ones that might be worthy of entering in club competitions.
After I grabbed the image below, I showed this to a fellow photographer and he agreed it was something different.
We refer to these images as “swooshery” or “swoosh” and I have to admit, I am addicted to them!
I had a few other compositions and quite liked the one below which captures the texture of sea water spilling over the concrete wall but also with some of the groynes in the scene too.
The sky was lovely this morning and a surprise given the forecast didn’t look overly favourable.
I had to take what is probably a classic Norfolk coast shot below.
For my final shot, I took a few images of the waves crashing against and over the remains of the concrete wall.
Experience and experimenting tends to deliver my best of these captures with textures visible in the waves.
And that was a wrap!
We wandered back to the car park along the top of the sea wall, and enjoyed our coffees and some biscuits while discussing the morning’s shoot.
One or two of the guys had never been here before so really enjoyed it, and we all agreed Gunton / Corton had lots to offer in terms of photographic options and opportunities.
I made my way home but not without the habitual visit to the Golden Arches.
We all agreed to look to meet up again next week. We usually have a New Year’s Eve sunrise shoot but now the weekend falls this year, it’s not impossible we squeeze in two shoots before 2023 comes to a close.
Onwards and upwards…