Normally I don't like an empty sky during sunset. Usually this just looks boring on a landscape photo, the drama is missing and so on. But in this case I have to admit the clear colorful sky gives the perfect harmony. Those jutting rocks are such strong graphic elements in the picture that I don't need drama in the sky which might distract from them. That's at least my current opinion about this shot but I'd be interested what you think?
PS: I went to Adraga a second time with clouds in the sky and a very transformed beach, tides and rain did a great transformation in 2 days.. so I'll soon show some pictures as contrast!
About the shot: hoya HD Pol + 0.9 Lee hard grad
Just some contrast processing and sharpening. I did increase the saturation too but the changes are not very drastic!
cheers
Tags: Adraga Portugal travel seascape sea landscape sintra water rocks beach sand
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Sunset on the second day of our vacation in Portugal. During the day the weather was not so nice - cloudy, windy and a bit chilly too. So for sunset I didn't expect much so we just went to the neighbour beach of the place we stayed. Well everything changed for sunset, the sky started clearing up, I found myself in a great location with lots of interesting rocks on the beach (didn't have this on my list at all ) and the colors were getting better and better.
The result is above image where I did nearly nothing to the colors, it's mainly some contrast and d&b here. I used a 0.6 Lee Gnd again to keep the dyn range in check. Ah how I love those filters :-) As with my last image I focused a bit more on minimalistic composition, so not to distract the viewer to much from the colors in the sky and on the beach. I used my polarizer turned so the reflection on the beach was very bright, I think this look particularly nice! hope you like it too!
There's much much more to come soon!
cheers
Tags: Landschaft Portugal Sintra atlantic clouds cloudy coast felsen küste landscape licht light macas meer natur nature ocean praia rocks sea sonnenuntergang sunset wasser water wolken wolkig
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It's been a while since my last upload. I was on vacation in Portugal for a week and came back yesterday with more than 700 photos. A lot to sort out but also some keepers I think. I'll start with the first evening here.
This photo was taken in Azenhas Do Mar, the place where we stayed. It's just great to look at the sea from your flat and then just walk down for sunset. No driving, no big walks, the scene you wanna shoot just in view the whole day.
For sunset the light was magic and we had some nice wave action. I just used my polarizer and a 0.6 Lee gnd here and the processing is reduced to some db, sharpening and contrast adjustments. Previously I was doing a lot dri stuff but during this vacation I focused more on using filters and it's so much more rewarding if the photo on your camera display already looks so close to what you are seeing and there's not the typical blending on the pc needed first. The use of filters alse let me focus more on capturing some wave action, I hadn't done this much to date . But in portugal during our stay the sea was just fantastic.
I already miss portugal and the sound of the waves. It's such a beautiful country with abundance of colors in the landscape, even in winter. When I now look out of the window here in germany and basically see black and white it's a bit frustrating ;-)
cheers
Tags: Azenhas do mar Landschaft Portugal Sintra atlantic coast küste landscape meer natur nature ocean sea wasser water
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In contrast to my last picture from this beach here's one with a stormy sky. We went back to this beach on our last day in Portugal.
Originally we had planned on going down to the Ursa beach which was a big MUST GO THERE on my list. But unfortunately the weather didn't let us go. The Ursa beach is only reachable through a steep 45minutes hike along the cliffs... well usually no problem and I would normally have gone down there despite the weather. But after all this was a vacation and I had my girlfrind with me and when we started the hike it became so windy that it was very uncomfortable. Also the tracks we were walking on seemed to serve as little water runways in case of rain and well, this day it looked like rain. We might have gotten down to the Ursa beach but the way back very possibly with rain was not how we wanted our vacation to end. That's the part when you have to remind yourself that doing photography is a hobby which should be fun and that your very, very tolerant girlfrind might be a bit pissed if she got drenched just because of one or two decent photos ;-)
So we went back to Adraga again and this was a good decision. After above Image rain started and 5minutes to the car was much better than possible an hour climb ;-) Also what was very interesting was the transformation the Adraga beach had gone through in the last two days. The rain and tide removed nearly 3 feet of sand and rocks emerged where the last time only their tips were showing. And it was also a complete different shoot because of the weather.
About the shot. Again I used a lee 0.6 hard grad here so one exposure was enough. But I also learned that when I go on with this shooting technique I need a better camera. The 40d is good but when it comes to shadow detail and noise It's quite hard to get everything right in one exposure. This in mind I'm quite happy with how this shot came out!
cheers
Tags: Adraga Landschaft Portugal Sintra Weather atlantic clouds coast felsen küste landscape licht light meer natur nature ocean praia rocks sea sonne sonnenuntergang sun sunset wasser water wetter wolken praia da Adraga
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The Magoito beach in Portugal is a beautiful place. It's at the feet of some steep cliffs and you can walk quite a time there exploring. Jutting out of the sand are various rock formations and during sunset on our fourth day I was running around between 'em searching for good comps.
This nice rock wall was one of my last finds there. I liked the two distinct colors of it, the redish on the left and the blueish on the right side so I snapped a shot. I waited for the incoming tide to create some movement through the gap.
About the shot: Hoya HD Pol + Lee 0.6 hard gnd
Postprocessing was some d&b and selective color increases but just so to arrive at the scene I saw there. Out of cam it was lacking a bit as usual ;-)
hope you like it!
Tags: Landschaft Portugal Sintra Weather atlantic coast felsen küste landscape licht light meer natur nature ocean praia rocks sea wasser water wetter Magoito lee filters
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