Dunraven Bay

It’s Monday so it must be time for a photograph.

This one was taken on Saturday morning at dawn on the South Wales coast around 30 minutes from home.  Dunraven Bay near Southerndown is renowned for its fossils; some major ones have been found here, and there are many more lying in amongst the rocks.  The cliff edge is crumbling into the sea, constantly exposing new fossils with each rock fall. 

But I wasn’t there fossil hunting, although my camera (a Nikon D800 in case you’re interested) is 4 years old now so that probably qualifies as a fossil in photographic terms these days!  The lens used was my cherished, oh so beautiful Nikkor 16-35.

This photo was taken in freezing cold conditions, made worse by waiting around for exactly the right wave.  I used a 3 stop filter to slow the exposure down to around 2 seconds, lending the crashing wave a degree of drama and motion.  I also used a graduated filter to balance the exposure between land, sea and sky.  I tried to time the exposure to catch a wave breaking.  I think I got it.

Composition wise, the picture is really very simple.  Intentionally so.  It’s just 3 layers: rocks, sea, sky.  It’s a type of composition I’ve used a fair bit in the past, so I thought I’d resurrect it for this image.

Anyway, I hope you like it.

Nikon D800, Nikkor 16-35 f4.0 at 20mm
2 seconds at f11, ISO 100
tripod, remote shutter release