Talacre Beach. Clwyd.

16th March 2007

I found this location because I was looking for a spot to shoot the dawn on the way to Cwmorthin with a friend.

The lighthouse, built out on the beach, offered good angles for both Sun rise and set so seemed ideal.

Upon suggesting it to Jim he said he knew the location but had never photographed it.

As I had never been here before I did not know whether we would have good access because the tide would be most of the way in by dawn. We set out with high hopes.

One of the first things that strikes you about the Point of Ayr Light is that it is tilted towards the sea. Over the years the sea has undermined the building and this leaves you with a difficult choice.

Because there is no other vertical reference, if you set up to level the horizon the lighthouse just looks wrong. If you correct the building the horizon is thrown off level.

It takes some very careful positioning to get any angle that looks natural at all.

This shot on the right was my first experiment with infrared from a digital camera. I used infrared film in my Bronica quite a lot when I could get the film, but I had not yet tried it with the Canon.

I must say I’m quite pleased with the results.

The exposure is very long due to the camera having an IR blocking filter built into the sensor, but working from a tripod that’s not too much of a problem.

What remains to be seen is if I can get the same type of effect as the film gave me.

After about an hour of shooting in good light we decided to move onto our main objective for the day.

The forecast was for fine weather and occasional cloud for the rest of the day.

Unfortunately by the time we got to Cwmorthin the light couldn’t have been any more different than our start to the day.