Snow!!!
Today I wanted to take it easy, just following a path of 8.5 kilometers through the oldest parts of the island, a trail called ‘tussen Kapenglop en Arnicaweide’. It was a quiet walk and I enjoyed the compositions I found. At the end of my walk it started to snow lightly, and I managed to get a reasonable composition. It turned out to be the prelude to a hectic time with heavy snowfall.
When I was back in my apartment it started snowing harder and harder, with those big flakes that show up nicely on photos. So I took my camera while going shopping for some food for the evening and found a composition I truly liked: a tree with one of the lighthouses, now a museum, in the background, and loads and loads of snowflakes. This photo got me excited about the possibilities near the other lighthouse.
So I quickly dropped my groceries at the apartment after which I hurried as much as possible - it was slippery - to the lighthouse I visited in the past two days. With the daylight rapidly diminishing snowfall still going strong. I tried a new composition and experimented with different settings for the snow: lower iso with slow shutter speeds rendering the snow as small stripes creating the vision of a blizzard (it felt like that actually) and higher iso allowing faster shutter speeds ‘freezing’ the snow creating a myriad of flakes. In one of the shots there were actually some jackdaws passing my composition adding a nice contrast and additional movement. Needless to say I had fun!
After the snow stopped I went back to that tree near the water I shot earlier for a night shot. Its branches were loaded with snow, but lighting the shot wasn’t easy. It always strikes me how strange the outcome is if you increase exposure time for a night shot, almost like creating a daylight shot with some infrared components in it. Nonetheless I’m happy with the outcome, especially contrasting the earlier shot with all the snow flakes.
As you can imagine my day that I wanted to go easy, ended full with excitement. I’m very happy I managed to get these photos of the snow. Maybe it is the last snow during my retreat, who knows? Tomorrow another day, with other surprises!
Enjoy!
Wim
