Simon HawkettsThings I’ve built, repaired, photographed and learned

Sailing Boats

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By Simon Hawketts ·

Sailing Boats

These boats are lined up at the Sailing club in Fairlands Valley sailing club in Stevenage.

I took this picture in March 2012 as I walked around the park in the springtime looking for good subjects. James was with me and he wanted to go off to the playground so we were walking off in that direction when the boats lined up in the sun caught my eye. I fitted my Tamron 10-24mm super wide angle lens to the Pentax K-r I used at the time and got quite close to the boats and fired off about 10 shots at various levels of over exposure to compensate for pointing directly into the sun.

When I got back home and opened the shots in Lightroom, this was about the best of all the pictures I had taken. I had to pull the highlights down to the minimum setting and boost the shadows to the maximum setting, but the sun was very low in the sky so that didn't really surprise me. To soften the image down and give it the slightly dreamy look, I dropped the clarity setting to about -30.

Comments (2)

  1. dinkerson
    Simon, I have a question. If you decide to answer, feel free to delete this silly comment, but I'm asking you this because I value your opinion on the subject of photography. Today, you and many others have skipped over my latest post, and found something else to "like". This has happened so many times that I'm going out of my mind with curiosity. What is it about my latest image that causes viewers to skip over it. You see, I am rather fond of how it turned out, but I know that there's something that others are seeing that is different than what I see. It could be that the image just sucks. Or that it was processed in a way that turns viewers off. Or that it's framed poorly. I just don't know, but I would love some very critical feedback if necessary. Or just a simple "I don't know Dinkerson, It's just bloody boring". Lol These kinds of questions are what makes me better at what I do. Thanks. And I apologize if this question is too presumptuous. And now you simply cannot "like" that post. It would make me feel like you took this as begging for a like. :) By the way, if you must be critical of this image, please be specific and blunt. I like criticism like I like my brandy. Or course, straight.

    Comments (1)

    1. simonhawketts
      Hi - Certainly don't be worried about asking a question I'm happy to help if I can. I'm not sure that I can however. What I can tell you is that I normally like a picture within a few seconds of seeing it. I will know as soon as I see it that there is something I like about it. That has certainly happened with many of your pictures or I wouldn't have followed you, but I can't really say what it is about that picture which didn't inspire me. I've been back and had another look and I certainly remember seeing it this morning and reading the post but I didn't click the 'like' link. Not sure that's helped.