January 2010

I have always been a morning person. Ever since I was a child, I was always up first up. Sometimes as a boy, neighbours would even ask me to knock their door early incase their alarm clock failed to go off.

As a result of habitual early rising, friends, relatives, acquaintances and even hotel night porters think I am not quite right! But it is the best time of the day and, as a landscape photographer this habit of rising early is what I consider a gift. You get to see and experience things most people never get to see.

So, while the majority of people sleep soundly, I am usually found walking the landscapes of Ireland under torchlight waiting for the sun to rise.

Recently while waiting in one such location, I was struck by the almost eerie beauty of the moonlit landscape. The stark shapes and ghostly forms rising from landscape really sparked my imagination.

Moon Tree

Above me a lone tree silhouetted against the moon lit sky really caught my attention. To capture the scene, I needed a composition that was strong yet simple. For me, the composition that worked most effectively was one that included as much sky as possible and as little of the silhouetted landscape as possible. Most importantly for the composition to really work, the moon had to be included in some way.

Technically, the image was a bit of a challenge. Light levels where very low and the cameras auto focus system became a pain in the ass. To over come issues with focus and to reduce the risk of focus jitter I set the cameras lens to manual focus, and focused on the distant tree.

An exposure of thirty seconds and an aperture of F13 was set, and as the first clouds began to encroach on the moon I fired the shutter.

The result a dynamic moody sky against the still silhouetted landscape.