Scavenge
Apr, 2015Views
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Behind The Lens
Location
This photo was taken off the back of my lobster fishing boat as the seagulls swarmed and scavenged the old bait we dumped overboard heading into Cribbon's Point Wharf in Antigonish, Nova Scotia.Time
This photo was taken early morning, about 2 hours after sunrise.Lighting
The lighting has an unnatural feel to it as the fog and the mist are finally beginning to burn off under the heat of the sun creating a eerily beautiful yellowish haze. The camera obviously exaggerated the yellows as it was prone to tint the whole picture based on which part of the frame it focused on, which can often ruin a perfectly good shot, but more often then not presents you with a unique picture, with an almost surreal atmosphere, of a completely natural scene.Equipment
The camera used was quite primitive and I was very, very new to photography so I was taking a pile of pictures of the same subject to have only one or two of them turn out ok or presentable. I used a Sony DSC-W55 point-and-shoot piece of crap. This was my first digital camera that I owned and it captured some of my favorite photos I have ever taken but with the worst resolution and most graininess of all my photos. So while it definitely encouraged me to keep with photography it also forced me into post-production editing which has since expanded into graphic design work and most importantly made me realize that I needed a better camera.Inspiration
The beauty of point-and-shoot cameras is that they are easy to carry around and quick on the draw when you need to capture action shots or to take a quick photo while you are busy working. This is a daily occurrence during fishing season, but I had never thought to take a picture of it before as it is usually a time to hide inside the cab of the boat to avoid getting shit on haha. I liked the look of the shithawks swarming and diving at the old fish in the wake of the boat and wanted to get a good shot of it but more importantly, I took it for my girlfriend, who is scared of birds, so I could show her the Hitchcockian scene which is her nightmare and my everyday commute.Editing
Since the camera I used in the photo was basically a prototype for digital cameras, and the photo was taken by shakey hands....on a moving fishing boat, post-processing in photoshop was basically essential for saving this great capture as the brightness/contrast, levels, and sharpness all had to be adjusted to make it more presentable, and to give it depth by highlighting the seagulls closest to the boat and dimming the seagulls in the background to silhouettes and has since become a favorite among viewers of my photos.In my camera bag
This is embarrassing...I have a Canon Digital Elph, GoPro 3+, and/or Samsung S5...if it doesn't fit in my pocket I don't have much use for it as I rarely pre-plan any photos, or I am usually working or travelling, and only have time for a quick snap shot or see something in passing that has to be captured before it disappears. Although this results in much lower quality photos, it allows you to be able to capture moments anywhere and everywhere, and can create a more natural/realistic photo for most viewers to engage with as opposed to professional SLR cameras which tend to look over-processed and too professional for amateurs like myself.Feedback
The early bird gets the worm, or old bait in this case. There is something really special about the lighting in the sky during the early morning hours from about an hour before sunrise to a couple hours after sunrise. Everything is waking up, life begins to stir again, and to me it is the most peaceful and positively beautiful part of the day. Most people don't get to experience this on a daily basis and 99% of people that look at my photos tell me how much they love my sunset photos as that is all they are used to seeing, when 99% of my sun photos are actually sunrises. As a general rule, the more clouds in the sky the better the reflections and scattering of colours; the old saying "Red sky at morning, sailors take warning" could be revised to "Red sky at morning, photographers get going" because if there is a storm on the horizon there are lots of thick clouds to produce very intense, bright, and contrasting colours that cover the whole range of visible spectrum. If you are lucky enough, and the storm is far enough away, the calm before the storm provides mirror-like water for brilliant reflections and intensifies the entire scene. If there are few to no clouds on the eastern horizon, the sunrise can be pretty boring (for photography purposes) and photo opportunities are usually over once the sun becomes visible, but when storm clouds are on the eastern horizon blocking the view of the rising sun, they can scatter and reflect the light for along time before and after actual sunrise creating otherworldly seascapes. In short, clouds are your friends.
