Dubai Sunset
taken from the Crowne Plaza at Dubai Creek with the Burj Khalifa in the distance
taken from the Crowne Plaza at Dubai Creek with the Burj Khalifa in the distance
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Jan, 2017Views
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Awards
Peer Choice Award
People's Choice in The City On Fire Photo Challenge
Peer Award
Top Choice
Absolute Masterpiece
Outstanding Creativity
Magnificent Capture
Superb Composition
Top Ranks
Top 30 rank
Top 20 rank week 1
Top 30 rank
Top 20 rank
Top 30 rank
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Behind The Lens
Location
I took this from the Crowne Plaza in Festival City, Dubai, UAE while on leave from Afghanistan. The view is looking over Dubai Creek towards the city center with the Burj Khalifa in the background. I was in an elevated position which allowed for a nice panorama.Time
This was taken in the early evening after a day of riding dune buggies in the desert. My wife and I were enjoying some good food and craft beer when I saw the small boat coming down the river. As the sun sunk lower, I thought it would make for a nice composition to get the traditional style boat in line with the construction of the modern city and the backlight effect worked out nicely.Lighting
Just waning sunlight filtered through the usual dusty air, but I did a series of shots over about 30 minutes with different angles and this was the one of only a few where everything seemed to come together.Equipment
I shot this on my Sony a550 with the Sony 18-250mm lens.Inspiration
I first started tracking the boat as it was coming down the river, and after different shots of that and shots of the skyline, I wasn't terribly impressed with anything. As the boat came into frame with the city skyline and the light shifted, I started to like what I was seeing in the frame and was digging the whole mix of water, city, and sunset with the elements of old and new.Editing
The main thing I did in post-processing was remove a lot of dust spots! There were some other tweaks in Lightroom, but nothing major.In my camera bag
I've always got extra batteries, but unless I am shooting something specific, I tend to keep the gear as light as possible. For travel, I almost always have the 18-250mm lens (a550 and a77) or 24-240mm (a7r2) attached and sometimes I'll bring along the 50mm and a flash. I do carry a Gorilla Pod on occasion, it works well and is nicely compact.Feedback
This really just came down to always carrying the camera with me and then having patience with the shot. The pictures I thought would be interesting really weren't working, but just relaxing and giving time for the elements to come together worked out.
