Tuesday 12 November 2013

Not Dark Yet

There's a light, a certain kind of light ... (No, no, start again, let's not invoke the Bee Gees).

There's a special light at this time of year, that sometimes spreads over everything in the last half-hour or so before dark.  It falls after the famous Golden Hour, beloved of landscape photographers, and just before dusk and the gathering shadows; an eerie, even kind of pale fire that seems to emanate from the landscape itself.  It's a moment of sober intensity, suitable for making solemn vows and clear-eyed judgements:  "Let us not talk falsely now, the hour is getting late...".


We were up on the western remnant of Twyford Down on Sunday, looking across at St. Catherine's Hill, when that cold radiance of the dying light fell across the land.  I grabbed a few quick shots, in the full expectation I was wasting my time.  Hand-held low-light photography is never more than an act of faith.

But I must have accidentally pressed a previously-undiscovered [GLOAMING] preset, as I got one shot that -- with a little help -- is as close as I have yet come to capturing that elusive luminous quality.  "It ain't dark yet, but it's gettin' there".

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