As promised here is one of the photographs from my recent sunset shoot on Windover Hill. Due to the extreme range of exposure between the sky and the foreground I used 7 shots combined to produce this HDR (High Dynamic Range) shot of Firle Beacon with the setting sun. I'll try to post a few more from the trip as they are processed.

If you want to visit this location for yourself it can be easily accessed from the A27 by taking the Wilmington turn off between Lewes and Polegate. Follow the country road past the Long Man of Wilmington and continue up the hill until you come to a small chalk parking area on the right, with views across to Alfriston. From the car park cross the road and go through the gate which puts on onto the path up to the Long Man. A few yards after the gate on your left you will find the discarded farm machinery used as foreground in this photograph.

I have marked the parking area on this map from Google

Firle Beacon Sunset on the South Downs

The weather has been fantastic recently, although the skies were a bit bland for any exciting photography. Clear blue skies whilst nice for walks and days out are just not as exciting as those filled with wispy or fluffy clouds. This combined with numerous PC problems meant I hadn't gotten out much, but last night I was finally able to fit in a trip to the South Downs.

I started my journey by visiting a new location I've been working on up behind Alfriston. I arrived at about 7:45pm and the sun was just starting to produce the low golden light that I was looking for. My goal was to capture the rolling landscape bathed in the warm light. I ended up trekking up hill towards the South Downs way before finding a spot that seemed to work. After spending some time with a couple of compositions I wasn't that enthused by the shots I was taking.

Instead I decided to revisit a location on Windover Hill by the Long Man to capture the sunset in the distance behind Firle Beacon. I arrived as the sun was rapidly sinking and had to move fast to start the walk up the hillside. After passing through the first gate I spotted an old piece of farm machinery next to the path. It had been there for a long time as it was a nice rusty colour and somehow I’d never really taken it in before. The sun was perfectly placed behind the plough and the opportunity was too good to miss.

I was using my trusty 17-40mm lens on the 1D MkIIN with mirror lockup and shutter release. As a side I really need to replace the shutter release cable as the wire must be damaged since it only fires when held at specific angles. Initially I fitted a Cokin P121 ND Grad filter hoping to hold back the bright sun to retain some foreground details. It was however not enough to balance the exposure and since I’ve not had good results by stacking filters I decided to instead go for bracketed exposures instead.

This process required a bit more work to get it right and more processing afterwards to combine the exposures but it is much better at handling greater extremes of exposure. I removed the ND Grad filter and whilst working AV priority at F/14 I went about making a number of exposures of the scene, adjusting the exposure compensation by 2/3s of a stop each time. After completing 5 or 6 frames I moved onto the next composition.

Having had a quick review of the shots this morning I think I’ve got one workable sequence that looks pretty good. I’ll need to spend some time processing the RAW files and merging the exposures to complete the photograph.

After capturing the sunset I waited a few minutes to see if the sky would provide any further excitement but it was obviously not in the mood so I packed up and set off for home. Passing the Long Man through Wilmington village I spotted an unusual scene which I had to shoot. The nearly full moon was out and up behind the hillside in the perfect spot to capture with the Long Man. Since it was only a few minutes after sunset there was enough light to capture the scene with a long exposure.

I parked up at the car park and jogged onto the Long Man path looking for a spot to set up the tripod. I didn’t have time to fully close in on the Long Man so I picked a spot very close to where I was shooting a sunrise a month or so ago. Again I needed to bracket the shots to capture some foreground detail whilst retaining detail in the moon. Having reviewed the shots I’m not sure I underexposed quite enough but since I work in RAW I have some latitude for correction. For my foreground detail shots I was shooting at 2 seconds to capture enough light. I think the shot may work but if the composition is not right I’ll certainly consider returning sometime soon to try a re-shoot, perhaps when it’s actually a full moon behind. I can’t recall ever seeing this scene at dusk or night so I’m quite driven to try and photograph it.

I’ll try to update this blog with some of the final shots once they’re processed. Until then remember to put the 24^th June in your calendar as I’ll be exhibiting around 24 photographs at Eastbourne Framing Centre on the corner of Grove Road and Terminus road, by the mini roundabout and Eastbourne library. I hope to see you there.

With some interesting clouds forming yesterday evening I decided to head out for a trip around the South Downs near Arlington in the hope of capturing some oilseed photographs. I was out for a couple of hours driving the lanes, parking up, walking around and then jumping back into the car and I came away with nothing to show for it. It was like a case of photographer's block hit me and none of the views seemed to work. I had a few ideas for shots in mind and at all but one location I didn't even unpack the camera. I think I need to head further afield to try some new locations to give me a fresh perspective.

I ended the trip by climbing Windover hill in hope of capturing a sunset behind Firle Beacon. As the time wore on I realised that it was looking far to hazy and not likely to produce what I wanted to capture so I bailed and returned home. In hindsight I wish I'd waited the extra 30 minutes to see what developed but looking out the window at home there was very little colour in the sky and the clouds had blown through leaving little interest in the sky. I'm planning to try that spot again as I think it has potential but I'll head out later in the evening to give me less waiting around.