About the Image(s)

First Light at Bodie Light

Nikon D850, Nikkor 24-70 lens @ISO 400, f13, 1/100, with polarizer and tripod.

Back in April I visited Bodie Light on North Carolina’s Outer Bank from early evening to dawn the following morning. I brought home a plethora of images but failed to capture the one shot I really wanted, the Milky Way over the lighthouse due to a lack of cooperation from the clouds. This month’s selection was the last image I captured in the morning before I departed and was taken just as the sun was rising. There was considerable planning that went into this image. Since I was on site all night I spent some of the last hours before daybreak working on creating a suitable composition. As the dawn began to break I took several shots during the blue hour that I was quite happy with but I kept visualizing the first light of the golden hour tinting the lighthouse with golden hues that I thought would work well with the golden hues of the grasses along the boardwalk. The problem was the first light of the sun while catching and tinting the lighthouse, was being blocked by distant trees from lighting the grass and left much grass too dark and without golden hues. I tried several exposures and was not satisfied. Part of the problem was a strong breeze that kept the grass moving and required a fast shutter speed to keep them from blurring. As the sun got higher a pair of wonderful pink clouds began blowing across the background. To my delight I was getting a double tint on the tower of the lighthouse. The bright white of the tower was picking up some blue tones reflected from the sky and some rose tones reflected from the clouds. I really liked these reflections. Since there were two separate clouds I decided I wanted to use them as a frame, placing one on each side of the lighthouse. Due to the sun being intermittingly blocked by the clouds out of camera view to the east I had to shoot whenever the sun broke through the clouds and lit the tower. This shot was the best I could get with clouds on both sides and the tower lit by sunlight

However I was not really pleased by the wide expanse of grass on both sides. I finally decided on a bit of Photoshop magic to solve the problem. I simply moved both clouds closer to the lighthouse and settled for a square composition. This gave me grasses with shadows and textures and not as much blank area on the left side. It also seems to make the lighthouse feel more intimate and kept all the tones and hues reflecting on the tower. Finally, it allowed for a more meaningful frame from the two clouds. I’ve posted both images, the wide view and the condensed view for your inspection. I’ll be interested which you prefer.

One final note. The main building on the right side appears to have some blue tint on the wall of the upper story. Those blue tints were actually present and I assume they were caused by the reflected light of the sky on the white wall. If you look carefully you will see the same blue tint on the left side of the lighthouse tower. Part of my planning for this shot included the fact that I wanted the golden hour tint to appear on the lighthouse. This required shooting for the high light tones on the house which required careful spot metering and a bit of underexposing to make certain that the light would not burn out the light tints. The double tint (the blue and the gold on the tower) are one of the reasons I particularly like this image particular image. I feel they add something to the overall appearance and are something I do not usually see in sunrise images.