In the past six weeks, I’ve photographed more sunsets than I can count along the coast. As someone who primarily shoots land, I’ve learned a lot about ocean photography and have compiled some of the most important lessons I’ve learned for your next seascape location.
Whether you’re new to the hobby or an inquisitive pro, there’s always a lot to learn and I couldn’t be more excited to push myself into new territories. I have photographed a few seascapes over the years, but they are few and far between. Living in my SUV and having the freedom to sleep on the beach literally meant that I had a crash course into a field of photography that was new to me. Some of the lessons are simple, while others are definitely a bit eye-opening, including falling into the water but thankfully I just took a dip and not my gear.
In this part of the series, I’ll introduce you to opening up your world of new photos without getting yourself too wet, explaining the importance of weather forecasting along the coast, and finally Lessons to predict composition with moving parts.
Into the water!
We’ll start with a tip that will give you the highest ratio of better images with the least amount of effort. While there are many spots where you won’t even find yourself near the water, times like these you’ll want the ability to get in the water. I spent a lot of time without being able to get into the water comfortably. In a tough situation, you can roll up your pants and go barefoot, but I wouldn’t recommend using it for continuous dives. Sometimes whatever I’m walking through isn’t soft sand. Or in a location like Iceland, the water can be unbearably cold and you can’t keep your feet in the water for too long.
Flip-flops or sandals aren’t good either, as you’ll lose them by the tide and they don’t solve the heat problem. Boots are a great place to start, but I decided to go all out and get busty runners. Although I don’t win any fashion contests, I don’t worry about getting wet at all. This is very important to me because I don’t have the freedom to go back home or hotel and dry off. The ability to slide on the amphibious vehicles I usually wear, into the water, and then back into my vehicle at dusk. Being completely dry after removing them is a game changer. This makes it possible for me to go into the water every night without thinking or worrying as much about getting wet.
Regardless of what you choose that best suits your situation, being able to comfortably stay in the water for long periods of time will make you feel like a different photographer. Seriously, I would compare it to just owning a telephoto lens and adding a wide-angle lens to your kit. Going into the water will open up a lot more unique compositions. I’ve spent too many times running away from waves and water in other locations, which causes more stress than necessary. The first time you walk into the water without worrying about getting cold and wet will change your enjoyment and perspective on the marine landscape. If you find yourself underwater, you will need to be extra careful depending on the conditions of the ocean.
Predict weather and surf conditions
As a landscape photographer, I have a potentially controversial opinion that predicting the weather has very little weight when it comes to good results. Of course, there is a time and place to measure conditions such as fog, cloud inversion, and clear skies for astrophotography. I also realized that I am spoiled with the ability to stay in an area until I get to the condition I want. Most people (myself included not too long ago) have to try to plan around the right weather conditions, especially when planning weekend trips. I can say with confidence that trying to use weather predictions along the coast is mostly a waste of time.
The image above was taken on an overcast and extremely rainy day. I remember paying to park and thinking there was absolutely no way I would see the sunset that evening let alone capture anything worthwhile. I was definitely wrong and went on to capture some of the strongest natural colors I’ve ever seen in photography. That was over four years ago.
Rainy days all day gave me some of the best conditions I could look forward to, while weather conditions seemed so ideal that I couldn’t even get the camera out of my pocket. One of the biggest culprits you’ll find along the coast is the sea layer, which killed off a good portion of the sunset I tried to capture. In my experience, rainy days that clear a lot of particles from the atmosphere while providing cloud cover usually provide excellent conditions as long as the rain dissipates sufficiently during the golden hour. My final piece of advice is to stay out there regardless of the conditions.
However, there are conditions you should always check to see if you’re going to be near the surface of the water and those are the tidal, swell, and swell periods. Tides indicate when the sea will be highest and lowest relative to the land you are standing on. The swell indicates the average height of those waves. The blooming period is the time between episodes. One important thing to know is that the longer the swelling time, the stronger the wave will be. So a 5 ft rise over an 8 second period is not the same as a 5 ft puff over a 15 second period. To track this down, I highly recommend using the very popular app Windy. It tells you everything you could possibly want to know when it comes to weather, surf and wind conditions. Furthermore, it has forecasting and modeling data from multiple sources. Magicseaweed is a great app dedicated to tide, swell and surf data. This will overlap with Windy, but it’s always good to have multiple apps in case something goes wrong with one of them.
Prediction of components
Unlike many other areas of landscape photography, some seascapes require you to predict and visualize what the image might look like if everything fits perfectly. This is not like planning something like a photograph of the Milky Way or arranging certain elements because you can predict those conditions very accurately with modern technology. When it comes to waves and their interactions on shore, there’s nothing to tell you exactly where they’ll be, whether they’ll be interesting enough, or even if they’ll work in the layout you’re looking for. try to shoot.
I could write endlessly about the different compositions you can find along the coast, but for this I will focus specifically on practicing and learning how to find shots that aren’t quite right. stay there until the right moment happens. Take for example the moment above. There are many great elements that we look for as landscape photographers: atmospheric colors, bright sunlight, foreground elements to help the viewer through the image, color reflections nice on the wet rock surface and we even got some movement in the waves. Even with all of that, it was severely lacking in emotion. A dull moment in a beautiful scene. But here’s what you’ll see when you scan the coastline, only a few rocks hit by the waves. You can easily pass by this area without thinking twice.
However, if you just stop and take a few minutes to soak up your surroundings, you might notice this composition coming to life in all the right waves (I like the pun). The tides hitting the rock below add an extra moment of turbulence, and if the bulge is large enough, they add a lot of energy to that empty part of the frame. Now you are capturing an emotional moment in a beautiful scene, which makes for a much more interesting photo. It’s something that will never happen again in the same way, and that’s what’s so beautiful about the seascape. They change constantly, which means you can go back to where you turned 100 times and get something new.
What this means for the first, tenth, or even thousandth time when you’re photographing a seascape is to slow down. Visit spots when the light isn’t good and see how the tides interact with your location. Start to consider what their potential might be rather than what they are at any given time.
We’ll talk more about this in the second part of this series, where I visited the same place for almost a week trying to capture the same image that I had in my head and couldn’t seem to get it. get the conditions I need. We’ll also slow down your shutter speed so you can capture all these beautiful moments in more interesting ways and include accessories or other methods you’ll need when shooting along seaside.
