Looking back on this Taste of Gower walk at Oxwich Bay I think we would all agree that we were fortunate with the weather and the photo above, taken at Oxwich Bay Hotel, helps to confirm this.At a time of year when it can still be cold it was remarkably warm when in the shelter of Oxwich Burroughs.
Stripes of water and sand on the beach and stripes of cloud in the sky at Oxwich Bay (see below).
On my walk this week with the Taste of Gower walkers at Oxwich Bay, the walkers ahead of me stretch across the beach and as the sun comes round I find that using my zoom lens (a Canon 70-300 mm 1:4 – 5.6 IS USM for those of you who are interested) brings out the contrast of light and dark. This both emphasises the striped patterns on the beach and the shade of Oxwich point in the background.
During this Taste of Gower walk at Oxwich I had conversations with a couple of people about photography and the “rule” of not taking photographs into the sun or keeping the light behind you. It’s not a bad rule in general and particularly useful for holiday snapshots. Apart from any tricks of the trade which can be used when you need to shoot into the light, deliberately taking a shot against the light can give some very interesting results and indeed, if you want silhouettes this is the way to get them.
This shot of some of the Taste of Gower walkers on Oxwich Beach was take, as I discovered afterwards, at 12.01 or High Noon! For this reason I could not resist having a little play with Photoshop – see the last image below.
Crossing Oxwich Marsh towards the footbridge, the Taste of Gower walkers enjoy the sunshine and their company while I look on and enjoy the textures of the grasses and the colour of their costumes.
While the Taste of Gower walkers at Oxwich walk ahead of me I am able to take in some of the details of our surroundings both visually and aurally. Some of these details may be considered incidental or everyday things such as the seed head above, the horizontal shadow patterns of walkers legs or the vertical pattern of fence posts in perspective.
My walk this week is the first Taste of Gower walk of 2017 and took place at Oxwich where we walked through the burroughs (sand dunes with vegetation). The walk was led by James Malatynski and we had Charlotte Toft and Helen Nicholas from Gower Unearthed giving some informative talks along the way about the heritage of the area.
Having completed the circular walk from Rhosilli with Swansea Walking Forum and enjoyed the food at the Bay Bistro courtesy of the Gower Landscapes Partnership “Tastes of Gower “project, I walked down the steep footpath to Rhosilli beach. On the way down I could see in the distance a couple walking out along the beach. By the time I was down on the beach and had taken some sandy photos (to be posted on Saturday), they were heading back towards me.
There is nothing like people in a scene like this to give a true sense of scale!
