You can’t let the weather stop you when it comes to stone hunting or if you prefer, beach combing.
In fact wet weather can be a bonus as the colours will be highlighted by the water. I have been very selective in my choice of images below but perhaps Continue reading
You may gather from the photos I am posting for my walk this week which spans the two weeks of our holiday in Scotland in September, that we were staying on the coast – if the sunsets over the bay posted yesterday didn’t prove it, this seaweed will!
Having returned from the Horton and Port Eynon RNLI station, we set off again in the opposite direction for this Taste of Gower walk and visited The Old Salt House which stands on the rocks at the southern end of the beach. Originally used, as the name suggests, to harvest sea salt, the building is now in ruins but has an interesting history which can be read at the link above.
View from a musket loop in The Salt House at Port Eynon
My walk across Colwyn Bay beach was fairly brief but gave me some sense of the place in favourable conditions. The low sun revealed classic line patterns in the sand and it seemed to me that these were reflected in the patterns of the encrusted fence that surrounded the old pier.
My short walk this week across the beach at Colwyn Bay in North Wales presented some fabulous patterns. The dilapidated state of the old pier was protected by these barriers which have clearly been there long enough to gather a healthy collection of seaweed.
Decaying with time, these old trolleys create a strange cemetery in the mouth of the River Tawe, Swansea.
Those that already follow this blog will know that there is more to come throughout this week to tell the story of a recent walk in the docks/marina area of Swansea.
The walk was the second Mission Gallery Walk and Draw with Sarah Abbott that I have taken part in. On this occasion, while I did a little sketching, most of my drawing was with my DSLR camera, iPhone and small edirol sound recorder.
Having read that the winner of the Jerwood Drawing Prize this year was sound artist Alison Carlier, I felt that my description of drawing with my camera and sound recorder while out on pre-production recce walks for StillWalks videos, is perfectly valid.
With The Big Draw continuing throughout this month, perhaps it is an appropriate time to consider and enjoy the broadening definition of drawing.
On a windy day in Swansea Bay, watching the movements of the top layer of dry sand getting blown across the seaweed and other debris on the beach is as entertaining as watching the sea itself.
The action of waves in the sea can be mesmerising, but so too can the patterns created by the wind on dry sand as it catches the various objects and undulations of the beach. The sculptures created can be fascinating but watching them be created is even more so.
The camera does not see in the same way as the eye but in these images I think there is some advantage to the relatively narrow depth of field. The areas of blur seem to me to emphasise the atmosphere and effect of the conditions at the time. The textures that show through in the areas of sharpness combined with soft foreground / background, feel much more like it physically was than if everything was clean and crisp and static.
I hope the second sound clip from this photo shoot helps to “put you in the picture”. Even my home made wind shield could not handle the strength of the wind on the beach, but I decided that the distortion and break up of the sound was all a part of the character of the scene.
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