Show Notes

A little bit late on this one! But it was an extremely fun day of photography. 

My friend and I went to the beach one evening to explore along the remote sandy beach. To get to the beach we had to walk several kilometres through a wonderful pine forest, which was planted to stabilise the shifting sand dunes along some areas of the Moray Coast. 

As we finally arrived on the sandy beach we passed an amazing forest of trees that had all died, it was an eerie but fascinating sight and my imagination immediately began to think of compositions for this unique feature. 

We sat down on the beach and had a hot chocolate from a thermos, while sitting on a driftwood tree a gannet feeding frenzy was diving into the waters in front of the beach. It is an amazing sight to see hundreds of birds acting as arrows flying through the sky and plunging into the cold waters of the Moray Firth. I was sure that there may have been dolphins in the fray but we couldn’t see them or we missed it every time they breached. I later found out from Twitter that there had indeed been dolphins among the gannets! 

After witnessing the birds manic diving session, I wandered along the beach looking for some detailed photography compositions. I couldn’t find anything on the beach, beautiful though it was. My whole imagination had been taken up by the dead forest. 

So, inevitably I made it over to the forest and explored various compositions. Trying different aspects that I use when photographing a forest. I even tried to capture the scale of the forest by taking a panorama that stitched beautifully in Lightroom. 

Finishing up with the forest I turned to see amazing sunset colours and I just ran down the beach, leaving the film camera behind to capture the amazing colour and light. Not a spectacular composition but the light was amazing! 

The last shot was a bonus I captured on the walk out. No time to film as it was still over an hour to the car and the light was fading fast, but I had to get the last shot and it was definitely worth it! 

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Onto the Images

After failing to find a beach composition, I couldn’t stop thinking about the dead trees among the grass. All around Scotland forests were planted in sand dunes to stop them from shifting and blowing away, which has created beautiful beach forests.

But this is the only place I have been to were there was a large area of dead trees, probably killed by tapping into the salt water around them. I was fascinated!

Walking into the marram grass my first instinct was to pick a tree and isolate it from the jumble of dead trees. This one was easily isolated.

I used a wide aperture to diffuse the background, a polariser to reduce the glare of the backlit sun, which, when combined with a 10 stop ND filter, created this wonderful ethereal and magical colour to the marram grass.

You can see why this tree captured me, the shape is simply amazing! The colourful living forest in the background off set the dead tree in shape, colour and texture and I thought that it would make an interesting image.

I’m not sure if a portrait image works in 16:9 crop, although it lends itself to a bookmark…

Because this landscape was completely knew to me, I wanted to try and make a composition that showed its unique nature. The first attempt was just to grab a picture of it, but I’m not happy with this really. Which is why I tried a panorama later on…

This turned out to be my favourite shot of the forest and it fits with the mantra I use when out taking photos:

K.I.S.S. - Keep It Simple Stupid!

By getting closer in on the scene, it reduced the chaos of the forest and focused on the contrasting textures and colours and the repeating pattern of the straight trees. Forest photography is the sub genre of landscape photography that requires the K.I.S.S. mantra more than any other form of landscape photography.

The whole forest reminded me of something from the USA or Australia, but I certainly would not have associated the images I managed with Scotland!

My second attempt to capture the scale of the forest and to put it in its context. I’m not going to lie the panorama process was not straightforward!

There was quite a bit of camera shake at first so I used a 10 second timer, while I was doing it I wasn’t sure if Lightroom would be able to stitch together such a complicated landscape but it worked really well!

The only other issue was that while I was taking the exposures the light changed slightly and one side is a bit more golden than the other.

Other than those little hiccups, it was a success!

Doing the panorama the sunset began behind me and the colours were developing beautifully! So I just had to ditch the vlogging gear and run off down the beach to capture the light.

I didn’t have time to find a composition that was more interesting with foreground interest or some other subject. I wanted to capture that light and it became the subject. A simple leading line along the beach and boom, snap away as the light changed.

Landscape photographers can be a little reluctant to crop or change a composition once they got it on the computer but these 3 images of the sunset were all taken from a single tripod placement.

It shows that as the light changes, you can create different yet related images based on how you crop or orientate the aspect ratio of an image. Simple changes, most completed on the computer can create new compositions!

Be bold when editing your landscape photos!

As we started the long hike back to the car, the sun was fading fast. I was sure that my day had finished but back on the path behind the trees, I loved their silhouetted shape sticking up into the colourful sky!

Quick couple of snaps as a bonus to top of the day. Then we continued the long hike back to the car, through the dark forest. On the way we had several chance encounters with cyclists biking around the forest in the dark with no lights!

It was a lot of fun!

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About the Film

Just a little information about the film and how I made it, as well as some links to equipment.

I edited the film using the Free Version of DaVinci Resolve. It’s an incredibly powerful piece of software that I am still trying to understand and will possibly write an article about in the future.

The tracks featured in today’s film were licensed via a subscription with Epidemic Sound. (By following that link, if you purchase a subscription then I will be gifted with a month free for referring you to their services)

• Last Sunrise in the Wasteland by At The End of Times, Nothing

• Lunar Flux by Of Water

• Forest Pond With Stars by Polar Nights

• Symphony Heartbeat by Tape Machines

A short Kit List

These are affiliate links, which means if you follow them and make a purchase I will earn a small commission for referring you to Amazon UK. You can find out more about affiliate links here.

Main Vlog Camera is a simple Panasonic G80 with the kit lens, its a great little mirrorless camera that I got for the sole purpose of creating YouTube videos. It’s capable of filming in 4k and seems to do everything that I want it to.

Rode Mic, I got this little microphone to boost the audio quality from the inbuilt microphone.

Action Camera, I use this to film myself when walking. It’s a simple DJI Pocket Osmo camera that has a motorised 3 axis gimbal head, which means that I stay in focus and static while the landscape around me moves. It’s also capable of filming in 4k and the audio quality is quite good.

Voice Recorder, to boost the audio quality when it’s windy or I’m using the action camera I use this handy little voice recorder with a lapellier microphone to record audio.

For a complete Landscape Photography Kit List you can read through what equipment I take with me when I go out here.

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Written by Daniel Long

Daniel Long created DRL Photography as a place to showcase his work as a photographer. Daniel has learnt a lot about photography and wishes to impart this knowledge with you, although the world is an ever changing place and he always says “you can never learn everything.” So as he makes his way, he continues to learn knew techniques, skills and information about photography. He focuses on Landscape and Wildlife photography and Daniel has a special focus on Scotland, his home away from home. As well as writing about photography and taking pictures out in the field, Daniel offers guided photography days so he can share his knowledge and locations in an effort to give his clients the best opportunities possible. Have a browse around this website to see his images, guided experiences and articles about photography. If you have any questions don’t hesitate to get in contact.