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Louis Stacey captures a dreamy selection of landscapes at his local water’s edge, using the Spinnaker Tower as a focal point
A pair of N-photo readers present their image portfolios
Mission: Capture foggy photos to be proud of, using the Spinnaker Tower as a focal point Photographer: Louis Stacey Location: Gosport, Hampshire, UK
Kit used: Nikon D750, Sigma Art 18-35mm, Hoya PRO ND1000 Filter
Website: www.instagram.com/louisstacey
My journey into photography began in the summer of 2017, when I was after a telescope to look at the stars and the moon. Knowing this wasn’t going to be easily portable, I ended up getting a Nikon P900 bridge camera with a zoom equivalent of 2000mm – This gave me the reach I was after. I learned to shoot the moon in Manual mode, then
began trying landscape astrophotography and instantly found myself wanting more. A few months later, I had my first DSLR.
The waiting game
I live near to the Spinnaker Tower in Portsmouth, and have always wanted to shoot it in the fog with some colour from the sun just about breaking through. I remember seeing a similar image on Instagram, and thought I could come up with my own take on this rare, beautiful scene. I only live a 10-minute drive away, so it was easy for me to get to, but I ended up waiting a year for the weather to be right. There was fog a few times, but it never cleared in time for sunrise.
At the time of the shoot, I had only planned on taking the one image, but upon arrival I could see a couple of compositions before me. The light was changing rapidly, so I knew I had to work fast. I ended up trying a few shots from each angle, using an aperture of f/8 and fast shutter speeds to save more time. The two landscape photos were taken first, as the water was rather calm and I liked how it looked [1 + 2].
Here, I went for a faster shutter speed. The portrait image was shot with an ND filter (ND1000) because the water started getting a bit more choppy and I wanted to smooth it out – and I do love those long exposures [3]. I also closed the aperture to f/10, in case I wanted to brighten some of the foreground in post-production.
What I like about these images is the subtle gradient between the pastel shades of pink and blue in the sky, the feeling of isolation I get from looking at it and the fact that the fog has covered everything, leaving only the tower. In my opinion, it makes it a more prominent subject and a cleaner image. I also included a touch of foreground to try and add to the depth of the fog. You couldn’t see as much colour at the time of shooting, as the sun was so bright at times, but I was pleasantly surprised when pulling the highlights down. Having just a touch of foreground made the fog stand out more.
If I were to take these again I would try to capture some moving boats passing through, and would play around with trying to capture some long exposure trails.
I only live a 10-minute drive away, so it was easy to get to, but I ended up waiting a year for the weather to be right