Whenever my wife Liz and I go on a holiday to somewhere new in the UK we always buy an Ordinance Survey map of the locality before setting off.
We use the maps to spot interesting features to explore and photograph, such as castles, mountains, waterfalls and, in my case, lighthouses.
I have a thing about lighthouses, as I find them very evocative, representing in my mind notions of departure and arrival, of danger and rescue, of light in the darkness and other such concepts.
So on our two week trip to northwest Scotland in the October of 2022 I was delighted to spot the Rua Reidgh lighthouse on our map, just a few miles north of where we were staying at Aultgrishan and perched on a cliff overlooking the vast expanse of the Atlantic ocean, with only the island of Harris and Lewis between the light and America, 3,000 miles away to the west.
So it was with great excitement that we drove up the single track road to the lighthouse, to see and photograph the views at this dramatic location.
It was getting late when we arrived, and with the sun dipping down towards the horizon it struck me as the ideal opportunity to shoot this time lapse video of the sunset behind the lighthouse.
However, with the skies clouding up rapidly the sun soon disappeared, but undeterred I kept on filming as the light levels fell and the beams from the lighthouse lit up the enroaching darkness.
It was pretty much fully dark when I finally stopped shooting, and it was a very careful drive back along that winding clifftop road to our AirBnB and a cup of hot coffee.
But what a magnificent and remote coastline!
Filename - rua reidh lighthouse timelapse 01
Camera - Canon EOS 6DMK2
Lens (1st clip) - 24-105mm zoom @ 45mm
Lens (2nd clip) - 24-105mm zoom @ 24mm
Exposure (start of sequence) - 1/1000 sec @ f/4, ISO100
Exposure (end of sequence) - 1.6 secs @ f/4, ISO100
Filters - 2 stop neutral density graduated filter used to reduce the brighness of the sky relative to the land.
Shooting interval - 3 secs
Music - Bach Cello Suite No. 1, G Major, Prelude - Cooper Cannell
Location - Rua Reidgh, northwest Scotland
This clip - HD 720p, 30fps (4K and 1080p HD formats also available)
Clip duration - 47 seconds
All content copyright © Howard Litherland 2009-2023 unless otherwise stated.