Collieston, Aberdeenshire. Nov 2013. This photo I took, with its flat sky, wonky horizon and lack of drama is quite frankly, dull. The sea was epic after big storms, the sun was going down and I had my new digital SLR camera with fancy lens, but somehow I failed to capture any sense of scale of the scene in front of me…. and I found it very, very frustrating. I went home and put the camera away for a good few months and read everything I could find about landscape photography, and composition and accessories (like a tripod and filters – yes I was a complete novice!), and slowly I began to understand what was missing from my utterly average attempt at capturing drama in a single image. Technical stuff aside I think I didn’t have a picture in my mind of what I was trying to achieve. I was simply pressing the shutter when a big wave came in and hoping for the best and it hadn’t worked.
Collieston, Aberdeenshire. December 2015 Fast forward 2 years…… same location, same time of year, big sea (better sky right enough), but this time I had an understanding of composition, the camera accessories needed and most importantly an image in my mind of what I was trying to achieve….. and bingo! I made a photograph that I am very pleased with. I wanted to show what I felt when I was standing there being blasted by the freezing wind with salt spray soaking me, and the sound of the wild sea. A slightly more inspiring photograph than my first attempt if I say so myself, but it did take me a lot of effort to understand the photographic process and make it work for me.
Shona Grant visual artist 