nomadlens

Images of the South West
The golden crescent of Blackpool Sands near Dartmouth in the South Hams of Devon

Summer, Blackpool Sands

It was a beautiful sunny day here yesterday, the best of the year so far; t-shirt weather. Whilst we weren’t out it made me look forward to the summer so I’ve pulled this photo out from a couple of years ago that I’ve never done anything with before.

Blackpool Sands (no, not that Blackpool) is one of the prettiest of the South coast beaches, with a broad crescent of golden shingly sand backed by pines. It lies between Dartmouth (a few miles around the cornet to the North East) and the lengthy expanse of Slapton Sands (to the South West). On a sheltered East facing section of the coastline it is an ideal beach for swimming and families.

It is not that easy a beach to photograph as the A379 climbs hills on either side with no stopping places, leaving little option but to park for the beach and then climb the steep grassy hillside behind it.

It was actually the scene of a battle in 1404 when a french raiding party landed here and were defeated by a force assembled by the Mayor of Dartmouth (a few miles around the corner).

When I imagine summer in the South West it is images like this that come to mind!

Location

Blackpool Sands, Dartmouth, Devon, UK

EXIF

Camera: Olympus XZ-1
Lens: Olympus XZ-1 (built in lens)
Focal Length: 6mm
Aperture: ƒ/8
Shutter Speed: 1/400s
ISO: 100

  • Before-Summer, Blackpool Sands
    After-Summer, Blackpool Sands
    Before Summer, Blackpool Sands After

Image Details

Hardly the ideal lighting conditions but in processing this image I wanted to work with that and further intensify the feeling of the middle of the day in summer. The image was a stop underexposed anyway as the camera was picking up the sun which is not far out of camera (before cropping there is a massive flare across the bottom of this image, and another on the sea has been retouched) so I brightened it and countered that with a substantial contrast boost in Color Efex's Pro Contrast, along with a bit of Polarisation on the sky. It was then processed in Alien Skin Exposure with a mid-70s Kodak Ektachrome treatment, adding a slightly blue cast to the image that I like and bringing up the grass. That washed out the beach a little, which was repaired by warming it up in Viveza.

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