A tale of two sunsets and noon day sun in Scotland

At the end of April I ventured up to Scotland for a spot of dancing and birdwatching and doing some photography on the way.  I started by dropping into the capital of the Northumbrian kingdom Bamburgh with its dominating castle.  I was heading for the beach when the heavens opened: hail covered my parked car so I left to have a look at causeway to Holy Island.  As I left Holy Island the skies lifted the clouds broke - I decided unusually for me - to go back to Bamburgh and just check how the bright low sun was playing with the landscape in the bright clear air one get's after a storm.  I'm so glad I did:







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A tour of Fife on a sunny day lead me to Anstruther where - sad to report - I had terrible fish and chips on the harbour front.  But the harbour was busy and I wandered for an hour or so in the strong midday sun.  I'm finding that HDR does offer some relief from the powerful bleaching effect of strong sun on colour. It also allowed me to play more with the "sunburst" effect which is easily achieved stopping my Nikon 18-55mm lens down to about f22. A certain amount of retouching is required afterwards to remove intrusive lens flare - which is reinforced by HDR processing.  I try to position the flare in areas of flat colour to make this easier.

As I motored home the sun was setting to my right and it seemed worth a visit to the Holy Island causeway again. I caught it just right.  The sun was setting over the main land and the tide was exposing the causeway.  There is something mystical about the place with only the sounds of rushing water and sea birds.