23 December 2024

The lights along the water

Seven minutes on a wooded hill above the city, while the lamps came on and the sky gave up its last grey.

From the top of the hill the city is one lit edge between black woods and a pale strip of water. By four in the afternoon the lamps were already on in rows, but the sky still held enough light to show the ridge on the far side.

Nothing happened in those seven minutes except that the balance changed. The water went from grey to blue, the far shore lost its hills, and the lights took over the picture one street at a time.

The view from the hill

A city at dusk seen from a wooded hill, hundreds of lit windows in rows below, a band of pale water beyond and dark hills under a heavy grey sky, bare branches in the foreground. — Lights along the shore 65 mm · f/8 · 8s · ISO 100

The same dusk view with a darker sky and softer light, the far shore fading into mist, the city lights reflected faintly in the water. — Two seconds 65 mm · f/8 · 2s · ISO 100

A wide dusk view over a city and a broad stretch of water, the far shoreline a continuous line of lights beneath low hills, treetops black in the foreground. — The wide water 34 mm · f/5.6 · 8s · ISO 100

The same view, later

The last three frames were made in the same quarter of an hour, at three focal lengths: a wide look across the water, a longer lens on the houses at the edge, and then the widest view of the evening, with the bare trees kept in the frame.

The city at dusk with the water flat and grey, the distant hills almost lost, a few foreground branches catching the last light. — The far shore 34 mm · f/5.6 · 2s · ISO 100

A dense field of city lights across the middle distance, low apartment blocks and lit streets below, a wide grey-blue bay and a dark ridge beyond. — Houses at the edge 70 mm · f/8 · 6s · ISO 100

A very wide dusk view with bare trees at the left, the city a low band of warm lights between dark woods and a long pale bay, a faint amber glow on the horizon under heavy cloud. — The last of the grey 24 mm · f/5.6 · 25s · ISO 100

6 photographs · Click a photograph to open it full screen. · 2 sections