Ruben Nilsson Photography
Svenska

The quay at night

A January night on the waterfront: floodlights, a canal, and a promenade that keeps changing its mind about colour.

After dark the waterfront becomes a set of separate stages: the lit deck, the orange walkway, the canal under its low bridge, and a white glare where something is being built. The eye keeps choosing one and losing the others.

The last two frames are the same bench and the same minute. Hold the shutter open for three seconds and the walkers turn into smears; close it in under one and they come back, one of them in red, as if the place had been waiting for someone to stand still.

The quay

A night view along a waterfront from a wooden deck, a canal and a low bridge in the middle, a lit stone building and coloured lamps on the left, a floodlit construction site reflected in the water on the right.
The canal 28 mm · f/8 · 6s · ISO 100
A paved waterfront square at night with a zebra crossing in the foreground, rows of white and coloured lights above a low glass building, a red sign and a dark canal with a lit bridge at the right.
The crossing 24 mm · f/8 · 2.5s · ISO 100
A long-exposure night view over a waterfront promenade, a row of orange-lit benches and a lit wooden walkway leading to a canal bridge, a bright white construction glare and office windows behind, empty paving in the foreground.
The empty promenade 24 mm · f/8 · 13s · ISO 100

The same bench, twice

The last pair was made five seconds apart, with the shutter held open for three seconds and then for less than one. Nothing in the scene moved except the people.

A waterfront promenade at night with a blurred figure walking past a low bench, white light streaking along a barrier and a red point of light behind, the paving lit warm orange.
Three seconds 24 mm · f/8 · 3.2s · ISO 100
A person in a red jacket standing at a railing on a waterfront promenade at night, another walker blurred at the left, a lit bench and canal bridge behind, the paving warm under the lamps.
Less than one 24 mm · f/8 · 0.8s · ISO 100

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