New England Lighthouses

April 22, 2021

In 2020 I really struggled with creativity. It was hard to be inspired in a time where everything was locked down and people were isolated. I found that it was a really difficult time to create content and find something that I was passionate about. I spent a few weeks alone in my apartment and during that time it was really hard to become motivated about my work. I took the initiative to pick a project that would get me out of the house and help me create some work.

Being isolated from other people during this time I had to think of alternatives to portraiture. Earlier in the summer I acquired a 35 mm lens and a 16 stop ND filter to film long exposures of landscapes during the day (I’ll eventually post a blog about that) so it was a natural transition to work on seascapes. I don’t know how I landed on the idea of shooting lighthouses specifically, but within driving distance I had more options than I knew what to do with.

The first lighthouse I went to was Fort Pickering in Salem, Massachusetts. It was very easy to access, you could see the lighthouse and the sunset from the parking lot, and it also had access to the beach. I went down onto the beach and set the camera up by the water. I was there so long I ended up having to move because of the incoming tide. But it was all worth it to get this picture of this beautiful sunset.

For this shoot I didn’t have a lot of options. The way the lighthouse was situated against the land, I had to have the sunset to my back. I always try to get the lighthouse backlit— when the sun is behind the object you’re photographing, because that’s where most of the color usually is. However, on this day I got very lucky and the clouds lit up this gorgeous purple/pink color! I thought that this day was going to end up being a total bust, but it’s actually one of my favorite images in this whole series.

At times this project was very disheartening because it was never guaranteed to be a beautiful sunset with lots of colors. In fact, most of the times the colors were really lacking, or I wasn’t able to be in an opportune position to get the shot I wanted. Overall this exercise was very fun. I enjoyed the process of looking up lighthouses, planning which one I’d go to, and then scouting out a spot to set up for sunset. Most nights were a bust, and freezing cold, but I always had fun sitting out there and waiting for something to happen.

After two weeks of doing this I thought myself somewhat of a professional sunset watcher—I remember at one lighthouse I was packing up shop a few minutes before the “official” sunset time, and I had someone ask me where I was going- saying that, “it wasn’t over yet”. I looked at the sky, and with the clouds on the horizon, and after watching the sky for hours over the previous weeks, I could tell that the light had already peaked.

At it’s very core, photography comes down to instincts. What are your instincts telling you? Stick it out or risk it and move to a different spot? You’ll definitely make the wrong decision at times, but when it comes to creativity you have to let go a little and let things take their course. Trust what your gut is saying!

**Point Judith Lighthouse, Narraganset RI**

I hate shooting at a place that I haven’t had the time to scout. My images always turn out bad when I shoot at a new place I haven’t had the time to look around. I think what this comes down to is my uncertainty. I can’t just look at a space and say “Oh that tree’s going to be perfect”. My style involves a more hands on approach where I like to test out shots before I make my judgement.

So for this project I always tried to arrive at the lighthouse an hour before sunset would begin, so I had plenty of time to walk around and figure out where I wanted to setup. There were a lot of factors that varied from lighthouse to lighthouse— terrain, parking, and lighting were the biggest obstacles that I faced. I spent time walking around and testing compositions before settling down in one spot for the sunset.

Shooting the Dog Bar Lighthouse was an interesting experience. I was running late, and the sky was very cloudy. I thought that I wouldn’t get anything interesting from this shoot, but as I was driving down the scenic byway I came across this. There was a small parking lot off the side of the road overlooking a beach with this view. I had the good sense to pull over and snap a few shoots before I continued on my way. I had thought that I would’ve been able to get a better composition closer to the lighthouse, but I was very wrong. I ended up wasting my time driving down to the lighthouse because I just couldn’t get a good angle on the light coming through the clouds. When I looked back at the images I got, I was so thankful that I had stopped to take this photo!

**Dog Bar Breakwater Lighthouse, Gloucester MA**

Each lighthouse was a different experience for me. When I went home to CT for a week I tried something new— I revisited a lighthouse multiple times. Here are some examples of some of the different types of images I can get of the same lighthouse:

This is the Watch Hill Lighthouse in Westerly, RI. I revisited this lighthouse three times and each day the lighting was dramatically different, and the best shots that I got from each day ended up being very different angles.

On the first day (left) it was very overcast and there was little to no color in the sky. The best photo I took from this day was about 30 minutes before the sun even set, the rays were breaking through the clouds and it was the most action the sky had seen all evening. This day was my first day at the lighthouse, so I went for a straightforward approach and stayed on the property to get this photo. I set up the composition so that the fence would act as a leading line, but the parking lot takes up a large portion of the frame which distracts from the lighthouse and the sunset.

On the second day (center) I went there were very few clouds in the sky, so I had more time to walk around and scout out different angles than I did the previous day. I didn’t want the ugly parking lot and wooden fence to ruin my picture again, so I went down onto the rocks and got a different perspective. This photo is different from the others in my series, mainly because I use a foreground item— the fence, to create additional depth in this image. As an individual photo it’s nice, but it doesn’t really have a place in my larger series because it’s so different from the rest.

On the third day (right) I had gone back to the lighthouse and I was striking out. From the parking lot I had no view, and it was very windy so I did not risk rock climbing by myself to get a lower angle again. Just as I was on my way out of Watch Hill, after giving up, the clouds parted. I found a beach parking lot that I could see the lighthouse from and parked. I ended up climbed through my sunroof and sitting on the roof of my car to get this image using my 70-200. Is it a winner? Not really- but in my opinion it’s the best photo that I took of the Watch Hill Lighthouse.

Moral of the story? Keep working at it.

I’m going to keep working on this project, so if you have any lighthouse recommendations— LET ME KNOW!

New England Lighthouses

Flowers by Morgan