Waves Breaking

Waves breaking, by Mike Jackobo.

Waves breaking onto the rocky shore, as a storm is approaching the land. I made this photo at Neo Oitilo, in Mani. This seaside village is built at the end of a bay. The pieces of land that form the entrance of the bay, create the backdrop of the photo. The subject are of course the breaking waves.

I wanted to focus on the parallel lines created by the waves. As I trying to compose the frame through, I decided to open the field of view and include the two pieces of land in the background. The storm clouds did their part for an interesting sky. I did quite a few snaps in order to have a nice pattern in the waves. In the end I picked this one because of the “spike” in the front-most part of the sea. Later, in post production I enhanced the clouds in order to make them more dramatic. I hope I didn’t overdo it.

A Square Landscape

The original frame was in portrait (or vertical) orientation. I chose this frame because the two pieces of land could dominate the frame but did not fill and strangle the composition. There were also more clouds in the frame. The downside of this approach was that I also included a greater portion of the beach. The beach does not include something interesting though. So, almost half of the frame was just uninteresting rocks; not a good framing decision. For this reason I cropped the image to a square frame. It is really unusual choice for a landscape photo.

Most people try to create ultra-wide frames; either horizontal or even vertical. The square frame is quirky in terms of composing an image, that’s why it is seldom used in modern photography. For this photo, it worked in making a good image. But for landscapes it is not just a matter of skill. It also a matter of luck to encounter a location that fits this choice of a frame. He who seeks, finds!