Behind The shot With Glen Fisher
One photographer. One image. The story behind the shot.
This is not a photograph I would have made even four or five months ago, let alone a year or five years back.
It was taken in April, during a photography workshop in Assynt, in the far north-west of Scotland. At the start of the week our workshop leader Simon Berry told us what he hoped for us. That we would come away with three good photographs that were just a level or two higher than any work we had done before.
The countryside up there is wild and rugged. Yellow gorse tumbling down steep hillsides, lochs and rivers glinting in the changing light, clouds and mist drifting in the early morning. Each day we were out before sunrise, trudging in wellies and rainproof gear with tripods and backpacks over reeds and marshland, looking for the right spot and the right light and the right framing. Then we would wait. An hour, two hours, three. For the sun to rise, for the clouds to move into place, for the light to catch those branches or touch the tips of the reeds or lift the shadows. Waiting for a moment of stillness and magic.
On this particular morning we were, on the face of it, disappointed. The clouds hung grey and low over the hills and water and the sun failed to appear. But standing there in the cold damp marshland, looking out toward this lone tree on its rocky outcrop, I could see in my mind's eye a black and white image pared back to its most basic elements. Along with the framing the key thing was the exposure. I was not really familiar with ND filters and long exposures so getting this right was a matter of drawing on everything I had learned through trial and error over the course of the week.
I'm pretty happy with the result. But what I remember most is not the moment of pressing the shutter. It is the place. The time, the scents, the chill in the air, the hills and water and the light.
Although I have to say that yes, this is a photograph I could not have made just a few months before.
You can follow Glens work on foto @glenfisherfoto or on his website glenfisherfoto.com
