There's something cathartic about walking around water. The sound it makes washing against the rocks helps soothe the mind and soul in a way that few things can. My wife and I spent a few days in Galveston, Texas this week for work but we did manage to sneak away to walk out onto a rock jetty and feel the wind and salt air.
After reading Daniel J. Wood's excellent intro to street photography post, I was dying to take my camera out and take some walking shots. The weather the day before had been incredible, the sun rising form the water like a fiery orb. The trouble was, work came first so I pushed off my photo trip until the next day. We woke up to this pea soup style fog at 6:30 a.m., barely able to see the water from our hotel on the beach. We decided to head out anyways and use the moodiness of the weather to get some haunting, vintage style photos.
I packed my Nikon D750 with only my 50mm 1.8D and headed down to the rock jetty outside of our hotel. The day before the beachside was full of people but with the descent of the fog, we had the jetty mostly to ourselves. The more I look over the photos the more I realize my love for moody, high contrast photography. There's a grittiness to the images that comes from heightened detail and vignettes.
I've struggled with finding a distinct style for my photography but if I had to make a choice, it would tend toward the look and feel of these images. The gray and cool tones just really feel like me at the moment. I'm sure that will change at some point, but right now I'm all about pulling the melancholy out of an environment.
So even if the weather doesn't cooperate, take some pictures. You never know what lies just behind the fog.
