Porthcurno beach
Photographing Surfers at Porthcurno
Sometimes things don’t go to plan… and sometimes that is just fine!
On this day, I had gone out with the plan of doing some woodland photography to capture the changing colours in the trees as autumn takes hold. I was even hopeful to find some mist as I drove west toward Land’s End with Trevaylor Woods in mind.
However, that was not meant to be. After a quick stop to grab a sandwich, a downpour made me think twice about the woods, as I know from painful experience just how muddy and boggy Trevaylor can be. So instead, I drove on with no real plan until I saw the sign for Porthcurno and thought… why not?
Porthcurno is a beach I have visited before. It is one of Cornwall’s most popular in the summer months and even in winter attracts a large number of visitors. Whilst not a massive beach by any means, its location makes it a go-to destination for locals and visitors alike, sitting directly below the Minack Theatre, set into the cliffs, with beautiful views across to Logan Rock on the Treryn Dinas.
After parking, I walked down to the beach planning some long exposure shots of the waves across a small area of rocks I’m familiar with. But when I arrived, I saw two surfers in the distance and instead made these my initial focus.
Surfing under Logan Rock
When I got out of my car to walk down to the beach, I decided against taking my 150mm-500mm since I wouldn’t need it for long exposure seascapes. Thankfully, my 70mm-200mm was in my bag, allowing me to capture these shots, although I was right at the limit of my reach. This lens is very old; in fact, it’s an early F4 with no image stabilization, so I had to bump my ISO a touch to 400 to get a fast enough shutter speed. Luckily, this beach is south-facing, and the sky was mostly clear, giving plenty of light.
Surfing at Porthcurno
The two photos above we my first edits from the shots I took. ( some 300 shots! ) But it was the day after when I checked my images again that I decided to edit this shot below which is by far my favourite of the surfers of the day!
Surfing at Porthcurno
This was shot a little wider, at just over 100mm, as I was trying to capture more of the rock—not an easy task since I also wanted the surfer in the left of the frame to have room for him to move within the image. Working handheld and being at the mercy of the sea and a surfer deciding to catch a wave in the right spot took a little patience. But I think it paid off.
Eventually the surfers moved across the beach and were no longer against these rocks and so I went back to plan A to try and capture a long exposure of the sea against the rocks on the beach. This didn’t go as well as the surfer photos and I confess to getting a wet foot, but I grabbed a few decent photos all the same. ( I hope! )
Long exposure beach photography at Porthcurno
Distant rain at Porthcurno
There was a short shower whilst I was on the beach, once it passed over I just managed to catch it in this shot (above) on the horizon although it may be hard to work out from the bright sun back lighting it.
Porthcurno Beach
Boy in the sand
This final shot (above) was perhaps my overall favourite... if not, it’s a very close second to the surfer! At this point, I had my tripod set up and was trying to catch favourable waves with a slightly longer exposure of around 1/3 second when two children started to play in front of me. I caught a few of them running back and forth in the sea, but with my shutter set just a little too long, those shots didn’t work. However, in this shot, this lad walked in front of me and stood just still enough to capture the moment at 1/25 second. I’ve edited out a few distractions in the sand but left his footprints intentionally. I would have liked him a few feet to the left, but I’m not sure it would have been right of me to direct him! :-)