Image Details
This view has long been my wife's favourite, and not long after coming to live in Wester Ross I decided to go and photograph it. Isabel came along too, not something she usually does when I go out hunting for landscapes, but I guess she just wanted to make sure I made a good job of it!
It was not a very promising start, quite overcast. However there was light rain falling and I always feel that rain somehow intensifies the colours. This viewpoint is about 40 minutes drive from home and the same dull conditions were present at the scene when we arrived.
The obvious place to shoot this view is from the hill top viewpoint, but some insensitive brutes in our elecricity supply company have ran pylons part way down the hill right in front of the viewpoint. What is wrong with the people who plan these things? I guess they have no soul, just get a job done in the least time and at the least cost.
So I wandered halfway down the hill to get under the pylons, trekked about to ascertain the best vantage and waited. Isabel sensibly stayed in the car and kept dry. I went on waiting and waiting, and after two hours a small break in the clouds appeared and lasted for about a minute before vanishing again.
During that minute the scene was completely transformed into a dramatic interplay of light and shade. I couldn't have wished for any better. However not until the film was processed and a frame selected for printing did the image get its final seal of approval, and that could only come from my wife Isabel.
Copyright © 1995 Gordon C Harrison All Rights Reserved