Looking into the image - Harbour entrance

A Brittany Ferries cross channel ferry emerges from the mist - Portsmouth Harbour entrance, December 2023

Fujifilm X100V 1/300s f5.6

I’ve taken a lot of photographs over the years. I prefer taking photographs of people, either portraits or sports and I’m definitely not a landscape photographer. Yet this is easily one of my favourite images I’ve ever taken.

I thought it might be interesting to try and explain why I think this is the case.

I bought the X100V in 2023 to use as an ‘everyday camera’. There was still a lot of hype around it and I was interested to see what I could do with one. I liked the idea of being forced to use a fixed focal length and experimenting with some of the Fuji film simulations as well as simplifying the photographic process. Undoubtedly, there was a bit of nostalgia for film involved as well.

A bit of background to the shot. On the day, I was visiting a winter craft market in a part of Old Portsmouth called The Hotwalls. It’s on the entrance to the harbour. It was a fairly uninspiring day, overcast and a bit nondescript, but I took the camera along anyway. I was just hoping for some interesting ‘street’ scenes and chance to experiment. After a while, the weather turned really misty, a classic sea mist. I thought this might make for some interesting compositions, so I wandered through the walls to the stony beach which is right on the water’s edge. There were some small groups of people and it was quite atmospheric. It reminded me of a day when I was sailing during a solar eclipse. A milky light and no wind. It was an unusual scene and small groups of people were taking it in. I grabbed a few photos. The mist created some interesting backlight images. Gradually I could see the ferry approaching the harbour entrance through the mist. They’re moving pretty slowly at this point. I could see straightaway that there was a really good image developing. This was the result.

Why do I think I find it so appealing ?

It’s a simple image. A small group of people in the foreground and a ship emerging from the mist in the background. I’m not fan of photography ‘rules’ but there’s a subtle bit of thirds at play. I’ve cropped the original slightly, mainly to remove a distraction, but this has placed the man with the white sleeves on a vertical third. Another pleasing factor is that the dark foreground elements fill approximately a third of the image. This introduces a subtle sens of balance. The overall effect of the dark foreground group is that it perfectly frames the main element of the image, the ferry.

Layers in a photograph are important for creating interest and depth. A photographic image is by default a two dimensional representation of a three dimensional world. I don’t think that if I’d tried to pose the people in the foreground I could’ve done a better job. Three pairs, near, mid and far. And even though they are the darkest part of the image they are still clearly distinct. I think my focus point was the man with white sleeves and the pair closest to the camera are out of focus. As a group they neatly frame the approaching ferry. As individual elements of the group they frame the next pair. This creates a very neat and effective simplicity. And I think this image really works because the layers and framing draw your eye in, create interest and more importantly, invite the viewer to wonder.

There’s always a lot of discussion about ‘story’ in an image. I think it’s more accurate to see this as the questions and emotions that an image provokes in the viewer. If we’re minded to, we create our own story in an image. For me, this image appeals because of it’s simplicity, a feeling of stillness, and mystery. Ships go in and out of this harbour all the time, but the weather conditions on this day added another dimension. But it goes beyond this. The composition places the viewer in the position of another observer of the scene. Clearly two of the couples are absorbed in the sight of the emerging ferry. They’re faces are hidden. The other couple are also absorbed but in something different, probably a phone, perhaps a photo on the phone. They are oblivious to the approaching ferry. From a technical aspect I really like that there is light on their faces.

So this image draws me in. Am I an observer in the image or just someone looking at it after the event. What are the people watching the ferry thinking. They’re clearly engaged enough to be watching in silence. What are the third couple looking at and why is it enough to distract from the ethereal scene behind them. And I’m also wondering how different this would all appear to the people on the ferry.

The final image has been edited. It’s been cropped to remove a distracting feature on the left. I’ve applied one of my Lightroom presets which has desaturated some colours a bit but there is colour remaining. The majority of the image was created in camera.

Today, photos are mostly viewed on a screen, I’ve made some prints of this and that’s when you really start to be absorbed and deliberate and really see all the subtleties. I’ll definitely be doing a journal piece about this in the future.

You can probably tell that I quite like it.

Finally. I recently posted this image on Twitter in reply to a post with another Hotwalls photo. The photographer, who’s work I really admire replied, ‘That’s a brilliant photo. Truly brilliant.’ I’ll take that.