The Magic Hour

To quote Wikipedia; the magic hour 'is the first and last hour of sunlight during the day, when a specific photographic effect is achieved with the quality of the light.' The light often appears more red, this is due to light traveling through more of the atmosphere because of the suns lower position in the sky. Shadows are longer because of the angle the light is coming in at. Galen described the magic hour as a mild version of alpenglow. The time of magic hour differs depending on season and where you are in the world but by looking at other people's images I can see that it can produce some very beautiful images.

So far I have had two magic hour shoots which I am in the process of processing. I have however processed a few images from my first shoot here in the UK. For this shoot I Decided to go up to the Halo Panopticon in Haslingden/Rossendale. It is one of a series of 'modern' sculptures dotted around Lancashire. It is very high up and in a peaceful country-side location so I thought it was an ideal time to capture the 'beautifulness' of the magic hour.
The first image is of the wind turbine which presumably powers the lights on The Halo. Its in an ideal place as I found it to be rather windy up on the hill. I took it in the earlier stages of shoot hence there's no massive area's of 'red' in the sky. I would still however class it as magic hour. I think its a well balanced image that seems to be well composed. I really like the colours that setting sun has brought out in the grass. There's a relatively good gradient in the sky from top to bottom. It was slightly enhanced using Canon's DPP to bring out the colours a little more.

The second image is probably my favorite. I decided to experiment with black and white to see if you could still capture the beauty and seeing this I fully believe you can. You could go as far as saying that black and white makes the magic hour look better as I believe it adds atmosphere to a photograph. In this photograph I really like the tones and the shadows. I used DPP to up the contrast of the image to give the image a better tonal range and add atmosphere. The dark, elongated shadows caused by the magic hour sun add atmosphere to the image. As you can probably tell the atmosphere is the reason I like this image so much. My only complaint with this image is the gradient in the sky; I believe with some more 'area specific' editing in photoshop I could adjust this and therefore make it better.

My second magic hour shoot was taken on holiday in Fuertaventura. I believed that this would produce some good magic hour images due to its position on the earth and constant, all year round, warm climate. After glancing through the images I can see some potential for some good photographs. These will be uploaded soon!