As I see it

Go for the Gold

Destination photography tips

Photographers often go for the gold — the golden hours when the sun is rising or setting. As a tourism magazine editor, I received (captured) and rejected countless sunrise and sunset photos. I even posted a story about them here on Medium. My comment always has been — they’re gorgeous, but what else is in the picture?

It isn’t just aiming the camera at a shimmering shower of color in the sky. It’s about seeing what the magical changes in the colors of the light — and dramatic shadows — are doing to the scene.

The magic hours are the one after sunrise and the one before sunset. If you live in the tropics, as I do, to take full advantage of it you have to be ready for it. Our dawns and dusks tend to be short and sweet—like life, they fade before you know it. Photographers in temperate regions may have more time to focus on their less fleeting beauty.

The earth is the canvas on which the sun paints. It is impossible to capture all the true colors of its creations with a camera. Its palette is too vast. We can only hope to hold a fragment of its beauty in our hands by wandering into or out of the dark (for the golden hours), camera in hand, to seek it!

I experienced this magic moment during a very early morning walk in Old San Juan. If I had stayed in bed, I would have missed it, and this masterpiece by the sun would have been lost to me forever. No jet will again leave a trail in the night sky to furrow the dawn and lead the eye to a distant fort.

Once one of my favorite “models,” the tall palm tree behind the city wall is now gone, swept away by a hurricane. Evanescence.

The magic hour can bring the unexpected. During the three years I lived in Old San Juan — steps away from its ancient forts, I witnessed (and too often photographed) countless sunrises and sunsets. Most were of historic places bathed by the tropical light. One evening, dust from the Sahara, blown across the Atlantic by the trade winds, opaqued the sky (not an uncommon weather phenomenon in the Caribbean) and I was gifted with this.

I admit that gold is my favorite color! I found it during a family visit to the island municipality of Culebra. Here my granddaughter is gathering gold in the early sunset sea. A golden hour indeed!

(Imagine the picture without her in it: sunsets benefit from a subject — and this model was perfect!)

No models here, just some teens enjoying a beach in Curaçao. My wife and I were admiring the copper sunset. We stopped to watch the young folks take turns jumping over each other.

Could I have planned this? The lesson: when the sky gifts you a gift be ready to accept it.

A subject, of course, doesn’t have to be a person. This enigmatically empty offshore bohío in Guánica, Puerto Rico, helped make “just another golden sunset” extra special.

This is one of my all-time favorites. I was at the right place (outside the walls of San Felipe del Morro fort at the entrance to San Juan Bay), at the right time. I watched as the reflection of the sun in the sea peeked through a natural coral bridge. When it did, I got it!

I’d like to take credit for the star pattern formed by the shutter of my camera, but that was serendipity. I love the little garita at the top right — it says “Puerto Rico.” That was on purpose!

The magic hour doesn’t need a sunrise or sunset. The color of the light can convert the ordinary to the extraordinary. I took this in the southwest coastal town of Cabo Rojo, Puerto Rico — notice the long shadows, the golden glow of the church, the dark, saturated sky. At any other time of the day, this photo would be just an average postcard shot!

I say I don’t usually like sunsets without a subject in the photo, but here what the sun is doing is really the subject — and those clouds! This was taken at Villa Montaña in Isabela, Puerto Rico, and was the cover photo for one of the magazines I edited.

I’ll close with this — not gold, but magic. Sometimes the weather blocks the sunset in a way that paints the world blue. I love this — I hope you do, too!

[All the photos were taken by the author and some may have appeared in other of his posts.]

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