A photographic lie

Not so long ago, I took the picture to the right.  In fact, it was barely more than a month ago.  Towards the end of our Hawaiian vacation, I was on the beach, waiting for the sunset.  Sunsets are always spectacular there, of course.

Now, the weather had been somewhat interesting – a bit breezier than normal, but not windy by any stretch of the imagination.  Looking to the south and north, I could see that breeze blowing clouds out to sea.  And as the clouds moved out, the rain started to fall.  So to the south, rain falling over the open sea.

So you see my view to the south.  I’m thinking to myself: how to capture this?  There’s a contrast in action – swimmers frolicking, but a heavy downpour in the distance.  To compress this and bring out blues, I used a zoom lens, tightened up the aperture as much as I could (for handheld), used manual white balance (under 5000K), and fired away.

What you’re seeing here doesn’t have much post processing.  Some warming on the upper clouds, and a slight tweak to the swimmers to bring out their details slightly.  And sharpening.

So what the end result is: a photo that looks like rough seas, with intrepid souls swimming, and a massive thunderstorm nearby.  In reality, the light was bright and we were in a hazy sunlight.  The clouds were brighter, and the rain was far away.  The chopping waves?  Just minor ones, actually.  The wind was making peaks…