Sometimes you get surprises. Jessamyne and I were up early, shooting along one of the shorelines on the north end of Kauai. I had picked the location because of the beautiful exposed tree roots due to sand erosion over the years. Quite striking. And we did two setups along the shore there. Both beautiful.
We paused for a moment and were in the middle of deciding what to do next. Head to another location or try something else with those trees. The morning sun was coming in low, almost behind us now from around a bend in the beach. It wasn’t direct light, but it was casting some interesting beams on the sand near a large piece of lava rock on the shoreline.
Jessa and I thought it might be interesting to try something there. I told her to get near one of the beams that was now quickly moving away from us. My original idea was to put her in one of them, but we were a few minutes too late for that. But still. There was something good about this light. Very soft.
And as soon as Jessa got down on the rock and I got down to sand level with my camera, I could see her lovely skin reflecting a very compelling glow. Admittedly, while photographing her, I didn’t know if these photographs would end up being great images, or just good images. Jessa was posing brilliantly, but I wasn’t sure if the light was enough to make her stand out from the background or not.
However, later when she and I reviewed all of the setups from this day of shooting, we both gravitated to this one. And we were both surprised because this had definitely been one of those, well we have great stuff here already, let’s just try this one more thing since we’re here, kinds of setups. It was an extra. A bonus.
Yet, sometimes you get surprises.
