As I mentioned in a previous post, in Irish tradition the winter has started with the beginning of the dark half of the year after Halloween.

But that doesn't mean that Ireland is not a destination for off season travel, on the contrary, with fewer crowds and some of the best light the months of November through to March are ideal for seascape photography in Ireland.

Here as well as shooting with the sun, we turned to photograph the sea cliffs with the sun setting behind.

It is a difficult photograph to shoot a landscape like this contre-jour but the movement and colour in the sky, coupled with some good post-processing has resulted in a fine image that is in contrast to shooting with the sun and its clear light (image coming soon in a subsequent post).

Making use of the texture and feeling of this deserted Irish beach at sunset.

I will be regularly running seascape photography workshops throughout the winter in Ireland, for more information contact me through the contact page or send me an email (up at the top of the page).

Summer, or the light half of the year, ends at Halloween or more accurately, Samhain, in the Irish tradition.

Here, a sunset seascape from the Irish coast as the light half of the year ends, the Celtic new year begins and although this will be the dark half of the year, the light will be fantastic.

While daylength shortens now until the winter solstice on December 21st, what light we do get is often bright, clear and colourful. 

On those rainy, cloudy days where the sun really doesn't make an appearance the light is still great for photography.

Autumn, winter and spring are perfect seasons for photography and with the added bonus of fewer tourists, Ireland in winter should be a photographer's preference.

Join me, Panoramic Ireland, to learn how to photograph and to see Ireland. Tours and workshops available all year round.

Autumn is upon us here in Ireland, we have passed the autumn equinox and now the length of daylight is shorter than night.

Last week I was photographing in County Roscommon at the inaugural Night and Day Festival which featured Irish and international artists - more to come on that soon.

This week I have been photographing in some woodlands in the Irish countryside, the weather was a little challenging but the workshop with NS from Virginia, a first time visitor to Ireland, went well as we covered long exposure photography and how to photograph colourful scenes.

Here we left the woodland to photograph along a wide, fast-flowing river to another section of colourful woods on the opposite bank. This is a scene that looks best in the autumn months.

Join me, Panoramic Ireland, to photograph Ireland's rivers, woodlands and countryside in autumn, winter, spring and summer.

I usually do prefer to work with colour images, for more than 99% of the photographs that I make they are in colour.

But every so often I do enjoy a good black and white image such as here in this landscape image of a tumbledown cottage amongst the mountain scenery from the west of Ireland.

Join Panoramic Ireland to photograph scenes like this from the Atlantic fringe of Ireland - photography tours and workshops operate all year round.

It may have been swelteringly hot throughout the rest of Europe this summer, but here in Ireland the heatwave consisted of a week or so of hot weather. 

For much of July 2022 the weather has been colder, wetter and windier than usual and on this occasion we had lots of trouble photographing the coastline along Ireland's famed Wild Atlantic Way.

In fairness, Dublin's Phoenix Park did see 33C in 2022, the second highest temperature recorded in Ireland after the record 33.3C in Kilkenny set in 1887.

I'm not complaining, the stormy weather was much more interesting for photography than sunny, warm and hazy heatwave conditions would have given; crashing waves showing the power of the Atlantic as it meets the geological landscape of these cliffs.

Indeed these cliffs as you see them rise steeply for 100 to 120m above the deep blue ocean below, the rocks here are amongst Ireland's oldest, dating to the Pre-Cambrian.

Join Panoramic Ireland to photograph in Ireland's majestic, stormy wild west.

Blue hour, especially the morning blue hour, is a special time for photography. At this time of year in Ireland photographing the coast before sunrise to capture that time when all appears blue, before the strength of the summer sun shines from beyond the horizon requires an early start.

It doesn't always look like this, indeed the heavy cloud seen here that adds to this image later became a block to the golden light of sunrise off the Irish coast.

But with this image from 04:15 in July, calm conditions were at least a bonus compared to previous days at Antrim's Giant's Causeway and over in the west in County Mayo.