Here in this west of Ireland sunset is one of my favourite images from 2017, as seen in my YouTube video here.

For over ten years I have been organising photography workshops and tours here in Ireland.

The sunset image is one of the most lambasted, often cited as a hackneyed subject matter in photography but actually, photographed correctly (like here from this Panoramic Ireland photography workshop), the sunset can be enticing, mesmerising, one of two potential perfect moments in a 24 hour period for lighting and colour.

Learn how to photograph the sunset in any conditions on a private photography workshop by contacting me here.

Join me, Panoramic Ireland, for a photography tour and workshop in the west of Ireland to learn how to photograph scenes like this.

The Blue Hour is a classic time of day for landscape photographers to photograph. There are in fact two blue hours and both don't necessarily last for an hour.

The first blue hour precedes sunrise and the second of the day comes after sunset; wrapped inside the day there is also the golden hour that we will talk about separately.

During the evening blue hour - light is fading, the sun has set and we lose the direct brightness from our light-giving star.

Red light passes through Earth's atmosphere and further into space, while blue light with its shorter wavelength gets trapped and scattered, and bounces around to create a blue coloured period we call the Blue Hour.

Another of my favourite images from 2017 came again from Ireland's midland region just like this one here.

Again, after a long day of photographing landscapes we found ourselves in not an ideal position for photographing the sunset, not being the chief objective of our photography workshop.

Here we found this lane that seemed to invite us across its water-filled potholes towards the colour of the evening's setting sun.

The wind was blowing, the usual, bright orange colour filled the horizon and above the blue hour was beginning to start.

This was one of my favourite unexpected scenes of the year.

It is very representative of Ireland, not the famous scenes from our beautiful coastline but the hidden Ireland that I like to find for you on my photography workshops and tours.

To join me on a personalised tour in Ireland, to find scenes like these, contact me using the main menu or use the email address at the top of the page.

This was at the end of a long day's photography workshop covering woodlands and waterfalls, Panoramic Ireland (that's me by the way) run photography workshops and tours for all levels in Ireland from Cork to Galway to Belfast to Dublin.

We were in Ireland's midlands for the best part of the session and sunset wasn't high on our priorities for the day but we happened on this scene and found that post-sunset cloud glow to be very photogenic with this pastoral scene of green fields and cows.

To join me on a photography workshop in Ireland for sunset photography, street photography or architectural photography and everything else as well use the contact page on the main menu above. Send me an email with whatever locations you are interested in and dates when you will be in Ireland.

In the meantime, enjoy this sunset scene, it's relaxing don't you think?

As I write this the clock is about to turn past midnight and into Monday 25th December 2017, Christmas Day.

I have been working hard on many projects this year, currently on my best of images - my personal favourites from the past twelve months.

Here is one of my favourites, a setting sun lowering through the sky over Northern Ireland - rays shining across the green countryside and high into the bright blue sky.

Your support throughout this year, and previous years has made all of this possible and I look forward to continuing into 2018, chatting on social media, via emails and indeed meeting you on tours here in Ireland.

To book a photo tour, one-to-one photographic advice and mentoring session from anywhere in the world or to buy one of my prints please use the contact form in the top menu.

It's hard at times to get a good location for sunset photography on the east coast of Ireland.

The further north and south out of Dublin that you go there become possibilities but Dublin south to Wicklow affords no opportunity to photograph sunset from the coast.

This is, however, overlooking the Dublin and Wicklow Mountains with the Irish Sea in the foreground.

Along with a series of images that I took in January of this year, 2017 this is one of my favourites and makes it into my "best of 2017".

Hazy light partially obscures the mountains, notable among them the outline of one of Ireland's most famous, Wicklow's Sugarloaf while sunlight shoots across the cloud-filled blue sky.

It's a beauty, don't you think?

A recent photography workshop saw me photographing at one of Dublin's scenic locations, the Samuel Beckett Bridge as it spans the River Liffey. 

It was a calm evening as sunset approached yet in the distance the singing from Croke Park could be heard all over the city, U2 were playing their one and only concert in Ireland as part of the Joshua Tree tour.

In Ireland it would be easy to assume that the best sunsets are to be found on the west coast with the sun setting over the Atlantic.

The Wild Atlantic Way is certainly a great place for sunsets but the east of the country and Ireland's Midlands can boast bright, saturated, stunning evening skies as seen in this image.

After a three day photography tour on Ireland's Atlantic Coast I was travelling through the centre of the country when the bright sky attracted me off the motorway, as I wrote in a recent post here.

To view more of my sunset images see here.

And of course you can enjoy the real thing, join me on a photography tour or workshop in Ireland.

You never know what to expect as an outdoor photographer here in Ireland.

After a three day photography tour in the west of Ireland I was finishing up and heading home through the midlands and close to sunset I spotted a great stormy sky.

The west of Ireland - it has great people, great food, great entertainment and great scenery and that all makes for the perfect location for photography.