Light Waves

We have a special Making Light post from Tom today. When I was planning this project a few months ago, I suggested he might contribute some photographs to speak to our winter coastline theme. I did not expect what happened next. Over the following weeks (during which Kintyre witnessed some particularly wild winter weather) Tom went out to the sea every day with his camera. When night fell, he sat poring over tide times and wind speeds, and when an Atlantic storm in the forecast caused me to groan a little, he just lit up, and grabbed a few more lenses.

Tom’s recent enthusiasm for photography in extreme weather conditions has caused me no small degree of concern, but he will tell you that, of the two of us, he has always been the better assessor of outdoor risk (which is true), and frankly I cannot argue with the extraordinary nature of the images he has produced, and what they have to say about the winter sea.

As someone with poor balance, high winds have never been my friend, but by looking through Tom’s eyes over the past few weeks, even I have begun to enjoy walking with him in a storm, watching the waves rise and fall in their ever-more dramatic strata. Tom’s wave enthusiasm has helped me start to really see the winter sea.

In my discussion of Richard Shimmell, I spoke about how his work celebrates an unusual beauty that is unavailable at any other time of year. The same might be said of Tom’s waves, which have been captured at moments of high wind and low light that are only found in winter.

Tom is by no means the only coast-appreciator around these parts, and he’s also enjoyed photographing our hardy local surfers, who have been making the most of the huge winter waves that travel, unimpeded, across the Atlantic to break upon the west coast of Kintyre.

Tom’s used a wide range of perspectives and techniques to explore the power, variety, and distinctive beauty of winter waves, heading out with a drone, to capture breakers from above, when the weather has permitted.

As the weeks went on, and he gathered hundreds of photographs, Tom realised that his exploratory wave studies had begun to coalesce into something more extensive. His images suggested the particularity of place and season at the same time as capturing something larger about natural energy and elemental forces. Gathered together as a collection, his photographs spoke to the interplay between light and water, while having something to say about the relationship between transience and timelessness as well. And so, Tom’s made a book of Light Waves. Here he is to tell you more about it.

Light Waves

Light Waves is a project which was born out of exploration, a project born out of necessity and a project born out of repetition.

In February 2024, Kate, our dogs and I relocated to Kintyre – a peninsula on the west coast of Scotland – flanked to the west, south and east by the sea. Kintyre’s beautiful landscape combines rugged coastal edgelands with wide open spaces, all of which offer rich opportunities for visual study and exploration. 

From its craggy central spine and rolling hills to its dramatic beaches and coastal vistas, Kintyre abounds with aesthetic inspiration. Since moving here, I’ve been particularly drawn to my new home’s coastline, and to making images of its surrounding sea. 

This in part is born out of necessity. We have two energetic dogs who need walking every day, no matter the weather. This means that, come rain, wind, hail, snow or sunshine Kate and I get to spend several hours a day outside: surely one of the great pleasures of sharing one’s life with dogs?

On the wildest and coldest of mornings, on the wettest and dullest of afternoons, I will still head out towards the beach – wrapped up against the wind and with a camera or two in hand – experiencing the elements and enjoying my new environment.

I’ve found that simply getting out to the same favourite locations every day has really grown my appreciation of how a single place or view is never, ever the same. 

The subtle changes in light (and time) borne out of a repetitious experience of place and space, have been a feature of my explorations of landscape imagery for many years now, but over the past twelve months, I have developed a focus (bordering on obsession) with light and the sea, and in particular with the interaction of light with waves. 

 The images included in this collection are the result of this current and ongoing obsession.

Waves are created by the wind, by the transfer of energy from the air to the sea. High winds therefore generally mean large waves, and so, the stormy conditions experienced in winter make for great waves in Kintyre.

 Of course, the formation of waves is also random and stochastic, and part of the joy of photographing them is the meditative nature of watching and waiting.

With the low winter sun and its sea-glancing light, the relationship between light and waves becomes even more startling and unusual, and I am really enjoying exploring these elemental interactions with my camera. 

“Exploring these elemental interactions” has at times meant going out and working under some quite extreme conditions, much to Kate’s concern. 

These images, for example, were made in the Force 12 hurricane winds that battered the west coasts of Ireland and Scotland during storm Eowyn. 

Beaufort’s original scale accurately describes such conditions at sea in these terms: “air filled with foam, waves over 45ft, sea completely white with driving spray, visibility greatly reduced”. I was safely on land with a long lens which allowed me to “get close” to Eowyn’s gigantic waves, but I could only stand by steadying myself against a juddering fence post or cowering behind a low stone wall. 

Being this close to a sea storm of such magnitude was a humbling experience, and I hope these images convey something of my reverence for elemental forces that are both breathtaking and terrifying.

There are calmer images here too.

I particularly enjoy the softness of the light in the following image, where the low golden light of the setting winter sun is diffracted and diffused by the sea spray and mist to create a painterly quality which I feel is reminiscent of the late work of JMW Turner – a fellow wave-obsessive, and one of my great maritime inspirations. 

Waves are simultaneously unique things-in-themselves, and indivisible parts of a whole, inseparable from their surrounding water. 

A camera’s shutter allows the photographer to freeze time and isolate a wave’s individuality, exploring textures and structures whose real-world existence is momentary and fleeting. 

Such isolated moments in the life of a wave might seem abstract or disorienting, on the one hand . . .

. . . or text-book familiar, on the other, with a visual appearance that very precisely matches Beaufort’s “glassy appearance” . . .

. . . or “many white horses.”

Finally, you will see several images of surfers in this collection.

Westport beach is a popular surf spot, and I enjoy watching and photographing the hardy, brave and skilful surfers of Kintyre at play. 

 I hope the images here convey some of the exhilaration of this all-weather sport. Surfers, I tip my hat to you!

If you’d like to support Tom’s work, the Light Waves book is now available to pre-order from the KDD shop (remember to apply your club discount when ordering!)

Please bear in mind that Light Waves is a pre-order item: it has just gone to the printers, and it will be a few weeks before it is ready to be shipped. If you wish to buy the book, it will really help us if you order it alone (ie, not in conjunction with any other item in the shop): this will speed up our processes and prevent unnecessary delays. Thank you!