Light vs Dark

I’d never really thought about the effects of these two on your experience of things too much. But the more I travelled the more it played on my mind. As a keen photographer I knew about the ever shifting qualities of light and how these can make or break a good photo, so there were a fair few occasions where I tried to make sure I was in the right place at the right time of day for a good shot.

Obviously the sunrise at Angkor Wat is a prime example, and a few thousand other people had the same idea as me. Getting there pre-dawn to catch prime real estate at the edge of the pond was a must and those are some of the best shots I’ve ever taken (stay tuned!). Dawn in the jungle was a pretty magical sight too: great swathes of mist rising up through the canopy, speared by the shafts of light broken down by the foliage of the trees at the very top. The jungle never sleeps but the sounds of the mammals and birds waking up I’ll never forget.

The midday sun can be a fraught time for photography: clear skies and bright sunlight cast ugly shadows on your subjects or through a haze of bright clouds the sky is flat and white, making otherwise beautiful scenes look lifeless. I spent a whole afternoon in Sapa, Vietnam watching the clouds shift the light minute by minute over a spectacular valley ribbed with rice paddys and hardly managed a single decent shot. Even the temples at Angkor were bland against the sky or badly silhouetted. That, and it was hot as balls.

Evening is a great time to shoot, especially beaches and seascapes where the water is a myriad of sparkles and reflections. Ha Long Bay looked spectacular as did the beach on Koh Russei in Cambodia. Or watching the sun drop behind mountain ranges covered in dense jungle from the top of the hill in Luang Prabang. I could go on.

Night time is different, even after a night spent wandering amongst the twinkling lanterns of Hoi An, watching kids and old women hustling floating lanterns down the river and grabbing some great shots in the process, walking home through the dark, deserted streets dodging pretty sizeable rats and roaches was disconcerting. Strange how darkness lends unfamiliar towns a vague air of menace. Especially in Phnom Penh, where I didn’t feel hugely comfortable to begin with. It has its good points too: staying up all night on the beach on Koh Russei around a fire, playing guitar and driftwood drum kits with a bunch of strangers who, in the morning were all friends. We swam in the pitch black, warm waters, as phosphorescent algae exploded in bright green sparks around our bodies. We all lay in the sea and watched the sky bristle with stars as I’ve never seen them before, utterly content in our liquid bed of green phosphorescence. Returning to sleep in my beach hut, daylight was questing through cracks in the rattan walls and the whole cycle was beginning again.