Chasing Sunsets — Part 1
Dawn of the Dusk
I don’t know why I haven’t done it sooner, but watching sunsets is now one of my favorite hobbies. I had captured their majestic presence on 5 different occasions during September 2021. A year has passed, and as I wake up to another September, I wonder if I will witness something even better, when the blazing fireball melt into the horizon.
I love seeing sunrays captured by others, and I have finally done it myself. The colors of the setting sun shifted from blinding gold to soft warm orange. And occasionally, when there are enough clouds on the horizon, sunrays will appear. And it often brings along other brilliant hues, such as that smear of rouge on the left.
This was taken near Cyberport Promenade, a place I have frequented in the last few years. I take strolls there to get closer to the sea and the nature. And on days like this, I will stand and wait patiently for the sunset to mature.
A clear sky is not a guarantee of a great sunset. But a foggy or cloudy one is almost always a disappointment. But I went anyway, if not to see nature’s curtain closing, but to walk for health.
On days without good fortune by my side, due to angles or locations, I would still salvage something from the ruined sunset. In this case, it was a thick patch of clouds rolling in from the wrong direction at the wrong time. Luckily it wasn’t all that bad. The searing sun slashed through the clouds, and the clouds thrashed in anguish and exposed its bright red orange wound in response.
The color of the sky above was a pleasant and calming pastel blue, almost greyish as the day crept into night.
Sunrays are magical. It emanates a mystical power just by being there in the photo. This was a special outing to Stanley with my friend, who appreciates sunsets just as much as I do. He was taking photos nearby, and I tagged along on his journey. This was an impromptu sunsets, because we finished the photo taking near St. Stephen’s Beach in the late afternoon, so we thought why not.
My friend working the magic on his film camera. We were blessed by good weather, although it was hot as the oven earlier in the day, the temperature took a dive as the sun dropped below the horizon. And as we were at the beach, the water vapor carried over by the breeze cooled us down too.
Another sunset witnessed with my friend, just 2 days later from our last adventure. And maybe he was the bearer of good luck, because I have never seen something quite like this afterwards. The clouds dressed in a velvet pink dress, and it was so bright the whole areas under its cover turned into a candy wonderland. I still think pink cotton candy might have fallen from the sky.
When the sunset is not impressive enough to make a good composition. I would try to incorporate something else into the scene. And in this case, since I’m looking at Lantau Island as the sun climbed below the crest of Lantau Peak, there’s always air traffic. So I was in luck when a plane flew across the sky in my direction. And as it approached the gap between the sunrays, I took a shot with a closed up zoom. Thankfully the image has good focus and clarity, and the suspended flight now looked like an amber, trapped in between the light beams.
