Whitby By Night

Whitby Moonrise. Nikon Z6 @ 185mm

Night photography. A genre I’ve not really had too much experience with. Throw in to the mix a bustling town on a Saturday night and it’s fair to say I’m about as far away from my photographic comfort zone as I could possibly be.

Yet this is exactly the situation I found myself in, complete with pub brawl, police and ambulances whizzing past.

I had a few nights booked in the town of Whitby, North Yorkshire and having visited many times over the years, I had a few locations I wanted to capture. Both the East and West piers at the mouth of the river Esk have extensions that reach beyond the harbour and out into the sea. For many years the East pier extension was cut off after the footbridge link had been removed due to safety concerns. This was replaced and reopened in 2018. As I’d never ventured along the East pier this was the number one destination that I had in mind. Compositionally you have two solid lighthouses at the end of the main harbour walls and then smaller beacon towers at the end of the extended sections of each pier. The curve of the walkway and the weathered planks and railings make excellent leading lines.

There wasn’t much of a sunset but I made the most of the little light and colour that there was before it was snuffed out and darkness fell.

The second location I had in mind was the Tate Hill Pier. This much smaller and older pier juts out into the harbour and is also on the East side of the river. It’s main claim to fame is that in his novel, Bram Stoker had Dracula’s ship (The Demeter) run a ground here. Towards the end of the pier is an old wooden anchor and on this particular night, a large collection of lobster pots. These were in complete darkness, so I used my torch to light paint the foreground while exposing for the bright lights of the town across the water.

The final shot was from this same location. I had the Nikon Z6 with me and I had the 70-300mm lens fitted. The moon was starting to rise above the roof tops, so I zoomed in and took some more detailed shots of the scene. All the while, directly across the harbour, police cars and ambulances were arriving. Whatever was happening was escalating quickly.

With the shots in the bag, I decided to call an end to the evening. Walking back past more ambulances certainly made for a more dramatic night than I was expecting.

Below are some of the images and please check out the video from the evening on YouTube.