I am a photographer and love taking photos. Unfortunately, I have not taken as many photos as I would have liked in 2018. Whilst this is frustrating this is the unfortunate reality of life as an actual photographer!
Still I have taken some photos, mainly on my travels, so which are my top 10 travel photos of 2018? In these two blog posts I will publish and write about 10 travel photography images that I really like. There is no science or commercial agenda behind this – these are just 10 travel photos that I have picked having gone through my Lightroom Catalogue for the year.
They are simply 10 photos that I have taken that I like the most on my travels in 2018.
How do I choose my top 10 travel photos of 2018?
Simple. In Lightroom I use the filter bar in the Library Module, and select the metadata attribute field.
All I need to do then is select 2018, and all the images from 2018 appear.
Once this is done I have all my 2018 photos in a grid.
There are two ways I select images from a set of images like this. I either use Pick flags (by hitting the letter P) or add them to a new collection (which is the designated target collection which I select using the mouse) called 2018 Top 10.
It depends really – these are just two ways of achieving the same thing.
I scroll through the images one by one and if I like the look of something I select it. Once I have gone through this process I have my first picks.
All I do now is go back through the images and remove the ones that I like less than others, and keep on going through this process until I am down to 10 images.
The images are published in this blog post in date order, starting with the oldest first.
They are from three foreign trips in 2018, to Altea, Rhodes and Paxos.
Image number 1 of my Top 10 Travel Photos of 2018 – Cap Negret Hotel in Altea at sunrise
I like photographing buildings, and love travelling, so I guess it is inevitable that I will photograph the hotel we are stopping in at sunrise!
And here it is!
Taken with my Canon 6D whilst everyone else is asleep, and processed using Aurora HDR 2019 with a bit of vertical correction done in Lightroom.
Camera settings
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ISO – 100
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Aperture – f8
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Shutter speed – 4 seconds (first photo)
This is from a set of three bracketed images, taken with the help of my Manfrotto 190 Go tripod.
Image number 2 of my Top 10 Travel Photos of 2018 – the dome of the famous church Parroquia Nuestra Senora del Consuelo
I had to get the stunning church on top of the hill in the old town of Altea before sunrise.
This photo was taken with my Canon 6D and Canon 17-40mm lens using a focal length of 17mm.
Camera settings
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ISO – 400
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Aperture – f8
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Shutter speed – 1/3rd second second (first photo)
This set of bracketed images were taken with the self timer and my Manfrotto 190 Go tripod and processed using Aurora HDR 2019.
Image number 3 of my Top 10 Travel Photos of 2018 – Sunrise street scene in Altea, Spain
This was one of those mornings when I was desperately searching for the right scene. I had photographed the main churh on the hill, the wonderful Parroquia De Nuestra Señora Del Consuelo – see above.
Then I went looking for shots of the streets before sunrise. The streetlights however did not come on that morning at the same time that they did the morning before which completely scuppered my plans.
So I had to find something with some interesting light. I was in the old part of the Spanish town of Altea, at the top of the hill.
I went to the east facing part of the town searching for some directional morning sunlight, and came across this scene.
This is what I was after.
I composed the shot to get all the shadow from the grille to the window in the foreground, giving the directional light prominence.
I also wanted some sea in the background which I have got.
I actually discounted this photo on my first pass, but had a rethink. I often go back through a set of images after I have made my selection of 10 images – I think the narrowing down process gets my brain working in the right way.
I like this image, which is all about that lovely golden morning sunshine and the directional shadows.
This photo was taken with my Canon 6D and 17-40mm lens.
Camera settings were
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ISO – 400
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Aperture – f9
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Shutter speed – 1/160th second (first photo)
This was one of a series of three bracketed images taken handheld.
Processing again was done using Lightroom for framing and verticals and then everything else was done in Aurora HDR 2019.
Image number 4 of my Top 10 Photos of 2018 – Sunrise at Navarone Bay, Rhodes, Greece.
Navarone bay is one of my favourite photo locations on the Greek Island of Rhodes. Lovely aquamarine blue waters during the day, but a lesser know sunrise location.
In this photo you can see the view across Navarone Bay looking towards Lindos and the mighty Acropolis of Rhodes on the top of the rock formation.
A stunning scene and one that I always enjoy all by myself. Well there might be the odd goat around to be fair!
I like this photo so much I wrote an article about it on Improve Photography.
Camera settings were
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ISO – 100
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Aperture – f16
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Shutter speed – 1/50th second (first photo)
Taken using my Canon 6D with 24-105mm lens set at 24mm, all securely placed on my Manfrotto Go 190 tripod.
This image was processed in Lightroom alone.
Image number 5 of my Top 10 Photos of 2018 – Sunrise view the Acropolis of Rhodes and St Pauls Bay on the Greek Island of Rhodes
When we go to Rhodes we stop in the lovely village of Lardos at our family favourite Cosmos Maris Hotel.
From Lardos it is a 10 minute drive down to the stunning town of Lindos, packed full of amazing scenes to photograph.
After photographing the sunrise there is still time to get more shots with the great morning light.
This is the view from the path down to the beach you can see in the foreground (there is another beach at the other end of St Paul’s Bay under the Acropolis).
I have never photographed this view before – I had been photographing the sunrise from the rocks way over to the right.
I knew this scene had potential, so having completed my sunrise shoot I walked over to this viewpoint.
This was a straightforward image capture, taken using my Canon 6D and Canon 24-105mm lens with a focal length of 24mm.
Camera settings were
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ISO – 400
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Aperture – f11
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Shutter speed – 1/800th second (first photo)
Processing was done with initial corrections in Lightroom and further processing done using Aurora HDR 2019. This image processing is another image that I have processed in my trial using Aurora HDR 2019 for my travel and architectural photography.
That was the first 5 images in my Top 10 Photos of 2018 – I hope you enjoyed seeing them and reading about them.
Next Monday I will publish the last 5 images, 1 more photo taken in Rhodes and four images from the wonderful Greek Island of Paxos.
