“Colour and movement danced before me as the waves wove a pattern of unexpected brightness under a winter sky, not yet locked in ice; they put on a final show for me.” – Ed Lehming

I love water. I love how it moves, the sounds it makes, and the constant sense of being a living thing. I also like to accentuate movement by adding movement of my own. Intentional Camera Movement (ICM) is a technique that I have used many times in forest scenes and a few seascapes. On this day, the light was subdued enough that I could get good results without adding neutral density filters or any other accessory to get pleasing images.

My hike among the dunes had concluded, and I drove the short distance to Lakeshore Lodge Point, still within Prince Edward County’s Sandbanks Provincial Park. One of the nice features of this point, jutting into Lake Ontario, is a shallow shelf of limestone that juts out into the lake. I find that the combination of rock, water, and moss creates some beautiful colour.

On this day, there was a slight breeze, which created shallow waves just tall enough to crest into low whitecaps, adding a touch of white to the palette. The way the waves crossed the rock and the backflow created this lovely weave effect that inspired the title of the image. After a few horizontal pans at low shutter speeds, I found I had the mix I needed to let the colours and movement of the water really show.

The tan that you see in the foreground is the limestone and a bit of sand, which switches to a deeper green as the water crosses a deeper point, then light green/aqua, before the lighter blues of the water further out dominate. There are also touches of lavender mixed in, which I can’t really explain, but they were there, and the longer shutter speed simply enhanced them, really complementing the greens.

What I really like about this technique is that every image is unique and unexpected, yet I can loosely anticipate the final outcome as I make the image, so it’s not just pure chance. Doing these handheld also adds some unpredictability and personalization to the shot. You’ll never get two the same. It’s kind of like a fingerprint.

I made about 20 images of the water movement that day and have only processed three so far, which I will spread out over a few days, but this is my favourite.

Nikon D800
Nikkor 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6 G I AF-S VR Zoom @ 300 mm
1/4 sec, f/40, ISO 640