Photographing Deep Time

Tom White

Tom is a freelance journalist and photographer based in the North East, his work has taken him across the UK as well as around the world.

tomwhitephotos.co.uk

A momentary burst of light, a passing cloud formation, a crashing wave on the shore – so much of what we do as landscape photographers can often come down to a few fleeting moments as all the elements come together in front of us. In that moment all our knowledge and experience kick in and along with a little luck we hope that we’re able to capture the scene in front of us.

As that happens I nearly always have a stream of thoughts running through my head – I hope it’s sharp, is this really the best composition, I should have worn my thermals – but I don’t really have time to make any changes and just hope that my ability to use the camera and my luck are both in credit. For many of us I’m sure this is actually part of the thrill of photography, how hours walking up a mountain or a flight around the world can come down to just a few minutes of pressing the shutter. In a recent interview with Tim, this year’s winner of the Landscape Photographer of the Year Mark Littlejohn summed it up beautifully when he said “I love little fleeting glimpses, I love trying to capture little snippets of time.”