Sailing under the Needles

Beautiful day, yesterday, as here, taken from the Isle of Purbeck, out to the Isle of Wight's Needles.

They're end-on at this angle and aren't that distinctly visible so you need to look for the lighthouse at the end of them.

Cropped image by about 30%, original had focal length equivalent of 750mm. Lens was Sigma 150-500mm OS, on a monopod and me holding the other end of the lens tightly as the wind kept blowing it off course. As with previous day's heron shot, used this lens' OS optical stabilisation using setting no '2', which helps freeze movement laterally, not up and down, which is what Sigma recommend.

A Sigma branded 86mm polariser was also used, which brought out the rich blue. One generally thinks polarisers are more for wideangles and they are indeed at their most effective the wider the sky area. A monopod/tripod is fairly essential when using such filters with these huge lenses and they allow you to alter and see the effects in (relative) comfort.

I purposefully kept it fairly dark and the Island's white cliffs subdued - any 'auto' editing programmes would have this garish and frankly, a bit sickly. Here, the boat is subject, with a wondrous background, not the other way around. I purposefully left the tall antennae intact, as it gives the letterbox format some height and they are a part of the Island, now, in the 21st century.