Lineage by Sean Bagshaw

Lineage by Sean Bagshaw

Moai statues at Ahu Tongariki on Easter Island, back lit by the full moon on March 22, my birthday! I couldn’t imagine a better way to celebrate. Visiting this remote South Pacific island was a dream. Learning about the history and culture of the Island was fascinating in a way only made possible by being there. The statues were a representation of the ancient ancestors and believed to be symbols of authority and power, both religious and political. The moai statues face away from the ocean and towards the villages as if to watch over the people. Photographing them in moonlight is a major life memory.
To create this photo I placed myself in the shadow of one of the tallest moai to minimize flare and contrast from the moon. I took a 4 minute long exposure, allowing the fast moving clouds coming off the ocean streak across the sky. Then I took a shorter, brighter exposure at a higher ISO while no clouds blocked the moon to capture the shadows in the foreground and detail in the statues. In the second exposure the moon had also appeared on the edge of the statue creating the moon-star. The two exposures were painstakingly blended using various masking techniques in Photoshop. Further adjustments were made for clarity and tonal balance. The final step was to convert the color image to black and white using Silver Effects Pro.
Canon 5DsR, 33mm. One exposure at 4 minutes, f/14, ISO 100 and one exposure at 25 seconds, f/4.5, ISO 800.

Sean Bagshaw: Photos