Shooting A Beach Sunset With A Telephoto Lens

One of the great perks of living in Florida is that the beach is never very far away no matter where you live in the state. For us, it's a little over an hour away on the gulf side. And there are several great photo subjects that can be found on the beaches of the Gulf Of Mexico, but not much can compare with the unbelievable beauty that happens almost daily when the sun sets over the water.

I have traveled around the country and lived in various other places, but I have never seen anything like the glory of a Florida gulf-side sunset. Of course, if the weather is not cooperating and there is heavy rain and thick clouds, it may not turn out as spectacular as you would like. But if the conditions are right, the sky just lights up with warm colors that gradually blend into each other like yellows, oranges, reds and even purples.

How you choose to capture the image of a Florida sunset is largely a matter of taste, but I notice that most photographers seem to like using wide-angle lenses. This is a great choice and makes incredible photos, but the down-side is that the sun becomes just a small dot with this kind of image.

But here in Florida, since you get to see the entire sunset as the sun goes all the way down on the horizon over the water with nothing of any substance in its way, the sun becomes a big red ball and appears very large just before it slips under the horizon's edge. So how do you convey this kind of effect in a photograph?

One way is to use a telephoto lens. Of course, this takes much of the foreground out of the picture, but why not make the sun the star of the show anyway? For instance, I like to use a fishing pier as a foreground object that is large enough to provide some kind of scale in the image if I can. You can also use a sailboat or yacht in the photo if it is available.

Here are a few shots I took recently at a couple of gulf-side beaches here in Florida using a 300mm lens:

The Venice FL pier at sunset

A sailboat at sunset

A large boat at sunset

In all of these shots, the sun was not altered in any way in post-processing. The size of the sun is in these pictures is more in line with what you actually see as the sun sets over the water here in Florida. A good telephoto lens helps capture that look and feel and that makes it a valuable tool in your bag for beach sunsets.

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