At the beginning of January Marcel and I went to the Algarve and over to Huelva to photograph the salt flats from above with the drone. We spent three full days in the region, scouted lots of places, and the weather played along. Incidentally, we now know how to declare drone batteries and a power bank as hand luggage with TAP – almost a doctoral thesis. Next time everything just goes straight in.
Textures and colours
I came back from this trip with so many photos that three posts are barely enough. In this one I’m first showing the shots taken along the way: beautiful shorelines and beaches, huge areas of greenhouses in the Spanish hinterland – Spanish tomatoes are unbeatable! – and an incredibly green saltwater lake.
The green lake
In the green lake the colours and the textures of the salt crystals were so intense that when editing I had to turn down the contrast and saturation. For me this view from above is one of the highlights of the trip.
Early January on the Algarve: green marsh crossed by branching tidal creeks.On the sand spit lie algae, lines and a single boat.On the shallow shore of the Algarve stand a red lattice tower and a small boat.A blue boat on the left, a white one on the right, both in shallow water.An orange stern with blue panels, the white wake behind it.Two moored boats, with a shared wake running out behind them.A small boat lies by the rocky shore, dark seagrass in the water around it.A single boat on pale ground, with patches of dark seagrass all around.Here the marsh is a grid of turquoise creeks and dark embankments.The green marsh grid twice over, each time crossed by turquoise creeks.In the marsh, the green branching creeks run towards one another.In the beige mudflat of the Algarve the creek spreads out like branches.Winding channels keep the brown islands in the mudflat apart.Yellow-green meanders wind their way through the red-brown marsh.Near Huelva, tracks divide the rows of greenhouses in which the tomatoes grow.Strips of greenhouses on the left, ochre fields near Huelva on the right.Pale blue roofs in a tight grid – vast greenhouse areas in the Spanish hinterland.Some of the roofs are pale blue, the adjoining grid clearly darker.The embankments run in parallel through a pale green basin with slanting sides.Beneath the almost white expanse, pale green lanes lie between white embankments.Blue edges separate the pale green stripes from the white ones, set very close.A pale embankment splits the green saltwater lake, two dark holes in it.White veins of salt crystals in the intensely green saltwater lake – one of the highlights of the trip.A hole with a channel in the green on the left, green water in white crust on the right.White cracks and a pale stripe run across the green saltwater lake.The green water reaches far into the white crust of the lake.The white crust leaves only a dark hole open in the green.A white network of cracks on the green lake, a pale embankment along the edge.A dark strip on the right, green water to its left behind a narrow pale embankment.Several white bands lie horizontally over the green strip of the lake.A green fringe meets the black water, and then the cracked white crust follows.A broad dark silhouette lies along the edge, otherwise green water and white crust.Sharply split: green water on one side, white crust on the other.In the shallow water of the Algarve: sailing boats, a motorboat and sandbanks below.Round parasols stand in rows on the beach, a blue rectangle beside them.On the Algarve beach, sand and turquoise surf lie in broad strips.Pale sand and a narrow line of white spray on the beach of the Algarve.A small boat draws a wake through the turquoise creek.Between the shores, sand ripples show through the turquoise water.
