São Martinho do Porto on Portugal’s Silver Coast is famous for a rare natural feature: a near-enclosed bay that looks like a seashell when seen from above. The bay’s narrow mouth to the Atlantic acts like a natural breakwater, which helps keep the water noticeably calmer than many open-ocean beaches nearby. 

Long before it became a holiday destination, this sheltered inlet had strategic and economic value. Medieval records mention the village as early as 1257 in a charter associated with the Monastery of Alcobaça, and the bay functioned for centuries as Alcobaça’s seaport—supporting fishing and shipbuilding alongside coastal trade. 

In the 19th century the character of the place shifted. With local development (including pier works) the “beach quarter” grew into a second nucleus, and from the late 1800s São Martinho do Porto became a seaside resort popular with nobility and the bourgeoisie—an identity that still lingers in the promenade, villas, and classic summer-town atmosphere.

Take a look at some of my pictures from São Martinho do Porto 
https://www.roygabrielsen.com/media-search/media-files-sao-martinho-do-porto/

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What do you think..?

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I think every location have their peak time for photo’s. We just have to find it.

Second, is that it is good to have a model that understand you, and understand the given instructions. This is an example of cooperation between model and photographer that works well.

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I talked to the man that has saved the boat for ending in the bottom of the laguna, – and he told me I was free to use it for pictures, but it was not possible to move it into any other position. It was in wrong direction from what I wanted, so I had to make a plan.

The plan was to use two pictures. One with the boat and the model, with a led lamp from the right position. Then analyse the picture, and take a second photo of the dark sea from same angel. The light in the water was from wrong direction, so I had to flip picture horizontally. Last time consuming thing, was to make a mask around model and boat – and in the end change the background by put the picture of the dark sea behind the boat. In the very end I had to adjust some shadows, so it should look like one picture.

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I was testing the water in São Martinho do Porto short time ago, and it is not warm, but just acceptable.. I feel therefor no shame to ask Soraya for entering the water, – and I did not have to ask her twice.

Soraya planned the transport with the very nice fishermen we have in São Martinho do Porto. I only have to carry as little equipments on my body as possible – in case I fell into water. 

The original plan by floating on a bodyboard does not work as planned, so we had to take a replacement picture into the boat.

But we already have a plan B ready. Just follow us for updating. (Part 1 comes soon..)

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The temperature was 18 degrees in both air and water. The sun goes down very fast in Portugal at sunset, so we had to spend our time smart and work fast.

We bring very light equipments. A Lumix GH5 and a Photoflex SoftGold LiteDisk. Because of the LiteDisk my assistant was very important today. Strong wind make our work more difficult, but the result looks good.

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