What are the best conditions to photograph a lighthouse?  Worthwhile question, or wrong question all together?

I’m leaning towards this question being worthless.  Every place–every subject–has different faces, different personalities and different characters at different times.  Like people, I think landscape and place-based subjects are never simply one thing.  They can take on new feeling and meaning based upon the mood and atmospheric conditions, as well as the time of year or day.

I’ve had the luxury of staying near the Roanoke Marshes Lighthouse in Manteo, North Carolina for several extended periods.  As such, I’ve photographed the lighthouse at blue hour, predawn, middle of the day, early evening, stormy skies, and every variant in between.  This frame is a darker more subdued set of atmospheric conditions that really spoke “winter” to me.  I utilized six or so stops of graduated filter to extend my exposure and smooth out the water in Shallowbag Bay.  As a result, the long exposure also softened down the edges of the quilted clouds above the lighthouse.

For a handful of reasons, I actually prefer this frame–or this unique set of atmospheric conditions–to the traditional fine art, big, bold, colorful sky stuff.  I feel as if I’m speaking more respectfully to the place and the subject here, and less to my artistic ego and to the whims of social media.

I don’t know.  What do you think?

Camera:  Nikon D810
Lens:  Nikkor 24-70mm f2.8 @ 34mm
Tripod:  Really Right Stuff TVC-33

Date taken:  January 29, 2019
Settings:  f14, 62.0 seconds, iso-64