The Ice Beach

My photo tour group and I had a great session this morning on the famous Ice Beach on the southern coast of Iceland. We had a clear sky so sunrise lighting illuminated the thousands of chunks of glacial ice and made them look like turquoise gemstones. The black sand beach was choked with ice -- more than I'd ever seen before. Due to the high wind the surf was incredibly violent. The waves crashed against the ice, and we had to extremely careful not to get wet. Even one or two drops of salt water can kill a camera. It was a memorable morning! This picture is a 5-frame HDR composite. I used this technique so I could retain detail in the sky as well as in the shadows and the black sand. I shot this with a 16-35mm lens at f/16 and 500 ISO. The sun star is a result of using a wide angle lens with a small lens aperture in combination with shooting a point source of light.