John Emslie and his wife, Liz, were on a city break to Rotterdam when he took this photo. “We were on the Erasmusbrug, nicknamed the Swan, which links the northern and southern halves of the city,” he says. “The long, white pylon and its distant glow, and the angled cable stays picked out by the projector lights, drew me in; I wanted to capture all of that light, form, scale and perspective. All I had to do was wait for the final element: the passing motorcyclist and his headlight.”
Emslie describes himself as an “enthusiastic amateur” and used his Google Pixel 7 to capture the scene. “I’m not sure my main camera could have produced such quality under such challenging shooting conditions. In low light, getting a manual camera set up is tricky and the moment is often lost by the time I’m ready,” he says. “The smartphone’s ‘brain’, on the other hand, is so fast and clever that shots like this are made possible. I can’t claim any credit other than for keeping my phone steady!”
Modesty aside, Emslie regards this as one of his most special shots, in which “everything fell into place … It seems sprinkled with some kind of magic fairy photo dust.”
