* The author is part of the community of readers of La Vanguardia
There are people who walk with their heads down, immersed in thoughts, you know which ones. I like to look up, towards the horizon, always looking for a funny or emblematic landmark, or one that I haven’t seen photographed.
When I find it, I imagine it with sunsets or moonlight, at dusk or at dawn with its sunrises; and here the magic begins!, which we see manifesting today in the Photos of the Readers of La Vanguardia.
In this case it was about photographing the silhouette of the Sant Marçal castle in a sunset. This building is located between the municipalities of Cerdanyola del Vallès and Sant Cugat del Vallès, in the Vallès Occidental region.
The first historical references date back to the 11th century. Today, its owners manage it for holding events of different kinds.
Planning the photography had some complexity. The place from which the shot was taken is the paleo-terraces of the Torrent de Can Codonyers. These, with the passage of time, have been remodeled by anthropic action, where the eroded material is replaced with fills, and where it is sometimes cultivated.
This factor makes the topography very variable, making it difficult to obtain a precise azimuth, that is, the alignment with the tower. Furthermore, the altimetry must be as exact as possible to achieve a frame that allows capturing the right moment of the Sun gently landing on the castle tower.
To do this, an exercise was carried out to correct the topographical elevations and altimetry. Literature was also consulted to find out the height of the tower, but that information is not available, so an approximate calculation had to be made.
In this way, the exact shooting point, day and time could be planned. We just needed the weather to be with us. And so he did.
