I've made it back inside where the fires burn warm & the dog rests sloe eyed & growling, & tried to montage the latest winter trip by combining 2 photographs overlaid, removing & ghosting the kayak back into its exact position within the frame to give an overall more empowered feeling of how it felt to be out there, on the edge of the Hebrides, in a sword fight at every turn. It's an attempt to try & explain or capture the week without a succession of pointless frames. A summary, a visual epilogue if you like. Maybe montage is the wrong word. It's more like using the old film Rolleiflex & doubling the frame exposure while post processing in the digital darkroom.
Ghosting & slightly rescaling the kayak, for me somehow adds to the feeling that in many ways, we are not permanent fixtures in the panorama, more, fleeting entities racing for cover or passage through a relentless charging surf. We remain tiny under the cover of storm, willingly seeking out remote violence & reprise, & become vanished in a moment. We are become a state of organic flux, permanent disintegration & evolution.
The seas, surrounding bastions & cyclonic fronts carry much more permanence, stomping up & down outside our shelters, issuing challenges when we have long since retired to warmth & sleep.
Back at Bills bar I summarized further to the question - Good trip?:
Aye, no bad like...Acquired 3lbs of seal meat.
Ate it.
Snared some wee beasties.
Ate them.
Paddled 50 miles...
Anyone got any chocolate?
At 16 January 2009 at 15:41, 
•≈ Sgian Dubh
Thank you Douglas. I was really just sound-boarding the idea of trying to compile the overall feeling of a week at sea without being over complicated about it & using 20 photos. I'm glad you like it.
A certain beardy G-style kayaker emailed me last night & said: Great idea! it makes me want to go out & fight waves, which I guess is what creating this image has been about - to inspire. I tend not to mess with photos beyond exposure compensation, DOF, aperture & filter channel exposure, & occasional high structure exposure, as per the sky in this shot. More realistic representations are preferable to me, over what can often be seen as over exaggerated or manipulated artistic interpretation, so this could be quite fun as an interim although I find shots firmly footed in reality are often already deeply steeped in visual delight. :o)
Where would Ansel Adams be without experimentation afterall?
Nice composition Si :o)