Christmas Nativity

A family trip to Rove's Farm in Wiltshire for my Niece and Nephew before Christmas. Some unexpected subjects on the way to the Nativity: a sheep, llama and cow. Low light levels resulted in a relatively high iso setting, but I think it suits the black and white image. All at f/1.4, 50mm.



 
 
 
 

Something different...

It's been a while since I did, let alone posted any 'proper' photography. At least anything I'd taken with my camera as opposed to my iPhone anyway.

A trip to 'Oktoberfest', a mountain biking event on the grounds of Bristol's Ashton Court made for a slightly different subject matter for me.

The event featured a mixture of professional and amateur riders, including Steve Peat who I confess I mainly know for a pair of handle bar grips I bought for my own bike which are branded with his name.

Most of the days weather was perfect for riding, and photography. The day also provided me the opportunity to get some use out of my 300mm f/4 L lens which has mostlly gathered dust since around 2001 when I last did any Formula 1 photography.

 

A quick downpour was welcome, at least because with a telephoto lens I could hide under a tree for this shot.

  

At the time we didn't realise that most of the races were four hours long, it explains some of the looks on the riders' faces as they passed us.

  

Some attempts at motion blur which were largely failures, this being one of the better ones - aided by the rider having to drop his foot on a reasonably quick and downhill left turn.

  

I just thought that this guys face said it all, he was in some pain after this race!

  

The good light enjoyed during the 'golden hour' extended to allow for some nice portraits of riders as they dismounted their bikes. This one being my favorite.

  

My friend Steve.

Instagram...

A random mix of recent pictures taken using the Instagram app on my iPhone. I enjoy being forced to use one focal length (zoom on iPhone is awful), while the filters offer some interesting processing options. I also really like the square compositions.

I'm using an iPhone 4, so these are limited to 5MP - not that the lens is going to be overly capable of doing much more anyway!

Milford-on-Sea - Rocks used to try and stop long-shore drift.

Electricity or telephone cables - not sure but I like these!

Beetle on a leaf - macro capablity hardly amazing, but not bad either!

Beach huts at Milford-on-Sea

View of the Isle of Wight and the Needles

A farm field

Cabbage white butterfly - again showing the macro potential of the iPhone!

Paris - July 2012

Some shots from a trip to Paris in mid-July. I really haven't been getting much use at all from my camera of late, to be honest I'm finding Instagram more enjoyable at the moment - I will post some of my favorite recent shots with that later.


A vandalised van, saw a lot of these - I thought they were quite photogenic. Filters applied in Lightroom to enhance the colours.



A day or two before the end of the Tour de France - this was a charity event, though I couldn't tell if this was the start or the finish.



Entrance to the Louvre



And finally, an Instagram shot from the Arc de Triomphe

Pembrokeshire: Part 2

As promised, more photos from our time in Pembrokeshire this week.

I spotted this boat through the bushes on the coastal walk and thought it would make for a nice shot - I'm pretty happy with how it turned out.

A wider view of the site of the castle remains at Newcastle Emlyn, I quite liked the direction of the vapour trails from the aeroplanes in the sky.

Some rapeseed growing a field that we walked through along the Cardigan Bay coastal walk.

Buttercups growing in another field along the same coastal walk

Some white wildflowers, these were growing everywhere but I have no idea what they're actually called.

Pembrokeshire: Part 1

My girlfriend and I took a short break to Pembrokeshire, staying in a lovely hotel near Cardigan.

We certainly lucked in on the weather, and the hotel was excellent - http://www.hammethouse.co.uk/ - I'd certainly go back.

I will do this in stages, so here are the first lot of photos from the trip.

The view of Cardigan Bay, and Cardigan Island from Poppil Sands, in Pembrokeshire Coastal National Park.

 

Remains of the Castle at Newcastle Emlyn, I thought this was better suited to a mono-conversion.

 

Some buttercups from a field (which I will post a landscape view of later) on the Cardigan Bay coastal walk.

 

View of a boat in Cardigan Bay from the coastal walk.

 

Canerth Falls, Pembrokeshire - I really wanted a slower shutter speed to capture some better water movement, but with no filter and already at ISO 100 and f/22 there wasn't much I could do!

Red

A tulip from my garden - I struggled a bit on white balance, but still a photo I'm quite pleased with.

Another tulip, this time shot into the flower from the side.

 

Fire Flower

Attempting a macro shot of a flowering dandelion while the light was quite low seemed to create an interesting effect to the image. I did also process this in LightRoom to make a greater impact on the colour, but essentially it is pretty much the same as the original photo. I have no idea where the purple colour comes from, as the dandelion was in grass!

Some Spring colour

Easily my favorite time of year for photography, so much colour about! All shot at 100mm, most at f/2.8.


Flower photography has always been a particular favorite of mine, and I feel as though my output is improving a bit too. Hopefully get a lot more variety and different compositions over the coming weeks and in to Summer.

Another Grecian windflower....

... another one! Wish they were around a bit longer.

White narcissus

Not totally sure if this is actually a daffodil, as the 'trumpet is only about 0.5cm long, certainly some kind of narcissus in any case!

Spring flowers

A small selection of wild flowers taken over the past couple of days.

This Grecian Windflower (anemone blanda) was taken in my garden, I wanted to shoot it from the side to get a nice depth of field. I love these flowers, though sadly they are only around for a week or so.





I wasn't expecting to see bluebells over the weekend, but a small number of them had already popped up. This was taken from the ground looking upward and I think it's created an interesting effect in the photograph - some ghosting which I'm sure must be a lens issue, but also the flower itself is almost skeletal.





Finally, one of my favorite subjects - the dandelion. Shot from the side to capture the detail inside the flower, another dandelion in the background helping to brighten up the rest of the frame.




I decided to add a small 'watermark' to my images, I hope that it's not distracting. I wanted to add something since I'm hearing more and more about photographs being used by others who claim the work to be their own.

Macro Mix

A nice sunny spring weekend, the first this year that I've manged to get out for a few hours with my camera.


I never think to take my 300mm lens out with me much, though I wish I had on this occasion. I think my 100mm macro lens (and on a full frame sensor at that) was pushed a bit! Thankfully the 5D2 is capable of some serious cropping. While the background is a little distracting, and the head is a little dark, I quite like this shot. Lydiard Park lake in Swindon.



The macro lens was more at home with these two shots, the first taken at Savernake Forest later the same day, the other at Lydiard not far from the lake. Plenty of yellow about, not much else!

Scrabble

I wanted to try and use the Scrabble board and its pieces to try and get some still life shots. Neither of these is what I'd had in mind when I started, but they work ok for me.

In both cases I used my iPhone's led flash as a means of lighting the scene, the top one is side lit, while the second image is lit from above.

I can't help but also be impressed with the Canon 5D2's ability to handle very high ISO's. A monochrome conversion helps it, but still the noise is very acceptable.

A proper update, at last....

Ok, it's been a seriously long time since I posted anything, apart from some family shots and 'iPhoneography'.


A trip to Savernake Forest this weekend allowed me to dust off some of my kit and get back in to some proper photography. Subject matter was quite a challenge, but after a night of rain and some very sunny skies I had a bit of help from nature. That and my girlfriend who (despite not really being in to photography) seemed to be spotting more than I was, and making some rather good suggestions too :)


Anyway, some of the better efforts...



Some fungi, growing between the bark and wood of a tree.



Grass, rain, sun.


And finally, what I consider to be a rather attractive tree. The clouds had started to set in a bit at this point, allowing for some texture in the sky too.