Up Against the Wall

Having brought things up to date with my previous post, I've gone back in time a short way to the end of August, just before we left Somerset. At the time we made a couple of abortive visits to the walled garden at Cannington, on the second of which we turned up to find the place closed.

However, I noticed these plant, which were growing in front of the white wall of one of the college campus buildings. I made several images and these are the best of bunch, as I didn't manage the depth of field very well. I was using my Olympus Pen F, which I find less intuitive to use than the Sony, so that's my excuse.

 

Movin'

I guess that the time has come to announce that we've moved to Malvern in Worcestershire. The images in this post were made during a walk to the Beacon on the Malvern Hills on a foggy Sunday morning recently.

The Moat In My Eye

 

So, here's the problem: to make this image using my DSLR, I would require the camera itself, a tripod and preferably a remote release, although guess I could make do without the latter and use the self-timer.

Anyway, this image was made during an evening out in Wells. Looking out of the restaurant window, I noticed that the moat was still and reflecting the palace gatehouse. Given that the day had been quite wild weather-wise, this would never have occurred to me as a possibility and even if it had, I wouldn't have considered taking all that gear with me to dinner.

So, given the above, the image should never have been made. As it was, I seized the opportunity and used my Pixel 2 smartphone, post-processed in Snapseed on my Chromebook, and here it is, along with the image below.

The only benefit of using all the kit would be that I would have a high resolution image in a lossless format - I use tiff in my workflow - which would be useful if someone contacted me, wanting to use the image in a print magazine.

But that's never happened. Sometimes, it does make you wonder why you bother with all that expensive, bulky equipment. Sometimes.

I Was Banking On It

 

This is one of those images that I sometimes make of objects (please use the French pronunciation, it sounds so much better).

This is an old money box that's been hanging round in my grandparent's, parent's and now my house for many years, and surfaces from time to time. There is some money in it, but the key - the keyhole is in the base - is long since lost.

The bank in question - not to be confused with the National & Provincial Building Society - ceased to exist as a separate entity in 1970, merging with the Nat West (which was not the best choice, with hindsight).

This is also one of those images shot using my Pixel 2 and processed in Snapseed on my Chromebook. I'm quite pleased with the result - some of my favourite images of the recent past have been produced using this workflow.

Maybe its the way of the future...

BTW: if anyone has any suggestions regarding how to open it, I'd be interested to hear them in the comments. 

I Wish I Was a Little Boulder

 

Another image from the Watchet set.

Harbouring a Grudge

This is an image of the seawall at Watchet harbour, made on a recent(ish) visit.

 

Eden Reject

A couple of images from another trip to the Eden Project. I've made images like the first on numerous occasions, and I'm not so sure about the second image, but here they are anyway.

Leave It All Bee-hind

 

Another image of a bee on our lavender - probably one of my favourites - and I final reminder of the summer as we move into autumn. 

Pulteney Weird

This post represents a first for this blog.

The original image was captured on my Pixel 2 phone, but this isn't the new bit. However, It was processed in Snapseed running on my Asus Chromebook, which I'm also using to write this post. And this is the first time that I've posted an image using that workflow.

Speaking of the original image, it was made around a year ago whilst on a day out in Bath. We went on a boat trip on the Avon and I made a few images of Pulteney Weir on our return. I processed it in Snapseed using the B&W conversion tool and the contrast filter. I also cropped it to a 3:2 aspect ratio.

Which is all a far cry from my usual, heavyweight process using RawTherapee and Gimp on a Windows PC. But, I have to say that I'm pleased with the results.

Swanning Around Shapwick II

 

Another image of a swan made at Shapwick NNR. For some reason, I failed to mention how much I like the image in the previous post - in fact, I think that its everything that I've been trying to capture in all the years that I've been making images at Shapwick.

So, here's another from the same set. It took me a number of tries to get it right. I was working at the very far end of the zoom range and trying to get an acceptable depth of field, so this is the only other image that was usable.

Swanning Around Shapwick

 

Yet another image from Shapwick Heath NNR.

Beachy Head

 

Another, and final, image from the Brean Down set.

How To Disappear Completely

Another image of Brean Beach from Brean Down, made on a different visit from the previous images.

There was a point, during post-processing, that I was thinking of removing all the people in this image, except for the group of four on the right, perhaps. The fact is that I have cloned out some figures, but I stopped short of removing the lot.

On reflection, this is probably my favourite image in this series, which will conclude with the next post.

Beaching

Another image from the Brean Down set. For some reason, this puts me in mind of the final lines from that ultimate distillation of Western philosophy, the Rocky Horror Picture Show:

“And crawling on the planet's face,

some insects called the human race.

Lost in time, and lost in space.

And meaning.”

On The Beach

A few weeks ago, we went for a Sunday afternoon walk on Brean Down. This image of the tide line on Brean Beach was one result.

I really like this image - for reasons that escape me, I find contemplating the various textures of sand and water particularly satisfying. There was an earlier version that cropped out the skyline, but I reinstated it. Although again, I don't know why.

Ill Bee-haviour

This really is the last of these bee images. For now.

Bee - Don't Try to Bee-Come

Another image of a bee-on-a-smoke-tree.

Bee-ing for the Benefit of Mr Kite

Another image of a bee on one of our smoke trees and another might fine pun as a title.

As an aside, there was some sad news this week - Olympus has sold its imaging division to a private equity firm, in a move that has been widely interpreted as an end to the brand as a force in consumer photography.

It also highlights my continuing, unerring ability to pick a loser. For a while now, I've been thinking of moving away from Sony and the obvious course, given that I already own a Pen F, was to replace my Alpha 77 with an OM-D M1. I suppose I should be glad that this news has broken before I need to make the move.

Back to the drawing board, I guess.

Bee-ing And Nothingness

Yet another image of a bee, on what I believe to be a smoke tree, of which there are a couple in our garden.

The Unbearable Lightness of Bee-ing

Right, enough of that tulip nonsense. Its's that time of the year when insects return to the garden, so here's an image of a bee. More to follow.

A Smaller Break

This is the last of these tulip images.

A Cleaner Break

Another image of that broken stemmed tulip.

A Clean Break

I liked this image better on the camera LCD.

There's a slightly unusual story behind this one. We have a small group of these stripey tulips at the back of our garden and I decided to make some images of them, using my diffuser as a background rather than faffing about with a piece of white paper. However, the diffuser is quite large and I dropped it as I was moving it into place, breaking the stem of this flower.

I was a bit nonplussed at this as I don't usually cut flowers in order to photograph them, but after a few minutes of fussing about, I got this into a pot and made a few images.

I did say that it was only slightly unusual.

I really thought this was going to be better, but I don't like the way the broad white stripe on the right bleeds into the background.

Chew Lip II

Another image of the stripey, striking tulip from our garden.

Chew Lip

Yet another image of a long stemmed tulip from our garden.

Black Tulip II

Okay, even I've had enough of this particular flower, so something different next time, honest.

Black Tulip

Another image of the same purple tulip, Unfortunately, there are more where this came from. Even worse, I may post some of them.

Tua Lipa II

Another image of the long stemmed tulip. A few more to come, I fear.

Tua Lipa

This image is one of few that approximates to the original idea that was in my head when I set up the camera. 

This long stemmed tulip was in a pot on our dining table and my plan was to accentuate the stem by photographing it from beneath. I used my diffuser as a backdrop, covering a window - this was a problem as the light was already going when I started, but it led to the nice soft quality of the image.

In all, this is everything that I'm trying to achieve with my "specimen images" of single flowers.

Below is a similar image, where the framing isn't quite right, so the formal properties aren't quite as strong.

Kewing Up

This is (probably) the final post with images drawn from the Kew trip. I'm rather proud of the first one although the composition might have been improved.

Alpine Resort

This image was made in the Alpine House during our recent trip to Kew Gardens. I was better please with it when I made it than I am now, but here it is anyway.

Orchids Right on Kew

During our recent trip to Kew Gardens, there was an exhibition of orchids going on in the Princess of Wales Pavilion. However, these images were made in one of the octagons in the Temperate House. Go figure.

Right On Kew

We made another trip to Kew Gardens over the recent half term, so the next few posts will feature images from that visit. First up, leaves from the tropical house:

I dithered about which camera to take with me on this trip, as we were going for a couple of days and travelling by train, so I was going to have to carry everything. At Kew, I was really glad to have the Sony, the following day at the Science Museum, I regretted my choice. 

In camera, I thought that the second image was my favourite, but now I'm not so sure - the third would be, if I hadn't made that image numerous times, at the Eden Project, Cannington and elsewhere.

A World In White Gets Underway

Cheddar Reservoir, New Year's Day 2020, around 14:00.

I haven't desaturated this image, just tweaked it a bit with GIMP's curves editor, having overexposed it in-camera.