Leafing Powis

 The final image from the Powis Castle trip, made in the formal gardens.

Orangery Order

This image was made in the Orangery during the Powis Castle visit. I really like it - I think that its the way that the background colour works with that of the flowers. Also, I see it as of a piece with the images of orchids that I made at Kew Gardens back in February 2020. However, I have to accept that others may fail to see the attraction.

There is a mono version, you'll be glad to know, which is below. I don't like it as much as the colour version, I don't think.

Look At Meeeeeeeeeee!

 

This image was made on a bank holiday weekend visit to Powis Castle. The animal in question was guarding the door to the keep and attracting a lot of attention from visitors, which was causing this display.

Paraglide in Blue

I was back out on the Malverns yesterday, after a couple of week's break. Around 1pm, as I was approaching the Beacon from the north, I spotted a group of six paragliders out over the Vale of Evesham. By the time I'd reached the top of the Beacon, they'd passed over the hills and were out to the west, which is when I made these images of them.

It may look like I'm flying with them in these images, which just goes to show what a good vantage point and a long zoom lens can do.

This first image is probably my favourite, and the next is very similar.

The wind was quite strong, so the paragliders were moving quite fast and were difficult to frame. On the up side, it was blowing from the west, which kept them close to the hill. I managed to get my horizons out of kilter in most shots, and had to fix them in post. 

Its a while since I've used the free transform tool in GiMP, but it's been improved in the meantime. For example, it will automatically crop the image for you once you've finished the rotation, which removes a fair amount of faff.

Last, and by no means least, this is another favourite of the set.

Snow Joke

I was out on the Malvern Hills earlier today and made a few images - the image above is probably my favourite. Its of North Hill to the right of the image and the Sugarloaf, lower and to the left, taken on the climb up to The Beacon.

I've written previously about my approach to images formats, which is fairly inflexible. Its pretty much 3:2 all the way with me. However, this image is faux-panoramic in that I've cropped it to a 2:1 aspect ratio, removing a great expanse of dull, grey sky.

There are a few more which are in the same format and with a similar treatment, below. This next one is different framing of the same view.

The same scene again, made at the top of The Beacon:

The one has some people in it:

And this final one was made on the way down:

Upton Top Ranking

Some images from a recent visit to Upton-upon-Severn, where the river had burst its banks. I have made similar images in the past, which were probably better than these, but here they are anyway.

The Missing Link

North Hill from Link Common, looking quite Nordic, or Alpine, even.