STILL LIFE 160 – LOOKING AT CHAIRS 5

 

I’ve sampled the excellent food in Rosemarino’s Italian restaurant several times now, and taken some pictures while waiting for my meal to arrive.  Two photos (including a chair) are already posted here and here.

Now, looking at chairs some more, here are more Minimalist views of this restaurant’s simple but completely adequate seating.  My favourite amongst them?  Probably the second image down, for its simple silhouettes and pale, pastel colours – and also, looking at this image naively, the question: which are in the foreground, the colours or the silhouettes?

Which (if any!) of these images do you prefer?

The first post in this series on chairs, which contains context and an image, can be found here.  Subsequent posts are here: 2 3 4

Click onto each image to open a larger version in a separate window.

Technique: all of these images are jpegs straight out of the X-T2; aside from application of the X-T2’s in-camera film simulations, there has been no post-capture processing whatsoever.  All were taken with the 55-200 Fujinon lens at 305mm (equiv); 400 ISO; spot metering.

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SOMERSET LEVELS 299 – MISTY MORNING, ALLERTON MOOR 3

 

 

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Looking into misty light, early in the day.

You can find other images from this dark and mysterious morning here and here.

Click onto the image to open a larger version in a separate window, and click onto that image to enlarge it further – recommended.

Technique: X-T2 with 55-200 Fujinon lens at 305mm (equiv); 400 ISO; Lightroom, using the Provia/Standard film simulation; Allerton Moor;  22 Aug 2017.
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STILL LIFE 151 – CHAIR BESIDE A ROUND TABLE (MONO)

 

 

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Felt like a black and white fix, it gets me like that from time to time, and so … The chair next to mine, in Browns Restaurant, Bristol.

This view was immediately to the left of the one here, the chair pictured above can just be seen on the far left.

Click onto the image to open a larger version in a separate window, and click onto that image to enlarge it yet again – recommended.

Technique: X-T2 with 10-24 Fujinon lens at 36mm (equiv); 6400 ISO; Lightroom, using the Velvia/Vivid film simulation; Silver Efex Pro 2, starting at the High Contrast Orange Filter preset, and adding a light coffee tone; 28 Apr 2017.
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PEOPLE 291 – GOING TO WORK 33

 

 

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Approaching Bristol Bridge, just after 7am.  High summer, dazzling, bright, already warm – winter might be a million miles away.  But in winter many workplaces are at least warm(ish) and dry, we are cocooned indoors; but in summer that cocoon dissolves and it is outdoors that we wish to be.

Deliberately unfocused, the blazing light biting into the silhouettes.  What is here?  Three people walk up towards the bridge, becoming progressively lost in the glare. 

On the left, the red light of a crossing tells pedestrians to wait while, beyond it, a green light calls traffic on.

Earlier images from this series can be found here: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28,  29, 30,  31,  32. Each will open in a separate window.

Click onto the image to open a larger version in a separate window, and click onto that image to enlarge it yet again.

Technique: X-T1 with 55-200 Fujinon lens at 305mm (equiv);400 ISO; Lightroom, using the Velvia/Vivid film simulation; central Bristol, 19 July 2016
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SOMERSET LEVELS 295 – HILLTOP (MONO)

 

 

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Hilltop; a Levels skyline; Minimalism.

The Somerset Levels are just that – level, flat, flat and flat again.  But just north of the area that I usually infest, they are cut by a long line of low hills – the high ground around Blackford, Wedmore and Wookey – that well within historical times formed islands in the vast morass of lakes, swamps and thickets that were the Levels in their original form, before they were drained for agriculture.

I’d driven down early from Bristol, and was sipping hot, sweet coffee in the little layby beside the willows in Swanshard Lane, and there was low cloud drifting by, almost brushing the hilltops.

Click onto the image to open a larger version in a separate window, and click onto that image to enlarge it yet again.

Technique: X-T2 with 55-200 Fujinon lens at 305mm (equiv); 800 ISO; processing, and conversion to mono, in Lightroom; Swanshard Lane, north of Polsham; 18 Aug 2017.
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SOMERSET LEVELS 294 – MISTY MORNING, ALLERTON MOOR

 

 

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Cows in the mist: early morning on Allerton Moor, west of Chapel Allerton; 22 Aug 2017.

Another early visit to these flatlands, with rolling banks of mist looming and vanishing with disconcerting rapidity.  Someone had just seen otters in a roadside ditch.  I couldn’t see them but then, driving on towards the village of Mark, cows were grazing in a rough field on my left and there was light seeping uncertainly through the mist.

Little colour: this reflects the original scene, and the Pro Neg Hi film simulation helps too.  The animal on the left is identifiable, but the two further off could be rocks or some derelict piece of farm machinery.  I really enjoy such lighting conditions.

I’m heading in towards minor surgery this coming week, and have much to do before I’m temporarily physically curtailed.  Hence I’ve not been able to give others’ blogs as much attention as I’d like – apologies for this.

Click onto the image to open a larger version in a separate window, and click onto that image to enlarge it yet again.

Technique: X-T2 with 55-200 Fujinon lens at 305mm (equiv); 400 ISO; Lightroom, using the Pro Neg Hi film simulation.
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SOMERSET LEVELS 293 – RIVER BANK

 

 

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Bank of the River Sheppey, beside Ashmoor Drove.

I was standing above the river on a little bridge that farmers use to access their fields.  I looked down, and the big, spikey leaves sticking out from the Sheppey’s bank caught my eye.

As is often the case, this could so easily have ended up in black and white, but the faint colours add something.  And there are lots of shadows, lots not on view, but the picture was always going to centre around the (slight!) colours and textures of the water’s surface, and the silhouettes of those plants against the water’s brightness.

Click onto the image to open a larger version in a separate window, and click onto the enlarged image to enlarge it yet again – recommended.

Technique: X-T2 with 55-200 Fujinon lens at 238mm (equiv); 200 ISO; Lightroom, using the Velvia/Vivid film preset; Ash Moor, Somerset Levels; 18 Aug 2017.
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ARCHIVE 309 – THE SUN RISING OVER GLASTONBURY TOR

 

 

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Sunrise over Glastonbury Tor, seen from Tealham Moor, on the Somerset Levels; 22 Nov 2013.

I’ve lightened the centre section to bring interest to the mid-ground with the two cows – but I’m sure they should have shadows … oh dear, digital … not always quite up to it are you?  Or maybe I’m not quite up to it – its probably me.

And of course I’m pointing my magnificent if distinctly weighty telezoom straight into the sun’s glare, and so to a second, orange sun low down in the frame, and also some rather fiery glows between that sun and the real one.  I could have gone at it with software to try and make good these optical artefacts but, first, I can’t be bothered, and second, I think they add to the atmosphere and feeling of the shot – I mean, I’m pointing a x6 telephoto directly into Our Star’s incandescent face, so what do I expect, perfect and pristine optical rendition?

I like the 80-400.  Large and unwieldy it may be and its not one of Nikon’s very quick AF-S lenses, but it is image stabilised and I can hand hold it, and it gives such reach and flexibility.

An earlier image in this series is here .

Click onto the image to open another version in a separate window, and click onto that image to enlarge it further.

Technique: D800 with 80-400 Nikkor lens at 300mm; 800 ISO.

UPDATE: that wonderful but rather bulky 80-400 Nikkor lens has now disappeared >>> in a part exchange deal to buy a Fujifilm mirrorless camera!  I wonder if it was a wise swap?  Probably, I think, probably, and certainly so in terms of size and portability.  And the (already, in our digital world, aged) D800 has a trick up its sleeve – using it in Nikon’s APS-C format, which Nikon calls DX format, it multiplies the focal length of lenses by x1.5, so that my lighter and less bulky 70-300 Nikkor (my favourite Nikon lens of all) becomes 105-450 – and 400mm is still covered!
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ARCHIVE 306 – EARLY MORNING GARDEN: SUNLIGHT

 

 

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Early morning sunlight in our back garden; 9 Jul 2013.

Looking down the garden through a thin screen of tall grasses.  A very shallow depth of field, produced by using a long telephoto at close quarters, has thrown nearly everything except the closest grasses far out of focus.  This is not an accurate representation of the scene, but rather an impression of how it looked.

The line of dark tones at the top of the frame are the shadows below the hedge at the bottom of the garden.

Click onto the image to open a larger version in a separate window.

Technique: D800 with 70-300 Nikkor lens at 300mm; 200 ISO; Color Efex Pro 4.

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ARCHIVE 305 – SUNRISE WITH THREE DUCKS (MONO + COLOUR)

 

 

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Three ducks and the sunrise over Tealham Moor, south of Wedmore, on the Somerset Levels; 23 Nov 2012.

As with my pictures of crows aloft , the birds are dwarfed by the immensity of their element, yet quite at one with it.

Click onto the image to open another version in a separate window, and click onto that image to enlarge it.

Technique: D700 with 70-300 Nikkor lens at 300mm; 400 ISO; conversion to mono and colour restoration in Silver Efex Pro 2.

UPDATE: Minimalism once more, and the slightly unreal look of colour restored to a black and white image.

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