OUTER SUBURBS 256 – THE YEAR IS MOVING ON

 

 

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As ever, time – and Life – move on.  The longest day is past, and each day a little shorter than the last.  Now, if I walk out about 5am, I meet the sun just starting to rise and, for perhaps up to an hour – if I’m lucky – the light is wonderful, even if only for enjoying the light show in the clouds overhead.

Over the past few years, I’ve come to realise that autumn is my favourite season, and even now I can feel myself looking forward to the faint chills in the air, the mists and the wonderful  colours.  Some might wonder why I’m not attracted to the warmth and colours of summer, but I have to admit to what really gets to me and – in terms of the seasons – it is the gradual closing down of the northern world as each year starts to wind down towards its end – and the more so if I can be out and about with a camera to record it.

Click onto the “early morning” tag (below) to see more images from the early hours of the day.

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

Technique: TG-5 at 25mm (equiv); 400 ISO; Lightroom, starting at the Camera Portrait profile; south Bristol; 13 July 2020.
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OUTER SUBURBS 254 – EARLY MORNING 2

 

 

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A beautiful, calm summer’s morning, 5.30am in fact, the sun just starting to rise, and I’m walking down the middle of the road in a silent but ‘comfortable’ street – expensive houses, security lights and cameras everywhere, and big cars on the driveways, quite some way away from the already blaring main artery that leads out southwards from the city’s heart.

A humanscape certainly, but with only one human (I use the term loosely …) in view.  A fox pauses, unsure of me; Jackdaws are already noisy up around their beloved chimney pots; and up above all there is the moon, appearing and disappearing behind softly drifting, fluffy clouds yet to be touched by the sun’s full glare.

Click onto the “early morning” tag (below) to see more images from the early hours of the day.

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

Technique:  TG-5 at 100mm (equiv); 400 ISO; Lightroom, starting at the Camera Portrait profile; south Bristol; 10 July 2020.
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ARCHIVE 529 – CLOUDS IN THE EARLY MORNING

 

 

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Early morning clouds over our garden; 22 Apr 2013.

Click onto the “early morning” tag (below) to see more images from the early hours of the day.

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

Technique: D800 with 70-300 Nikkor lens; 400 ISO; all underexposed to various degrees in Capture NX2 to saturate colour and bring out detail.

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OUTER SUBURBS 243 – EARLY MORNING, LOOKING UP

 

 

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Click onto the “early morning” tag (below) to see more images from the early hours of the day.

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

Technique: TG-5 at 25mm (equiv); 250 ISO; Lightroom, starting at the Modern 03 profile; south Bristol; 14 June 2020.
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ARCHIVE 523 – LOOKING UP AT SUNRISE (MONO)

 

 

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Looking up over our garden this morning – clouds and a contrail caught by the rising sun; Bristol; 22 Apr 2013.

I was just on the point of making that greatest of luxuries, the morning’s first cup of tea, when I glanced out of the window.  And then came one of the great improbables – a FATman moving at a rate of knots – in a frantic dash out into the back garden!

I love skies and clouds but, especially when the sun is just appearing or disappearing, and when contrails are moving steadily across the sky, things happen quickly – and there’s no time to hang about!

Click onto the “early morning” tag (below) to see more images from the early hours of the day.

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

Technique: D800 with 70-300 Nikkor lens at 135mm; 400 ISO; Silver Efex Pro 2, starting at the Fine Art High Key preset.

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ARCHIVE KENYA 22 – THE HUGE SKIES I MISS SO MUCH!

 

 

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Skyscape on the eastern side of the Maasai Mara Game Reserve – the huge skies that I miss so much!; April 1979.

Notice the effect of the polariser, which turns the sky at upper right almost black.  If such a photo can have a subject within it (i.e. as opposed to the subject being the whole skyscape), I think that here its the large cloud at top right, which is well defined against the very dark (polarised) sky, and which is at a compositional strong point –  the intersection of the upper and left hand thirds.

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

Technique: Olympus OM-1 with 28mm Zuiko lens and polarising filter; Agfa CT18 colour slide film rated at 64 ISO.

THE ARCHIVE KENYA SERIES

I’m re-posting photographs that I took in Kenya over 30 years ago.  You can find more context here .  Click onto the “Archive Kenya” tag (below) to see more of these film images from Kenya.

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OUTER SUBURBS 232 – A WEATHER FRONT MOVES THROUGH

 

 

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Out early, walking in the lockdown.  I’ve taken fewer photos during these walks recently, for three reasons I think.  First the sun is higher in the sky now, even during the very early hours I keep – I’ll have to wait until the very earliest stirrings of autumn before the light gets lower and more golden again.  Second, I’ve worked out a “safe” walking route where the all important social distancing can easily be achieved, but as this is mainly through suburban housing estates, I’m rather reticent about pointing a camera towards anyone’s front windows!  But thirdly, and inevitably I suppose, all of this virus turmoil is getting to me such that, as I walk, my mind is often preoccupied with things other than photography.  It can take quite an effort to re-focus the mind into real “looking and seeing” mode; having Roe Deer and Foxes around does me good!

But last Thursday the skies became a little more dramatic as a small weather front passed eastwards over Bristol.  It brought a couple of light and in fact quite refreshing showers, and as I looked at the clouds moving over from the west, this scene unfolded.

Click onto the “early morning” tag (below) to see more images from the early hours of the day.

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

Technique: TG-5 at 70mm (equiv); 200 ISO; spot metering; Lightroom, starting at the Camera Portrait profile; south Bristol; 21 May 2020.

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OUTER SUBURBS 213 – WINTER TREES (MONO)

 

 

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Lockdown: walking out to buy a newspaper in the early morning – and looking up.

This scene was on the opposite side of the road to the one shown here, and these were the trees casting the shadows onto that new fence.

Click onto the “early morning” tag (below) to see more images from the early hours of the day.

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

Technique: TG-5 at 25mm (equiv); 320 ISO; spot metering; Lightroom, starting at the Camera Portrait profile; Silver Efex Pro 2, starting at the Strong Infrared High Contrast preset, and adding a light Coffee tone; south Bristol; 31 Mar 2020.
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ARCHIVE 446 – SEASCAPE

 

 

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Study in blue – looking out to sea from Lizard Point, Cornwall; 19 Oct 2016.

Composition: a Minimalist image, take away the fluffy cloudlets and there’s really not much here, although it might still (just) work sans nuages.  But I like these little clouds – their shapes, fluffiness and colour – and the way they are at once separate from the dense, dark overcast – their relationship to this overcast is rather like that of little children skipping along beside their humourless, stolid, heavily pacing parents.  There is also that thin, linear break in the parental overcast just above these cloudlets – is it the trace of a smile? – perhaps their parents are not so humourless after all …

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

Technique: X-T1 with 55-200 Fujifilm lens at 305mm (equiv); 400 ISO; Lightroom.

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SOMERSET LEVELS 450 – LOOKING WEST AND LOOKING UP

 

 

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One of my favourite places – Tealham Moor, on the Somerset Levels.  And using a very wide angle lens to look up at the sky and give some idea of – some feel for – the very peaceful morning.

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

Technique: X-T2 with 10-24 Fujinon lens at 15mm (equiv); 400 ISO; Lightroom, starting at the Camera Astia/Soft profile; Tealham Moor, on the Somerset Levels southwest of Wedmore; 14 Feb 2020.
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