Looking at – and seeing – the world
April 6, 2020 Leave a comment
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Walking the locked down suburbs: sunrise, a new fence and a car.
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 100mm (equiv); 400 ISO; spot metering; Lightroom, starting at the Camera Vivid profile; south Bristol; 31 Mar 2020.
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April 5, 2020 Leave a comment
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Walking in the lockdown, on a gloriously sunny morning – and being grateful for the TG-5’s wide angle lens.
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); 250 ISO; Lightroom, starting at the Camera Portrait profile; south Bristol; 31 Mar 2020.
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March 12, 2020 10 Comments
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Looking east on Tealham Moor, as the sun rises. Using a very wide angle lens, and exposing for the highlights.
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); 200 ISO; jpeg created and processed in-camera from a raw file, using the Acros + Red Filter film simulation; Tealham Moor, on the Somerset Levels southwest of Wedmore; 14 Feb 2020.
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March 7, 2020 27 Comments
1: Path through modern housing
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On 25 Aug 2018, I posted this picture on FATman Photos. I’d been taking long walks around Bristol’s outskirts for sometime and, time and again, had passed this quite mundane scene and been visually attracted by it – and so to the decision to take a camera along on my walks, and to start by photographing this scene. Walking around often empty roads in the dark early mornings with a big camera seemed unwise and so I took to slipping the relatively diminutive Olympus TG-5 TOUGH camera into my pocket. The resulting Outer Suburbs series is now at 200 posts.
And the long walks continue, usually about 5 miles or so. For me, they bring four very real benefits. First, I have been retired (Oh, Happy State!!!) from work for nearly 7 years, and am sure that keeping up some form of physical exercise in these later years is most important; Sue, my doctor, wholeheartedly agrees. Then, second, there are mental health benefits too: I feel relaxed on the walks, they frequently raise my mood, and they give me time to both daydream and to think things through. Third, I have been a naturalist nearly all my life, and these walks give me the chance to commune with Nature – plants and birds, a few mammals (Roe Deer, Foxes – some rats too!), the weather, the changing seasons. And, last, the photography of course: this is never forced, I just have the little camera in my pocket, and point it anything that happens to catch my eye. Sometimes I don’t take any photos at all; but I never let poor photographic conditions deter me – ALWAYS, ALWAYS, its better to have some sort of image rather than no image at all!
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2: the TG-5 (Photo credit: TrustedReviews)
All of the pictures here have been taken with the TG-5 (mine is black). Its compact and light, and disappears completely into my trouser pocket. Hence its totally unobtrusive and, when in use, less intimidating / noticeable than a larger camera. Being a TOUGH camera, it is extremely robust and, amongst other things, waterproof. I don’t use or indeed understand all of its capabilities / controls, but it shoots Raw, which I use for all my photography; has a useful zoom range (25mm-100mm, equivalent); has spot metering; works fine up to at least 6400 ISO; can perform flash and macro work; and, having a small sensor (6.16mmx4.62mm), delivers great depths of focus. I’d prefer it to have a viewfinder and greater telephoto reach, but its still a really handy camera to have around, and to carry anywhere and everywhere.
Trying to select a relatively small number of images from 199 posts is no easy job, and so I’ve tried to show representatives of this project’s main subject areas / genres.
Clicking onto images opens larger versions in separate windows.
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3: Autumn
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4: Bus shelter (with illuminated arrival times) beside a busy main road, a major route into the city from the south. And the first, faint flush of sunrise.
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5: Full English Breakfast – black pudding (the luscious black disc on the left, essentially blood and fat … 😉 sausages; hash browns; fried eggs; mushrooms; toast; bacon (under the toast); fresh tomato; baked beans.
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6: Out walking, and looking down
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7: Bus shelter, wet morning
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8: Greengrocer
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9: Early morning
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10: Early morning gutter with lamp post, frost, moss and banana skin
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11: Human tragedy (the two words say it all)
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12: Stormy sunrise
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13: Laughing gas, nitrous oxide, now the commonest recreational drug in the UK after cannabis
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14: Modern housing
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15: Early morning mist, main road
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16: Starlings, in autumn
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17: Early morning mist, main road
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18: Looking down, this morning
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19: Photographing shadows
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20: Early morning
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21: Foggy morning
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22: Looking up, early in the day
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23: Tree in winter, dawn breaking; my first flash photo for a long time
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March 5, 2020 23 Comments
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The simple fact is … I love kids. Why? Well, because not yet having acquired adult minds through that “wonderful interval”, adolescence (which has now been found to extend up to the age of 32 by the way), kids have a different outlook on the world, and I’ve long been truly fascinated to hear about it. I want to see and think as they do >>> and of course it has often been said that one way to become a better photographer is to try and retain a childlike sense of wonder at the world – which I suppose translates into being able to look at and feel a sense of wonder at something that the adults find facile and mundane >>>> bring it on!!!
And so, one early morning, I was more than happy, inspired and sheer plain thrilled in fact to find this kids play park, which I regularly pass on my walks through the outer suburbs, thoroughly festooned in till rolls from the local Asda supermarket, they were everywhere! Ah, the simple pleasures of Life …
I imagine that a group of kids had found or stolen a box of these paper rolls and, with that vast imagination that kids have, promptly set about thoroughly decorating their play area. So that when an ageing and somewhat portly photographer passed by early the next morning, the while place was “thoroughly decorated”, as witness this tree with its multiple floating streamers caught by the breeze >>> and said photographer was instantly and MIGHTILY amused!!!
And the title of this post? Its from the superb film Apocalypse Now , and the speaker, Colonel Bill Kilgore, is referring to napalm, rather than to till rolls – and so this post ends on a more serious note.
Click onto the image to open a larger version in a separate window.
Technique: TG-5 at 74mm (equiv); 3200 ISO; spot metering; Lightroom, starting at the Camera Portrait profile; south Bristol; 16 Jan 2020.
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February 24, 2020 9 Comments
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Other images in this Early Morning series – from both rural and urban settings, and from Kenya too – are 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 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 . All will open in separate windows. You can also search on the “early morning” tag, below.
Click onto the image to open a larger version in a separate window – recommended.
Technique: TG-5 at 100mm (equiv); 800 ISO; spot metering; Lightroom, starting at the Camera Vivid profile; south Bristol; 6 Feb 2020.
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February 9, 2020 12 Comments
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Other images in this Early Morning series – from both rural and urban settings, and from Kenya too – are 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 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 . All will open in separate windows. You can also search on the “early morning” tag.
Click onto the image to open a larger version in a separate window – definitely recommended.
Technique: TG-5 at 100mm (equiv); 800 ISO, spot metering; Lightroom, starting at the Camera Portrait profile; south Bristol; 5 Dec 2020.
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February 6, 2020 11 Comments
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Looking up at sunrise from Top Hut on Mt Kenya towards Nelion, one of the twin peaks of Mt Kenya; August 1978.
Almost the roof of Africa! Nelion stands at 17,021 feet, while the other peak, Batian, rises to 17,057 feet. These two peaks are separated by the wonderfully named Gate of the Mists, and they are the tallest peaks in Africa second only to Mt Kilimanjaro, which is nearby in neighbouring Tanzania, and which soars to over 19,000 feet.
What was it like being up there on Mt Kenya? Well, taking this photo, it was extremely cold – I remember having trouble changing the lenses on my Olympus OM-1 SLR; they were very stiff to twist off, presumably due to the intense cold having slightly contracted the metal. Getting up to this altitude on the mountain required no rock climbing skills, it was simply a long walk, made more strenuous in its later stages by the decreasing oxygen content of the air – but after a day or so at these altitudes, breathing became easier. We were up there for several nights, sleeping in the various mountaineering huts around the peaks; and my abiding memories of those huts concern the rats which ran over and around us every night as we slept!
Click onto the image to open another copy in a separate window, and click onto that image to enlarge it.
Technique: OM-1 with 28mm Zuiko lens; Agfa CT18 colour slide, rated at 64 ISO; Lightroom.
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February 5, 2020 4 Comments
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Other images in this Early Morning series – from both rural and urban settings, and from Kenya too – are 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 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 . All will open in separate windows. You can also search on the “early morning” tag.
Click onto the image twice to open a larger version in a separate window.
Technique: TG-5 at 100mm (equiv); 800 ISO; spot metering; Lightroom, starting at the Camera Natural profile; south Bristol; 2 Dec 2019.
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January 22, 2020 16 Comments
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Other images in this Early Morning series – from both rural and urban settings, and from Kenya too – are 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 33 34 35 36 37 . All will open in separate windows. You can also search on the “early morning” tag.
Click onto the image twice to open a larger version in a separate window.
Technique: TG-5 at 100mm (equiv); 6400 ISO; spot metering; Lightroom, starting at the Camera Vivid profile; south Bristol; 10 Jan 2020.
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