SOMERSET LEVELS 393 – EARLY MORNING 5

 

 

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Early morning, Tealham Moor.

Once more, in-camera processing.  The image looks rather flat, but I’ve deliberately it in the Neutral profile (to which, since I shoot Raw files, my camera is permanently set) to stay with the rather low contrast, quite misty, early morning light.

Other images in this Early Morning series are here: 1 2 3 4 .

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

Technique: Z 6 with 70-300 Nikkor lens used in DX (= APS-C) format to give 450mm; 800 ISO; jpeg created and processed in-camera from a Raw file, using the Camera Neutral v2 profile and in-camera cropping; further minor processing in Lightroom; Tealham Moor, on the Somerset Levels southwest of Wedmore; 9 Aug 2019.
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SOMERSET LEVELS 392 – TOTNEY DROVE, TEALHAM MOOR (MONO)

 

 

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A vehicle approaches the tiny bridge over the North Drain at Rattling Bow, on Tealham Moor.  The bridge itself is seen as the low rise in the road immediately in front of the vehicle, while its guard rails to the right are catching the light.  Totney Drove, the single track road, glistens after rain.

This is in a rather different style to many of my other Levels pictures: it is an image both captured by the camera and which has received most of its post-capture processing within the camera (more detail below).  This in-camera processing is a different way of working: capturing images in the usual way, and then sitting down later with the camera (usually accompanied by a few excellent Belgian golden ales) and trying out different crops and (customisable) looks on them.

Obvious question then, do I like this picture, do I like the post-capture processing that, via my commands, the camera has given it?  I think I do, I think this way of working is worth pursuing as a side line to more “traditional” methods.  The camera’s treatment is harshly dark, but perhaps this suits this flat, wet, open and at times bleak landscape.

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

Technique: Z 6 with 70-300 Nikkor lens at 300mm; 800 ISO; jpeg created and processed in-camera from a Raw file, using the Camera Graphite profile and in-camera cropping; further minor processing in Lightroom; Tealham Moor, on the Somerset Levels northwest of Westhay; 9 Aug 2019.
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SOMERSET LEVELS 374 – LOOKING WEST FROM THE JACK’S DROVE BRIDGE

 

 

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As the single track lane of Jack’s Drove cuts northwards across Tealham Moor, it crosses a little bridge and, looking left – that is, towards the west – this is what you see.  Here are the dark, peaty waters of the North Drain, speckled with water lily pads and moving slowly away westwards.  This drain is totally manmade, to help shift water away from these often sodden flatlands – and the fact that it is full almost to the brim in the first week of July only goes to show just how much water there is around here.

The land on either side is flat, rough pasture right out to the horizon, but there is some slightly higher ground at top right – higher ground that used to be part of an island when all of these flatlands were largely underwater.

And if you enlarge this shot (which you should!!! >>> the enlarging method is given below) >>> then tightly screw in your monocle (ouch!) and fix the horizon at upper left with a fierce and penetrating stare, you may just be able to make out a long, shadowy line of high ground, the Quantock Hills, far off to the southwest.  Travel on past them, and over the horizon you’ll find the Brendon Hills, the Blackdown Hills and Exmoor and – before you know it – you’ll be in Devon!

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

Technique: X-T2 with 10-24 Fujinon lens at 15mm (equiv); 400 ISO; Lightroom, starting at the Camera Provia/Standard profile; Tealham Moor, on the Somerset Levels; 5 July 2019.
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SOMERSET LEVELS 373 – MEADOW PIPIT SINGING

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Feeling tired after an early morning start, I’d just slumped down into the car’s driving seat, thinking about the drive back to Bristol, when this little pipit landed on a gate post right in front of me and burst into song.  Pictures through the car’s dirty windscreen clearly weren’t going to cut the mustard and so, leaning carefully sideways – using the car as a hide – I managed to poke the business end of the telezoom through the gap between the car’s open door and its bodywork.  It was the lens I’m married to (the new version of it) the 70-300 Nikkor zoom and, putting the camera into APS-C mode gave me 450mm = x9 magnification.  I started carefully squeezing the shutter button, taking care not to make any sudden movements.

The bird is a Meadow Pipit, Anthus pratensis if you want to know, a small warbler that lives and breeds on open grasslands, like the rough pasture here on Tealham Moor.  It gives its full song when in flight over its territory, but also uses perches like this to deliver partial versions.  Sitting or lying back in a soft, warm, summer field, listening to Meadow Pipits singing overhead – where there may be Skylarks singing too – is certainly not the least of Life’s simple and totally freely given pleasures.

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

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Technique: Z 6 with 70-300 Nikkor lens used in DX (= APS-C) format to give 450mm; 800 ISO; Lightroom; beside the Jack’s Drove bridge over the North Drain, Tealham Moor, on the Somerset Levels; 5 July 2019.

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SOMERSET LEVELS 372 – EDGE OF A WATERWAY

 

 

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Lush summer growth, beside water, on Tealham Moor.

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

Technique: Z 6 with 70-300 Nikkor lens at 135mm; Lightroom, starting at the Camera Standard v2 profile; rotated; rhyne beside Jack’s Drove on Tealham Moor, on the Somerset Levels; 5 July 2019.

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SOMERSET LEVELS 368 – JOGGER (MONO)

 

 

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Morning run amongst the flowers and lush growth of early summer, on the northern edge of Tealham Moor.  The farm behind has prudently been built on the slightly rising ground above the moor, well out of the way of flooding.

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

Technique: Z 6 with 70-300 Nikkor lens used in DX (= APS-C) format to give 450mm; 800 ISO; Lightoom, starting at the Camera Vivid v2 profile; Silver Efex Pro 2, starting at the Wet Rocks preset and adding a light coffee tone; Tealham Moor, on the Somerset Levels; 5 July 2019.
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SOMERSET LEVELS 366 – SPRING MORNING (MONO)

 

 

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A rather unusual picture from these mostly open flatlands: my car surrounded – besieged  almost – by spring flowers and pollarded Willows.  It was early in the morning and I was driving out onto the Levels from the north – on the road from Blackford to Westhay as the wonderfully aslant SCC (Somerset County Council) signpost informed me.

And I’d pulled into the open entrance of a rough track called Tealham Moor Drove, to drink a cup of coffee, savour the quiet of the early morning, and just take a look at anything and everything.

And so to peace, quiet, flowers with a shadowed field gate on their left, the leaning and wonderfully unModern signpost, dense trees – and my small, old, battered and dirty car, bedecked with lichens, spiders’ webs, mud and other less mentionable substances.  A simple scene, and an at once wonderful and very ordinary little place to be.

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

Technique: Z 6 with 70-300 Nikkor lens used (mistakenly!) in DX (= APS-C) format to give 105mm; 640 ISO; Lightroom, starting at the Camera Neutral v2 profile; Silver Efex Pro 2, starting at the Center Focus preset and adding a light Ambrotype tone; at the western end of Tealham Moor Drove, on the Somerset Levels south of Blackford; 3 May 2019.
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SOMERSET LEVELS 346 – LANDSCAPE (MONO)

 

 

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Landscape with trees. 

Can you see the birds’ nest, high up in a fork?  From size and position, I’d guess nesting crows.

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

Technique: Z 6 with 70-300 Nikkor lens at 300mm; 3200 ISO; Lightroom, using the Camera Neutral V2 picture control; Silver Efex Pro 2, starting at the High Contrast Harsh preset and adding a split tone; west of Tealham Moor, on the Somerset Levels southwest of Westham; 12 April 2019.
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SOMERSET LEVELS 345 – MALLARD ON THE NORTH DRAIN (MONO)

 

 

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A pair of Mallard, a very common duck, on the calm waters of the North Drain, on Tealham Moor.  The more ornate male is on the left, and the far more camouflaged female on the right.

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

Technique: Z 6 with 70-300 Nikkor lens used in DX (= APS-C) format to give 450mm; 500 ISO; Lightroom, using the Camera Flat V2 picture control; Silver Efex Pro 2, starting at the Underexpose EV -1 preset and adding a strong coffee tone; the North Drain on Tealham Moor, on the Somerset Levels, seen from the Jack’s Drove bridge; 12 Apr 2019.
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SOMERSET LEVELS 344 – MORNING LIGHT, LOOKING EAST ACROSS THE NORTH DRAIN

 

 

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Morning light on the North Drain.  This is not a river, it is a totally man-made waterway that helps drain these lush and often wet flatlands.

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

Technique: Z 6 with 70-300 Nikkor lens at 125mm; 500 ISO; Lightroom, using the Camera Landscape V2 picture control; looking east, early in the day, from the Jack’s Drove Bridge across the North Drain on Tealham Moor, on the Somerset Levels; 12 April 2019.
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