Dunstanburgh castle in Northumberland

I was up at Dunstanburgh Castle in Northumbria on a bit of a motorbike/photography trip with a friend recently when I got this photo. Unfortunately there wasn’t much of a sunset and there was even less of a sunrise but we did the best with the light we had. Dunstanburgh castle is a very photogenic location, with waves rolling in over the large round boulders as foreground interest and the ruined castle on the hill top it gives the landscape photographer numerous opportunities to create a great image. A great sky would really set the image off but as the clouds weren’t really dancing I made sure the sky wasn’t really the focal point, one of the ways this was done was by positioning the horizon on the top third as opposed to the bottom. I wanted the motion of the waves to appear misty, this was done by having the camera on bulb mode and keeping the shutter open for 90 seconds (a very opaque neutral density filter such as a 10-stop is pretty essential for long exposures).

Dunstanburgh castle in Northumberland (Colour Version)

Composition was a little tricky on the beach but I knew I didn’t want a single rock dominating the middle of the foreground so tried to make sure the rocks were fairly evenly scattered. I also had to wait for a bunch of pretty large waves as it is the white choppy water that gives the mist effect on long exposures, gentle waves wouldn’t have worked. It’s worth noting that the tripod was in about a foot of water here (as was I occasionally) and any wave splashes or rain on the filters had to be cleaned straight off, a tedious task to say the least. I used a 10 stop ND filter and a 3 stop grad to retail detail in the sky, as I wanted the cloud movement as well.

Dunstanburgh Castle with a Pink Sky

Processing was done in lightroom and the black and white conversion was done using nik software’s silver efex pro. The shot was taken at f/8, 16mm, ISO250 for 90 seconds. I’ve added a couple of colour versions of Dunstanburgh Castle as well, sometimes it’s difficult to choose!

Landscape Photography of A Lake in Wakefield, West Yorkshire at Sunset

Anyway back to the (swan-less) image. Shots like this always work well low to the water so you generally get a bit wet, your tripod and camera strap usually get dunked too but as long as you can keep the camera safe no harm is done. This one needed a little foreground inerest, the previously mentioned swan would have been great but a rock would suffice. This was taken at 20mm, f/8, ISO500 for 30 Seconds. Yes it was a long exposure, I have ordered a more accurately colour balanced 10 stop filter from Lee which I will hopefully soon have but the HiTech version worked fine, once the magenta was removed in lightroom. There is a little lens flare coming from the centre of the image but I quite liked it in this version so I kept it in. The sky in the end didn’t go as red and impressive as I’d planned and the swan didn’t stick around but next time maybe…

… I added the version with a few swans, not the best but worth posting.

Landscape Photography of A Lake in Wakefield, West Yorkshire at Sunset

Talk Photography – This is a forum I’ve used quite a lot in the past not only for inspiration but it’s also great learning resource. It really helps develop a critical eye for both others photos and your own, this becomes very important when you are out composing photos. There is always a little voice saying “what would that lot on TP make of this?” There is an issue of some people being overly critical and believe me, photographers are the most critical when it comes to, well, photographs. You sometimes question their validity to criticise but everyone has an opinion, if you can learn without taking too much to heart you will develop as a photographer.

Stumbleupon – I’ve only got into this recently but it’s great, you basically register and put in your interests (photography) and start stumbling. I’ve got a toolbar on firefox now where I just click and it’ll take me to some obscure site showing great photos, you can even say if you like it or not to get it noticed by others. I’ve found some great photos and resources just by stumbling.

Flickriver – This shows some of the best photos out there on flickr for a particular day, and there are hundreds, daily! It’s across a whole range of subjects so there is plenty of inspiration. Definitely worth a look.

Twitter – Again I’m kind of new to twitter but it’s a great way to meet others with the same interests, there are loads of big photographers who twitter a lot and the info is really good stuff. Other photographers are great for inspiration, just to look at the sort of images they are putting out, how they light and compose images. I always think looking at photos is a great way of learning, you absorb them somehow and they come back to you when you are out with the camera.

Flickr Maps – Flickr is great for photos but there are quite a lot to wade through and some of them have, ahem, limited appeal. The maps tool though is great, especially if you want to get out and don’t have any place in particular to go to. I put the map on an area I’m interested in (usually about a 10 mile radius of my house) then just search for landscapes, if an interesting shot comes up I see where it is on the map and get down there. It’s important not to go and try and replicate a shot but it helps open your eyes to landscapes that could just be on your door step.

It’s not always easy to keep inspired and more often than not you can go out and come back with nothing, but hopefully some of these links will inspire you to go out and get some shots. To quote Ansel Adam:

“Landscape photography is the supreme test of the photographer – and often the supreme disappointment.”

I’ve posted one of his shots below, he knew his way around a camera!

The Tetons and the Snake River

Panaramic Photo of Emley Moor Mast in the Winter Snow

I did a talk at a photographic club the day after, this being one of the images I showed. The high resolution version really is quite detailed, you can pretty much see the windows of the church near the mast. It was taken about an hour before sunset, I should have really stayed to get a better version with a lower sun but I had to move to a different place and I thought the location isn’t going anywhere and neither is the snow by the looks of it!

A Lamp Post in the Snow

Out again this evening, sky was nice, although a bit too clear for my tastes but you can’t have everything. I got this wintery lamp post as it reminded me of the one from the lion the witch and the wardrobe. I was reading about Ansel Adams again and so my processing veered towards black and white, if anyone knows how he managed to get shots like his it would be a great help, they didn’t have photoshop in the 30’s either! I loved the texture of the snow on the wall, processing it was a little tricky as I didn’t want the sky too dark as to merge with the top of the lamp post.

I’m also posting the obligatory tree shot, I liked how the shadow acted as a lead into the sun, although I was concious of the fact that I had taken a very similar tree in snow shot last year but I guess no two trees are identical. I couldn’t change a lot compositionally as I became aware that I was on a frozen pond or ditch, I don’t think it was too deep but didn’t want to hang around to find out. Both of these were taken with my 24-70 lens (now I have an adapter ring for it, yay!) at ISO100, f/16 at around 1/15

A Winter Tree

Sunrise in the Snow

I was up early this morning and could see we would be in for a decent sunrise so I donned just about all the clothes I own to keep warm and set off to a nearby field. I got there in good time but the shot I originally planned wasn’t going to work, it was more of a sun set location so I went over a small bank so the land would be lit up as soon as the sun peaked over the hills. As a side note, I also found quite a substantial bee farm, about 20 hives, luckily with it being -10 degrees there were none about. I used the tracks and the fence/hedge for foreground intrest and as leading lines towards the dramatic sunrise. I had my 3 stop ND grad on to balance the exposure and thats about it. I had underexposed the shot slightly to get the saturated colours, generally you should overexpose snow scenes to get the snow white as opposed to grey but in this case the sky was the main subject and I knew I could bring up the land a little with the graduated filter in Lightroom. This shot was taken at ISO100, f/16, 1/3 sec at 16mm.

Ribblehead Viaduct

Ribblehead Viaduct

Tree near a stream in the Yorkshire Dales

I’ve developed a bit of a love hate relationship with my tripod, I have a Manfrotto 190 cxpro3, it’s great being so light but the amount of times I have trapped fingers between the centre column and a closing leg is far more than I’d like to admit, maybe it’s just me. It’s a little annoying I can’t remove the centre column as I like to get quite low, I’ll have to look up some tips on it.

Trees in a Field at sunset near Nostell, Wakefield, West Yorkshire

Tree in a Field at sunset near Nostell, Wakefield, West Yorkshire

I sometimes use Flickr maps for a bit of inspiration as to where to go if I’m a bit undecided and it looked like we may have a decent sunset so today it sent me to Ackworth which is near Nostell Priory just outside Wakefield. I could see (from google maps) there was a good size field with a few lone trees so off I went. The sunset wasn’t the best in the end, a thick layer of cloud just above the horizon stopped it really lighting up the clouds but as the saying goes, you’ve got to be in it to win it! Got a couple worth posting, both taken at f/16 and ISO100 around 25mm and 1/10 sec. I had the circular polariser on along with my Lee ND grad.

Lepton Skies

It was a pretty clear this evening so I got out to snap some trees, there were a few whispy clouds to make the sky interesting which was a bonus. This clump of trees are in a small town called Lepton, between Huddersfield and Wakefield and they kind of remind me of the trees on the Maasai Mara, only in Yorkshire. In the black and white photo I was going for a fine art type shot purely because I thought the subject lends itself to that style. Taken at ISO100, 33mm, f/16, 1/8.

In the colour image I used a telephoto as I wanted to include Castle Hill in the background this wouldn’t have worked with a wide angle as the distant castle would be far too small. It’s been a while since I visited the land of the silhouettes but quite liked it as I could didn’t need to worry about graduated filters or anything, handy as I was just packing up! It was taken at ISO100, 70mm, f/16, 1/100. I’ve edited this post and put up a colour panoramic instead, thought it looked a bit better.

Sunset over Castle Hill