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Blog 45 - Bamford Edge Peak District I love the Peak District just a stunning area and one i don’t visit enough try and will try and change that, I purposely booked this trip as the weather looked good so left at 5.00am and had good trip to Bamford edge its a great walk along the top over looking Ladybower Dam and reservoir below, my walk started before sunrise but it was evident that weather forecast had changed from the night before and really was a flat light but the walk and views are great and took a few shots. circular route back to the car and drove towards Derwent Dam and realised how low the water line was, checked my aerial map and asked a local chap if I could take of from his land and sent my up drone for some arial shots as the village that was flooded back in 1944 started to show its walls and footings, just incredible I’ve never seen this water level so low. Just a few from the day:
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Blog 44 - Pistyll Rhaeadr Planned this trip for a while and the weather look overcast but was happy with that as this would be perfect to photograph one of Wales highest waterfalls, Just west of Oswestry and Shrewsbury at 240ft high it could well be Britains tallest single drop waterfall. As we got closer the rain started to get heavy and by the time we parked it was torrential, luckily a great little tea shop adjacent to the car park and we sat and had a pot of tea for two and cake. I don’t mind rain but this was on another level and was still coming down after an 1hr, there is a limit of weatherproofing on my camera and lens and how weatherproofing my wife was, at this stage was a resounding no! So I managed to get a selfie of us and got soaked through, at least i had picture, this is my second time here, third time lucky in 2019 hopefully  Blog 43 - Dovercourt Lighthouse At the 2017 photography show I watched an Adobe Seminar with Paul Saunders a truly inspirational photographer and really is on another level and one of his images flashed up up of Dovercourt Lighthouse, it was just a beautiful image so this place was put in my little black book and earmarked for a visit. So had the chance to visit I new going at this time of the year the weather really wasn’t going to be how i had it picture in my head i wanted a dull misty day but instead had a sunny bright day, so the 10 or 15 stop filter would be needed. There are actually two lighthouse 200m apart one on the beach and the one I photographed they have been scheduled as ancient monument by English Heritage back in 1975, The lighthouses, commissioned by Trinity House in 1862 and completed in 1863, served to guide ships towards Harwich harbour (some 1.5km to the north) their different heights enabling the two lights to be aligned on approach. My long exposure was 210 seconds and I just love the way Lighthouse sits within the view, one of my favourite places visited in 2018 Blog 42 - Ragley Hall Firework Champions Well if you ever wanted to photograph fire works this is place to come for a bit of practice. The spectacular Firework Champions returned for it’s 3rd year at Ragley Hall, you can photograph the Ragley skyline illuminate with four spectacular firework displays, three of the UK’s best firework companies will be firing against each other to win the title of Firework Champion and you decide who will win via text vote, then a final display by MLE Pyrotechnics. a great evening you take can take picnic and chairs or plenty of food and stalls for food. Camera in manual mode, ISO 100 f/8 and in bulb mode with a shutter release and sit and watch, just a few of the many many photographs i took. This was unexpected find just outside Hartlepool an old pier that was left from the the old Steetley Lime and Building Stone Company that was along the shoreline and the pier supplied water to the works. So a bit of planning on sunset times, tide tables, airspace check and weather looked good and a new road has been built to serve the new housing estate you can park within 5 minutes of the pier. Using a six stop Lee filter managed a few shots of this wonderful old pier as you can see a missing section was taken was taken down to stop people from walking down to the end of this old wooden structure. Just a few from the day:- Saturday and looking for inspiration and fancied a walk so went to a local wood for a walk with camera gear packed and tripod had a lovely walk through the woods but really couldn’t find a composition I liked, I really struggle to find order or groups in a wood, so settled that you don’t always need a photograph and just enjoy the walk even though i was arguing with myself i still wanted to go home with something. I came to break and came out into the fields and found a great old dead tree along a tree line but the composition just didn’t work, the local farmer was ploughing his fields so I thought i would take 30 min and see what i can get from a few aerial shots. So checked my flight information and quick risk assessment I was up love the lines and patterns of looking straight down on freshly ploughed field and watched as a tractor came into view and found a great composition looking down with the old tree and green trees either side. I was happy got my shot for the day.  I have been wanting to find and photograph this ship wreck for a long time and is in-between Weston-S-Mare and Burnham On Sea coast. Having a free Saturday and checking the weather and tide times and google earth found a good place to park and a walk across the dunes and beach you come across a half buried wreck of the SS Nornan that has been siting here for 121 years, the ship’s crew of ten, together with their dog, were taken off by the lifeboat and landed safely at Burnham During the early part of March 1897 a howling south westerly gale swept up the Bristol Channel, bringing with it high seas, driving snow and sleet, many ships soon found themselves in distress, among them the Norwegian barque SS Nornen which had tried out to ride out the storm but had found her anchors dragging. The ship was being driven towards Berrow’s mud flats, and the crew desperately tied to save her. The Berrow beach is several miles long and found myself on my own it was actually a beautiful sunny day perfect blue skies and really not the atmosphere i wanted for this photograph, but had my composition and waited for the tide to come back in and captured a long exposure of the bones of the wreck with a 31sec exposure using a Lee 10 stop filter and hard grad 3 stop to bring the sky down. Will back for another visit.  7th & 8th July 2018 The original Chateau Impney speed trials were organised by the Hagley & District Light Car Club, running from 1957 to 1967. These speed trial events epitomised the golden era of motorsport, when amateur and professional drivers competed alongside one another in the fastest cars of the day and across every discipline of motorsport Then in 2015 Chateau Impney relaunched this great historic Hill Climb race and today in 2018 I'm here. Armed with 5 million public liability a Sigma 150-600mm and my D500 this was the perfect test for camera and lens combo, the 10 frames a second and ultra fast autofocus this is what the Nikon D500 is built for I was lucky enough to get a media accreditation for trackside access via @instagramworcester and Chateau Impney for this classic hill climb race, fulfilling my love of motorsport and photography in one hit!. Saturday 7.30 signed in, the all important coffee and bacon butty, and off to the track various view point around the hill climb with the Chateau as a backdrop is really a stunning location. The D500 went into action tried various focus modes from 3D tracking to single point with a continues focus setting, the camera was absolutely spot on just nailed the focus every shot. actually don’t need 10 frames a second and soon dialled it down but very please with capabilities of this camera. Football fans not being forgotten they were also catered for as England game on Saturday was on the screen overlooking the start line so all was covered in this important world cup run, The day went very quick and finished 18.00 tired and went home for a cold beer and rest those feet. Sunday coffee & sausage butty and it’s race day, the race starts & 8.30 and continue all day, with a collection of classic cars and competitors strive to write their names in a new chapter of the Chateau's motorsport history by challenging one of the UK's most unique hill climb courses. Have to say this great location for photography without media access as you can really get close to the action all along the hill climb track, and large TV screens around the track you never miss the action, there are plenty of other attractions around from static cars and great selection of food and coffee outlets a great weekend in the scorching UK Summer, looking forward to 2019! Weekend of the 7th & 8th July Historic Motorsport returns to Chateau Impney with over 200 competitors racing one of the most unique hill climb events in the UK, looking forward to a weekend of motorsports  Whitby - Somewhere I always wanted to visit and we always tend to travel South for UK Holidays so we managed to find a great deal on a little seaside town house next the Harbour in Whitby for a week and use this as a base to explore the North East Coast. As usual we packed the car as if we were leaving for a month and soon settled in to this friendly seaside town its very well photographed Abbey, but once you get the classic shots out the way there is plenty to photograph with fantastic Harbour walls and great historic town centre buildings and harbour boats to explore. We travelled as far up as the Holy Island of Lindisfarne and visited many castles along the east coast, it really is photographic paradise with many locations with very few people. Unfortunately we didn’t check the web N/T Lindisfarne as the they were doing major restoration to the Castle inside and out and was covered in scaffold, but still an experience to see, and also check the tide tables you could be waiting a while to get across or stuck on the other side. Photographing Sunrise this week couldn’t have been harder with the longest day that week, but staying in town I literally had to get up up and walk 100 yrds to the harbour but was one of the best experience standing looking out to sea at 4.30 in the morning watching the sun rise was just stunning and I will never forget the air and a start of a new day is magical. |
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