Motor-racing

Some photos from a free day out at Castle Combe Race Circuit a few weekends back. 

 I love motorsport and had a great day, but find photography a poor medium to capture this kind of event. Nice to photograph something completely different, but I feel like my photos also lacked action or atmosphere. 

ISO200, 400mm, f/5.6, 1/400s, -0.3ev 

ISO100, 105mm, f/4.5, 1/200s, -1.3ev

ISO100, 180mm, f/7.1, 1/50s

ISO200, 400mm, f/5.6, 1/800s

ISO200, 300mm, f/8, 1/320s, -0.3ev

Test trails

Finally a test run to start getting to grips with star trail photography!!  

Clear sky - check.  No moon - check.  Full batteries - check.

Nothing else more important to do - fail, but to hell with it anyway!

Learned quite a few lessons which was the main objective and considering it 

was a limited time, work-night session I'm relatively pleased with the potential it shows.

The MoD laid on a fireworks display over Salisbury plain to keep us entertained which was nice of them, although the thuds of heavy artillery may have been a little excessive for the occasion.

115 x ISO200, 16mm, 30s, f/8, stacked, noise reduction,  cloned out hotspots

Space Bridge

A bit of Friday funkiness with a 360 degree conversion of my Vasco de Gama bridge photo, 

which I think turned out brilliantly!

Black and white

St Anne's church near Lacock.

Not actually very old at all (mid 19th century) and a mish mash of architectural styles, but still a great subject for a dramatic black and white photo, especially with the dramatic skies of late. 

Shot with the Sun behind the tower and bracketed plus/minus 1.3ev to grab both highlight detail in the sky and shadow detail in the foreground, combined manually in Photoshop, with levels and curves used to bring out the foreground texture and contrast.

ISO100, 16mm, f/5, 1/250s, composite, levels, curves

Skylarking

A trio of photographs of the critically endangered Skylark, the population of which is estimated to have dropped by up to 90% in 30 years due to changes in farming intensity.  The top shot makes for a nice image, but Rape seed fields are one of the causes of the decline since Skylarks nest amongst crop fields and Rape seed grows too fast for them to complete their seven week nesting period.

The second shot has a nice natural blur vignette effect thanks to the narrow depth of field and some foreground foliage, which really focusses on the bird while still showing the surrounding habitat.  The in focal plane Hawthorn Fly was a lucky bonus. Straight from camera which is always nice.

The last image is of the male Skylarks famous vertical hovering display and song, taken almost into the Sun which has lit up the edges of the wings.  Shot at a high ISO as I was trying to capture them flying amongst the Rape seed fields when this one flew up.  Apart from a crop and some post-production noise reduction, the image is straight from camera again.

ISO100, 560mm, f/8, 1/800s, -1ev, levels

ISO200, 560mm, f/8, 1/1000s, -2/3ev

ISO800, 490mm, f/8, 1/4000s, -1/3ev, noise reduction, cropped

Going with the flow

If there's one photo cliché that I find hard to resist it's flowing water and long shutter speeds.  

Without my tripod and ND filter I resorted to ISO100 and the narrowest aperture which isn't ideal for lens performance, but it worked well enough - one of the few times when a "fast" lens (16-35mm f/2.8 II) is a drawback.  Hopefully the next waterfall photos I post will have been done properly!!

I bracketed three exposures to keep the sky from being totally burned out (could have done with wider bracket though).  Half a second for the main exposure created a nice level of blur and I managed to hold it pretty still even without any Image Stabilisation on my lens.  

A nice image, but can't help feeling it would be a great scene for a themed portrait shoot, 

maybe a medieval maiden shot in the style of John William Waterhouse.

ISO100, 16mm, f/22, 1/2s, -1ev

Great Crested Grebe

Wasted some time sat by a lake in the Sun on Sunday,

blessed by the company of this fine Great Crested Grebe.

Sunny enough to attach the 1.4x teleconverter for a bit of extra reach, however with the best light coming when the clouds edged overhead the ISO was strained a little.  Overall I'm pleased with the image, I cloned out some floating debris to match the cleanness of the composition and I love the colour contrast, reflection and soft ripples of the water.

The second shot is from a sequence taken as it appeared with a large fish, unfortunately the light was pretty poor under full cloud and it decided to whisk it's prize away from me.

ISO1600, 560mm, f/8, 1/500s, -2/3ev, noise reduction, cropped, cleaned, levels 

ISO1600, 560mm, f/8, 1/1000s, -2/3ev, noise reduction

Graveyard Life

A Robin hunting from the tops of gravestones in front of a gorse hedgerow.

I'm not convinced the nice backlit rim lighting and interesting shadow outweigh the lack of a catch-light in the eye, but the pose, texture and colourful gorse flowers add something to the mix.

I very rarely stack different white balance images together, but with the cool shadow and warm sunlight I couldn't find a colour balance that suited both, just one of those times when a bit of Photoshop makes a photo more like what the eye sees.

ISO500, 560mm (teleconvertor), f/8, 1/1000s, -1ev, selective colour balance, levels

Floods, fields of gold and a supermoon.

Flood creating white water as it crashes straight over flood defences.  I took a few slow speed shots, but this one had the best details and painted quality.

ISO100, 35mm, f/22, 1/6s

Fields of gold, as rape seed laps up the weather for a bumper crop.  

I shot from this same spot a few weeks back, but never posted. I felt the hedge lines, tractor crop lines and old style telegraph poles added flow and interest, but it was still lacking.  However this time the sky was a lot more interesting, the flowers were denser and I had time to wait a while for a splash of sunlight to break through to add contrast and depth.

ISO100, 24mm, f/10, 1/160s, -0.6ev, circular polariser, cropped, levels

Any grand plans I had for the weekends' Super Moon were scuppered by cloud unfortunately, 

but I still like the colours and detail enough to blog it as a "nice failure".

ISO1600, 400mm, f/5.6, 1/250s, -0.6ev, noise reduction, levels, cropped, vignette

Woodland Wildlife

ISO1250,105mm,f/7.1,1/200s, -2ev

ISO200, 400mm, f/5.6, 1/640s,-1ev

ISO400, 105mm, f/2.8, 1/3200s (oops), -1ev

Some shots of the critters making the most of the shelter that local woodlands offer from the Spring rain, including a vigilant female Mallard duck sitting in her unusual nest site.

While below the flooded river Avon rises right to the top of the usual 8 foot bank, bad news for this years project KFC and obviously devastating for the Kingfishers that were nesting nearby.

Window to the Soul

Apologies for the failure to post again last week, on closer inspection the other photos I had lined up to post fell into the reject pile.  With a lack of outward looking images, I turned my lens to look inward...