Week 11 - Highland Cattle on the coast path. Had a look at part of the local coast path today, chiefly looking for insects. But the rather cool fresh sea breeze kept most of them hidden away. However there were some of the Highland cattle along the path. I tried to give instructions regarding the best posing positions but they totally ignored me. So this is the best I could get by working with the light angle.
7D with Tamron 24-70 lens. 1/800 F11 Iso 400
1/640 F11 Iso 400
Geoff, the first photo in particular is wonderful. It looks like the beast has track down the long winding trail to the spot where you caught the photo!
Thanks Bruce. With that shot I had to focus then wait for it to look upwards. If you examine the path you can see where these cattle have left their 'calling cards' all along the path but carefully avoiding the side areas.
Week 12 - Keeping well clear. I was photographing and recording some early insects today when I heard a tractor in the next field and thought I could obtain some nice farming scenes. This wasn't quite what I was expecting; but it is a part of farming life.
7D with Tamron 24-70 lens. 1/400 F10 Iso 400
And today, when I returned to a parking area I heard another tractor in a nearby field so I wandered along with my camera; but there was a hedge in the way. However, there was a mound of old turf and soil about 5 ft high so by scrambling on top of the mound I could see over the hedge where a tractor driver was adjusting his plough.
7D with Tamron 24-70 lens 1/1000 F8 Iso 400. I went to F11 for later shots but they didn't show the man and I liked that addition. No choice of camera angles because I was limited to the mound and there was a small tree on the hedge to my left side
Week 13 - Another tractor. Some old and unsafe trees had to be felled.
7D with Canon 24-105 lens. 1/160 F11 Iso 400. Merge of two bracketed exposures
One of those scenes with many limitations. Branches overhead had to be avoided and a difficult light angle. Tried several options but finally settled for this one, looking through the open gate.
Over the past few months I have put together a 5 minute video of the local fishing boats.
vimeo.com/695632475
I struggled with panning shots in some of the video. Just about acceptable but not quite so smooth as I would have liked at times. Using a ball head tripod, although with the ball locked, but sideways rotation was difficult for me to follow.
I also tried to create a short video about a local little ferry and their unique method for landing passengers on the beach
vimeo.com/695847246
Loving the red boat.
It isn't a direct link, Bruce. You have to copy that address and paste it into your search/go to bar.
Doing a direct auto link in CinC produces a rather small image. However, using the copy and paste method shows the full image size replay.
And when you get into my videos, clicking on the face symbol shows a list for my other work.
Incidentally, there is also a slideshow there about the history of this town which I produced a few years ago for the local history society. But it is an hour long presentation. Concentrating chiefly on the first half of the 20th century with memories of many people who lived through that period.
Last edited by Geoff F; 9th April 2022 at 05:03 PM.
Thanks for the comment, Bruce.
Week 15 - Maintenance Work at Andrews Wood. Another volunteer work day but due to the conditions and work environment I only took my little Fuji X20 camera so the dappled light was a bit excessive for such a basic bit of kit. However, I exposed for the bright areas and recovered what I could with some editing. That camera is reasonably OK for the cost, however there was a bit of noise in the shadow areas, particularly faces.
1/500 F4.5 Iso 400. Iso 200 would have been better but I needed a reasonable amount of shutter speed for a scene with movement.
1/480 F5 Iso 400
1/850 F4 Iso 400
A fun series of photos. I eventually realized that the strange piece of equipment in photo #1 is a portable winch!
As you know well, there are always problems when dealing with the lighting contrasts in dabbled shade in the forest/woods. For my money, the end results work well in these photos.
Thanks for the comment, Bruce.
Week 16 - Fly Group Meeting. Spent today with the local fly recording group, of which I am a member, so I wanted some sort of record for the day.
7D with Tamron 24-70 lens. 1/160 F11 Iso 400. Bit of a dull light and I wanted to show some of the background so the shutter speed is dangerously slow for action shots.
This is how you get flies out of the net.
Geoff, it's a good thing you gave an explanation of what's happening in these two photos. To the uninitiated, whatever it is the men are doing looks like a very odd activity especially since a quick look might suggest that the men were eating whatever was in the nets!
Photographically, they're good documentary record shots. The action is caught in several poses and there was no motion blur that I could detect.
Thanks, Bruce.
I tried to get scenes where the action was reduced, because of the poor light level. Which meant before or after an actual net sweep. These images record what was happening on that day; although I wouldn't want to enter them into a photographic competition.