Landscape Photography

December 27, 2016

While drinking my morning tea and sifting through my RSS feed I came across a very good instructional post from PetaPixel this morning:

"10 Ways to Become a Better Landscape Photographer in the Next Year"

At least two of the ten tips struct a chord with me:

#4 Stop caring about success of other photographers: For some reason I find validation in the number of likes I get on Instagram. Finding validation on any form of social media is quite possibly the most moronic thing that I have ever done and will be something that I will be working on getting away from in the next year!

#10 Always try to find something extra in your photograph: It's not always something I do and I think I have become a bit formulaic in the way I have been shooting of late, taking photographs that could have been taken by anybody instead of shooting something that I see.

The post is written by Albert Dros (a Dutch photographer) and his shots really are amazing and definitely worth aspiring to. He also has tutorials and a blog on his site that is well worth spending time with.

Christmas Market

December 24, 2016

Seeing as it's Christmas I thought I would post a selection of photographs that I shot at the Christmas Market at Edinburgh's Princess Street. I hope everyone reading has a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Here's hoping for a prosperous 2017.

Strathy Adventure

December 21, 2016

I title the post Strathy Adventure because that's exactly what it was, an Adventure. Finding a cottage in the middle of a small village may sound easy but unfortunately it was pitch black and if not for some friendly highlanders at the local town hall we might still be looking for 'Samhchair'. Strathy is a small village on the very north coast of Scotland, surrounded by sea and hills. It's the kind of place you don't want to leave, it has no cell reception (which is magnificent) and is eerily calm and peaceful. The pictures below don't come anywhere close to doing the location justice, but there isn't much I can do about the weather (that's my excuse and I am sticking to it).

I have had an invitation to visit Samhchair for several years and have never had the time or opportunity to visit. The area is one that I am familiar with as family vacations when I was very young toured the majority of the North of Scotland. It was a long drive from the central region of Scotland (5.5 hours + coffee stops).

Chiquita, wondering where the next coffee stop will be ;-)

December Days

December 6, 2016

December rolled around just in time for the temperature plummeting. People that know me are aware of how much I like the cold and dark days of winter. It's perfect for light trails, Christmas lights and early golden hours. As demonstrated (hopefully) by the photographs at the bottom of this post. Since the Instameet I have been trying to post a new photograph everyday. It reminds me of the marathon photo days of 2013, which became very stressful towards the end of the year.

The majority of my photos get some post-processing, it is a perennial subject for me talking to other photographers. For some people post-processing detracts from the photo and think that it is 'cheating'. Other people think that it adds to the photo. I am in the latter camp, I like to think I can make the picture look more like I see it in my mind when I am taking it. I think it's good that there is discussion around these topics in photography, as there is no 'right' answer.

The photograph below uses Apple's new Depth Effect on their iPhone 7+. I was wondering if this is regarded as post-processing as the camera takes two shots at different focal lengths and mashes them together. It works quite well, although there it is no substitute for using my 50mm lens. Of course, I added a little more post-processing...

I thought I would post some of the SOOC (straight out of the camera) photographs, that have been edited and can be found on the Instagram page that I have taken from recent trips to Edinburgh.

Instameet

December 1, 2016

I took part in the worlds smallest (unauthorised) InstaMeet last night! Well, the planning stages of an InstaMeet anyway! What's an InstaMeet you say? An InstaMeet is a group of Instagrammers meeting up to take photos and videos together. An InstaMeet can happen anywhere and be any size and are a great opportunity to share tips and tricks with other community members and an excuse to get out and explore someplace new.

This was on the roof of the bar, it would have been crazy not to take a shot of it.

I met a few new people and we discussed arranging an InstaMeet in Glasgow (Scotland) in January. As we met in a bar it quickly descendant into midweek drinking and complaints of hangovers this morning. Thankfully I did take some pictures, before the Guinness started flowing :-) Thanks to Jens, David and Tina for being willing (?) models for me! The links are to their Instagram accounts and are well worth checking out and following.

I have been wanting to start shooting portraits of people and this seemed as good a time as any to start. The photo's below are all shot with my 50mm fixed lens, f1.8, ISO200. I am moderately happy with the outcome.

If you would like to join our InstaMeet in January get in touch with me for more details.