Sometimes you just have to head up the road to catch the sun rising over the horizon at a favoured castle ruin.
I have photos for sale of Dunnottar Castle over on shiny.photo.
Sunrise at Dunnottar
Category Archives: photos
Evening bike-ride
I spent a happy 25mins yesterday evening biking around the outskirts of town at golden hour.
Full video – 25mins compressed down to 5: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fF4MYvQ-IDQ
vdB14 and vdB15, Camelopardalis
Partly due to the weather, mostly due to recognising foibles and problems in my gear, it’s been ages since I made an astro image worth publishing.
I shot in OSC (one-shot colour) using the QHY 268C camera, using two filters (a Neodymium light-pollution filter and IDAS NBZ dual-narrowband) for a total of over 30 hours’ data over the course of 3 nights in the past fortnight, of which I kept 20.9 hours.
Prints, cards, masks, clocks and other products featuring this image are available via my ShinyPhoto website: vdB14 + vdB15, Camelopardalis.
A full write-up detailing all the data captured and how it was processed can be seen over at my Telescopius page: vdB14 + vdB15, Camelopardalis
This one feels rather good 🙂
Around Comrie
A few years ago I discovered a pleasant gentle walk route around the Water of Ruchill outside Comrie. Almost entirely flat, it follows a loop from the village centre through scrub woodland (ideal shade on a sunny day!) along the side of the river past fields formerly occupied by a Roman fort, down to Cultybraggan PoW camp and back along the main B-road for a bit before taking a detour along a path from a standing stone over fields into the southern end of Dalginross and back along the streets to where it started.
In the town centre, the White Kirk stands out for its architecture with prominent tower and spire. Formerly the parish church, it is now home to a community centre.
Scrub woodland detail: a plethora of small gnarly trees amid a sea of wild garlic. Taken on a stroll around the Water of Ruchill walking route. 
Taken on a stroll around the Water of Ruchill walking route.
One of a handful of standing stones in the West Cowden farm area, hinting at possibly being a stone circle, the cup-marked “Roman Stone” sits beside the B827 south of Comrie. 
One of a handful of standing stones in the West Cowden farm area, hinting at possibly being a stone circle, the cup-marked “Roman Stone” sits beside the B827 south of Comrie.
A striking building with its tower and spire, formerly the parish church but now home to the community centre. 
A striking building with its tower and spire, formerly the parish church but now home to the community centre. 
A striking building with its tower and spire, formerly the parish church but now home to the community centre.
Finally, a drone overview of the whole town – to the north, Dalginross, Comrie, Melville’s Monument and Glen Lednock; to the south, the Highland Boundary Fault runs from Glen Artney in the west right along the field across the road from Cultybraggan through Cowden Loch, Mill of Fortune and Newburgh Wood.
A map of the area, courtesy of the BGS Geoindex:
Sunset, Rhue by Arisaig
I wouldn’t be the only person to favour Scotland’s west coast – its beautiful landscape, impressive geology.
After a day exploring outside and around Mallaig, I stopped at Arisaig to catch the sunset and was not disappointed.
First, a couple of obvious scenes at the end of the road, the low warm light skimming lines of rock
A favoured location – can’t beat a day on the west coast of Scotland, the beautiful landscape, impressive geology. After a day exploring, I stopped at Arisaig to catch the sunset and was not disappointed. This was an easy composition to find, the lines of psammite rock zig-zagging through the vertical frame, all illuminated by the bright warm/orange sunset light from the west.
I flew the drone a little way out over Loch nan Ceall for a more elevated perspective. The light was turning red, catching the rugged hills nearby
The view out west directly toward the setting sun was particularly impressive
A favoured location – can’t beat a day on the west coast of Scotland, the beautiful landscape, impressive geology. After a day exploring, I stopped at Arisaig to catch the sunset and was not disappointed. So I flew the drone out over some small islands just off the shore of Loch nan Ceall – the imaginatively named Sgeirean Buidhe (“yellow reefs”) and caught the sunset over Torr Mòr 
The 360º panorama is one of my favourite art-forms: for best results, the optimum workflow is:
- choose a location directly above some non-uniform structured area – not just directly above the sea but over a reef, so the panorama can stitch properly
- think about the contrast-ratio from brightest to darkest areas of the scene; if the sun is visible, use a narrow aperture (f/10 or thereabouts) so the diffraction-spikes cling closer to the sun; choose an exposure such that the brightest part of the scene is just beginning to overexpose – typically you can recover 2/3EV highlights in post but the shadows get noisy fast and with a direct into-the-sun shot the shadow-side can easily require a 3EV shadow-lift
- shoot RAW DNGs and ignore the JPEG
- use RawTherapee to convert the JPEGs – apply lens distortion correction and a small amount of tonemapping, maybe even the dynamic-range-reduction module
- use Hugin to stitch the panorama: optimize for position, barrel distortion and view but not translation; use equirectangular projection and auto-straighten; ensure the FoV is 360×180º (it may be out by 1, ie 179º); use blended+fused output for noise-reduction, unless it introduces stitching edge artifacts
- finish, including toning and noise-reduction/sharpening, in darktable.
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Finally, just as I started the return drive, the sky provided yet more drama to see me on my way:
A favoured location – can’t beat a day on the west coast of Scotland, the beautiful landscape, impressive geology. After a day exploring, I stopped at Arisaig to catch the sunset and was not disappointed – the sky provided these beautiful parting shots of the sunset fading to twilight just as I was driving away. 
A favoured location – can’t beat a day on the west coast of Scotland, the beautiful landscape, impressive geology. After a day exploring, I stopped at Arisaig to catch the sunset and was not disappointed – the sky provided these beautiful parting shots of the sunset fading to twilight just as I was driving away.
A selection of the above photos are available on my gallery website as prints, cards, masks and other products: Arisaig on ShinyPhoto.
Mallaig Circular and Loch an Nostarie
On a whim, I spent my August bank holiday out and about exploring a new location: on the far west coast, Mallaig is home to the ferry port connecting to Skye.
Just to the south of the town lies Loch an Nostaire – a lovely shallow loch of clear pure water and indeterminate name etymology: the current spelling is clearly anglicised, although there are no mentions of the more obvious Gaelic Nostaraidh, but rather variations include “Nosaraidh” and “Nossery” according to the 1852 Admiralty Charts. One option is for the name to date back to Old Norse naust, a ship; an alternative derivation might be via Gaelic nòsar, juicy, sappy, white. This would be cognate with nòs, cow’s milk, which sits well with one of the tributary burns being called the Allt a’ Bhainne.
The Mallaig Circular walk leads from Glasnacardoch just off the Rathad nan Eilean inland to the loch, then up between the hills Creag a’Chait and Cruach Mhalaig before descending to Mallaig.
The view down the loch, especially from higher up, is beautiful: to the east the hills of Cruach Clachach and Cruach Bhuidhe are quartzite outcrops forming a backdrop behind an unnamed island on the loch covered with native Scots Pine trees; along the opposite side of the loch runs a prominent ridge where Morar schist pelite changes to psammite.
Classic landscape: small rocky boulders in the foreground, an expanse of grass, and the loch and hills beyond under a clear blue sky. 
A view down the length of the loch to thet south, small rocky hills with clusters of Scots Pine and other native trees. 
An impressively clear prominent ridge running along the west of the loch: to the west, the Morar Schists Formation – Micaceous Psammite And Semipelite; in the plain of the loch, Lower Morar Psammite Formation – Psammite. Metamorphic Bedrock formed approximately 541 to 1000 million years ago and covered with a layer of peat. 
As landscape goes, the Mallaig Circular route is beautiful even on a sunny day. It has a little bit of everything – some isolated native Scots Pine trees (could use more!), clear water in Loch an Nostarie, and stunning geology – a quartzite-topped mountain to the south-east and prominent ridge where the bedrock changes from pelite to psammite along the west edge of the loch. 
An idyllic setting: a clump of Scots Pine trees on an isolated and sadly unnamed island in the loch
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Chanonry Point Lighthouse
Last weekend it was ludicrously hot around home – 25ºC after lunchtime – so we drove all the way up north to the Black Isle for a stroll around Fortrose and neighbouring areas. We started with a stroll down to Chanonry Point where the lighthouse looked good in black & white.
Noctilucent Clouds 2021-06-05
Noctilucent (“night-shining”) clouds are the highest in the atmosphere, at around 76-85km altitude. They only appear in the summer months at latitudes from 50-70º (north or south), when the sun is more than 6º below the horizon. Formed in the mesosphere at very cold temperatures from ice, dust and water vapour, their gossamer threads undulate and shimmer in shades of electric blue.
There was a particularly decent display on Friday/Saturday morning – I nipped out and spent a happy hour making the video:
Timelapse: Sony a7r3, Sigma 14-24mm lens, SkyWatcher StarAdventurer tracking mount for rotation
Stills: Fuji X-T4, 16-80 f/4 lens
A selection of the images are available as prints, masks, cards and other products (even socks and jigsaw puzzles!) from my main website: ShinyPhoto: Noctilucent Clouds
Dunning Glen
One of my favoured local woodlands, just a few minutes’ drive from home, is Dunning Glen. Starting from the village, stroll up the road, round the corner and through the small doorway into the woods where trees and rivers play.
There are some steep bits, but plenty of the oak trees in particular have a gnarly character.
Herewith, some photos:
Appreciating shape and form: strong lines of an oak tree. 
Appreciating shape and form: a large oak tree standing amidst a sea of green grass and bracken. 
Appreciating shape and form: a dead branch 
Appreciating shape and form: the base of a split oak tree in a sea of green grass, white daisies and purple blebells. 
Appreciating shape and form: a split (coppiced?) oak tree. 
Appreciating shape and form: strong lines of an oak tree
My favourite from this particular afternoon was this oak – some of its branches having rotted and fallen off:
The latter is available as prints, cards, masks and other products, via my main website: there is a pleasure in the pathless woods.
Around St Fillan’s
I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve driven through St Fillan’s over the years, always en route to somewhere else the other end of the A85, barely stopping a handful of times to take the obvious photo the length of Loch Earn. Even the couple of craggy rocky outcrops on the way into the village were much admired from the road but I think I stopped once to shoot them for their own sake.
So last Sunday afternoon I rectified matters, slowed down and parked in the usual layby and walked back through the village, over the road, around the golf course and up St Fillan’s Chair, admiring the mountains behind a little closer.
A day of symmetry – on the way out I noticed a view up the path to a small Church of Scotland kirk was particularly appealing; on return, the view along the loch was pure calm still reflection in the water.
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Pure simple symmetry – the water reflecting the cool tones of blue hour on a grey day. Beautiful. 
Pure simple symmetry – the water reflecting the cool tones of blue hour on a grey day. Beautiful. 
A gull admiring the scenery – pure simple symmetry – the water reflecting the cool tones of blue hour on a grey day. Beautiful. 
A gull admiring the scenery – pure simple symmetry – the water reflecting the cool tones of blue hour on a grey day. Beautiful. 
For years I’ve admired these mountains from the A85 driving into St Fillan’s; this past weekend I finally stopped, parked up and explored them directly in person. The weather wasn’t the greatest, but it was good to clamber up to St Fillan’s Hill / Dundurn and view the landscape from a little higher up. 
Prints and things are available from my main ShinyPhoto website: Loch Earn.
Early Autumn at Glen Affric
A year without a trip to my Nice Place™ just wouldn’t be a year. It had to be done – in a moment between lockdown and further covid-19 restrictions, I nipped up to Glen Affric for a few hours.
Some intimate landscape views:
Vibrant colours in the soft light, days shortening at the start of autumn, Glen Affric. 
Vibrant colours in the soft light, days shortening at the start of autumn, Glen Affric. 
Vibrant colours in the soft light, days shortening at the start of autumn, Glen Affric. 
I don’t think I’ve ever seen the water levels so low as this in the famous waterfalls on the River Affric
I also flew the drone around a bit. Lovely light, getting a better overview of the extent and distribution of the Caledonian Forest, river, mountains and haze into the distance.
Some of my favourite trees – Scots Pines in the Caledonian Forest reserve at Glen Affric, with Loch Affric and Sgurr na Lapaich in the distance. 
Some of my favourite trees – Scots Pines in the Caledonian Forest reserve at Glen Affric, with Loch Affric and Sgurr na Lapaich in the distance. 
Some years ago, I had visited the glen in the middle of winter, with temperatures a degree either side of freezing, thawing slightly as the morning progressed. I was struck by a pattern of foam flecks on the water – particularly with a fine layer of ice just millimeters below the surface, over which the foam flowed. It moved so slowly, an abstract pattern messing with my eyes trying to work out how it moved. And I was surprised, because a couple of hundred yards upstream, the river had just travelled over a couple of waterfall cascades – so where did all the energy go? With a little thought, the river changes from wide yet rapid to deep and slower, with a yet deeper central channel in a V-shape.
This time, I flew the drone over the same mouth of the river, looking straight down onto the surface. This perspective makes the patterns of the foam all the more apparent – not just a difference between the central streak flowing faster, but a semi-regular pattern in the pattern against the far bank – indicating submerged boulders.
Unlike previous years’ visits, where I gravitate toward early mornings, this time I had arrived late in the afternoon, with just enough time to fit in a stroll before the light faded.
The light faded.
My favourite trees looked really rather pleasant in softer light, part-silhouetted against the sunset:
Then, in conventional fashion, night fell. I’d never been up at the Nice Place to watch that happen before, but it was magical. I stood at the famous viewpoint near the memorial, watching the clouds skimming overhead from the north as the moon rose – with Jupiter and Saturn nearby, and noticed a moon-dog aka paraselene – the first time I’ve seen such a thing, an analogue with a sun-dog during the day.
Finally, with night thoroughly underway, I made a photo of the well-known view looking along the length of Loch Affric toward the mountains of Kintail in the west – the landscape bathed in moonlight, all cool blue with the barest hints of structure and even less colour in the otherwise reddy bracken.
Prints, masks, cards and other products based on images above and others, are available from my ShinyPhoto website: Glen Affric.
A Geek in Lockdown
I’m comparatively fortunate that the coronavirus and covid-19 have not affected me or anyone I know directly. Having spent the last 15 years working from home, life has not changed as significantly as it has for others.
So, apart from staying home and doing nothing much, what’s a geek to do to contribute back?
First, contribute data. As often as I remember, I update the KCL/Zoe app to say I’m still alive.
Second, grid computing projects.
There’s a significant amount of computer power available and machines would otherwise spend their time idle. A couple of months before the coronavirus became known, I had already installed BOINC, perhaps the oldest and best-known grid-computing system. As the scale of the Covid-19 problem became more apparent, I discovered the Rosetta@Home project which has been working to predict structure of proteins involved in the disease.
For mobile devices, there is Vodafone’s DreamLab project which similarly uses one’s iphone/ipad/tablet’s downtime to perform computations hopefully to identify drugs to fight Covid-19.
Third, art.
This took a bit of thought, but recently RedBubble who I use for selling my photography added the option of selling masks alongside the usual prints, mugs, etc.
I wasn’t at all sure what to make of it. The idea of profiting off others’ health and necessity jarred with the idea of art being a luxury item. However, a friend pointed out that if face-masks are to become normalized in society, having interesting art designs on could make them more approachable. There’s also the bit where Redbubble match each mask bought with a donation to an appropriate charity. So, a net good thing then.
Inspiration struck and I spent much of the weekend designing an image to represent the coronavirus (using a fragment of its gene sequence as a background, naturally) and even rendering a little video from it, both using Povray, my favoured ray-tracing software from the late 1990s(!). Naturally I made the scene description and other sources available as open-source: the-lurgy (on github).
The “lurgy” design and a selection of other landscape images are available on redbubble as face-masks with a profit margin set to 0.
And of course work continues, producing more photos to go on my website, ShinyPhoto…
Lunan Bay
In general, lacking high pointy mountains, Angus always strikes me as one of the less dramatic parts of the country. However, I’ve visited the Lunan Bay area a few times and it makes a good escape for an afternoon.
There’s quite a nice beach…
Pebbles amongst sand 
Decaying lump of tree bark on sand 
A small floral life-form amongst the pebbles and sand. 
Signs on a shed on the weay to Lunan Bay beach 
Sweeping leading lines – where the Lunan Water meets the sea 
Beach details: dead tree trunks/branches embedded in the sand, pointing at a hut amongst the dunes.
and the ruins of Red Castle stand out stark sandstone against blue skies – ideal with high-flying cirrus cloud in the background.
Pleasantly contrasty light illuminating the castle ruins, against a dramatic cloudy sky. 
Pleasantly contrasty light illuminating the castle ruins, against a dramatic cloudy sky. 
Quite an impressive ruined castle atop a small hill. 
Mouth of the Lunan Water outflow through the beach below Red Castle.
It also looks quite good from the air.
Red Castle, Lunan Bay 
Red Castle, Lunan Bay 
Floor plans 
Lunan Water 
Estuary 
Red Castle, Lunan Bay
And finally, I’m experimenting with a different art form – composite overlays, controlling visual information by selectively retaining structures. Essence of Lunan in one.
Assynt, Day 2: Solus Na Madainn
For the second day of my holiday last Autumn, I got up – again! – at a ludicrously early hour and drove from Tongue round to the Assynt peninsula, to my favourite viewpoint for sunrise.
It was some drive.
All the way from Tongue to Loch Assynt without seeing another car. Bliss.
Take the A838 road (abused as part of the ghastly NC500 coastal route) via Durness at 5am in the pitch black, the wind blowing a gale, rain + windscreen wipers on full speed.
Picture avoiding a herd cows intruding across the road. Avoiding more than 10 deer.
At that surreal pre-caffeinated hour of the morning, seeing a signpost advertising “serving local seafood” makes me picture a restaurant waiter taking a scallop’s order at table.
The music of choice was Arcade Fire Mountains beyond Mountains – a song bemoaning city life with its world so small – a mental image contrasting with my surroundings, passing rural Scourie, pop 132 – the sort of place that takes longer to say the name than drive through.
And so I arrived at Rhicarn – the landscape black, clouds a grey plasma, just a little bit windy…
And the sun rose. Quite spectacularly, casting brilliant crepuscular rays from the horizon and underside edges of clouds.
A brilliant display of crepuscular rays, shadows coming from the edge of a cloud as the sun rose beside Canisp. 
Beautiful morning light: crepuscular rays streaming from a cloud edge, illuminating the sides of Suilven and Canisp and the Manse Loch in the foreground. 
A thick cloud obscured the freshly risen sun – its edges casting crepuscular rays over the hazy landscape. Autumn at my favoured viewpoint, Rhicarn in Assynt. 
A thick cloud obscured the freshly risen sun – its edges casting crepuscular rays over the hazy landscape. Autumn at my favoured viewpoint, Rhicarn in Assynt. 
Loch Uidh a’Chliabhain and the Manse Loch in the foreground; beautiful receding layers of mountains in the middle; a stunning dramatic display of crepuscular rays as a cloud obscured the rising sun in the distance. Projection: Rectilinear (0) FOV: 23 x 16 Ev: 11.38 
Loch Uidh a’Chliabhain and the Manse Loch in the foreground; beautiful receding layers of mountains in the middle; a stunning dramatic display of crepuscular rays as a cloud obscured the rising sun in the distance. Projection: Rectilinear (0) FOV: 23 x 16 Ev: 11.38
Throughout the sunrise, the light was spectacular – brightly illuminating colourful clouds.
…and casting a subtle hazy glow over the morning fog across Little Assynt, outlines of hills receding into the mist
As the sun rose, the ground heated just enough for the overnight dew to evaporate into a thick fog, filling the landscape enough to obscure the receding lines of hills into nothing but a bright haze beside the sun. Manse Loch / Loch Uidh a’Chliabhain remains clear, a mile into the foreground. 
Iconic Scottish landscape: the Manse Loch and layers of hills and mountains receding into the hazy distance
Perhaps my favourite image from the morning has to be Suilven, the unmistakable mountain on the horizon, catching a subtle patch of oblique sunlight on a flank.
Once the sun rose, I explored the Falls of Kirkaig outside Inverkirkaig. A nice long walk through lumpy landscape, to a large thundering waterfall.
Undulating landscape; gneiss outcrops amongst the grass and heather beside the path above the River Kirkaig gorge. 
An impressive waterfall – 60ft tall and flowing deep and fast into its splash-pool below. It’s also one of the scariest places I’ve been in a landscape; this view is from a small platform area, a steep descent down the left face of the gorge. With my own dog for company there was limited space even to turn around and plant the tripod and camera bag. 
As if the river Kirkaig wasn’t full and fast enough in the bottom of the gorge, walking back along the top the clouds were pretty dramatic, the light behind coming through as crepuscular rays above the silhouetted hills.
Returning to above Rhicarn, clouds had flowed in obscuring the mountains on the horizon, so I experimented flying the drone to admire the surrounding landscape.
There’s something about finding a thin strip of old tarmac that obviously used to be a road – it makes a connection with the story and heritage of a location. From researching on Pastmap, it appears there was not much road here at all throughout the 19th century – presumably a cattle drovers’ track or similar. Then the old tarmac was laid, following a circuitous path around the gneiss rock hills. Finally, some time after the 1960s, a new road, now the B869, was laid through it in a boring straight line, the old route relegated to a carpark yet visible and walkable either side of the road.
Behind this scene, on the way to Clachtoll, lies some beautiful Karst landscape (cnoc’n’lochan or knock-and-lochan), formed by underground erosion of softer rock, leading to a classic pattern of rocky knolls interspersed (almost 50-50 by area) with lochs.
The joys of knock-and-lochan Karst landscape: it’s almost all equal parts gneiss rocky outcrops and lochs with roads wending their way through the shapely landscape. 
Further along the road lies the Maiden Loch, of which I’ve been very fond since first catching sight of it years ago. That first view was on a sunny afternoon, the sky blue reflecting in the water. I flew the drone over it, to admire the gneiss landscape all the more…
Some of the above photos are available on my photo gallery website: ShinyPhoto: Assynt
Smirisary
Can’t beat Scotland’s West Coast in summer. Saturday was spent exploring a new place to me, Smirisary in Glenuig, Lochaber.
A beach of large psammite outcrops with lyprophyre dykes
Cracks and sedimentary strata lines in an exposed lump of psammite, Smirisary. 
Erosion in action: an exposed lump of psammite (metamorphosed former sandstone) showing lines of strata and cracks, with gentle folding, yet surrounded by stones and boulders where the sea has eroded it away. 
Cracks and sedimentary strata lines in an exposed lump of psammite, Smirisary. 
A perfect subject for an abstract art: dense close strata layers of psammite (mid/coarse-grained metamorphosed sandstone) tightly packed.
Signs of habitation – old (but possibly still in use) croft/houses just above the shore in amongst the caves
Signs of settlements – Smirisary forms a small cluster of houses down around the shoreline, nestling amongst the rocks. 
Evidence of former habitation. Just because the west coast has its culture and traditions does not mean we should refrain calling out an example of litter for what it is in the context of environmental pollution. Discarded metal bath-tub and other crap in a cave-mouth, Smirisary. 
A beautiful beach – ideal for a paddle in the shallow seas with Dog – surrounded by rocky cliffs. 
Beautiful landscapes – wide vistas via light on the sea out to the islands of Eigg and Rùm on the horizon
Sunlight playing on ferns in the foreground, looking out to the islands of Much, Eigg and Rum with their distinctive mountain outlines on the horizon. 
Sky meets sea in an atmospheric haze of glowing light. Very ethereal. 
Dramatic light: crepuscular rays emanating from dark clouds over the islands of Eigg and Rum across the water. 
A variety of types of cloud billowing gently over the distinctive outlines of Eigg and Rum on the horizon.
And on the way back home we called in at Loch Eilt by the roadside – partly to wash the salt water out of the dog, but also to admire the symmetrical reflections. The midges were out in force, pesky and biting as ever, but the photos were worth it…
Pure green: Scots Pine trees on an island across Loch Eilt. Pleasant clear and pure water. Shame about the hordes of midges – some flying so close to the lens I could see them larger than life on the live-view screen. A combination of long exposures sufficed to remove them, however – this is a combination of HDR (5*±0.7EV) and pixel-shift (4*1px offset) for optimal dynamic range and resolution. 
Scots Pine trees on an island across Loch Eilt.Pleasant clear and pure water. Shame about the hordes of midges – some flying so close to the lens I could see them larger than life on the live-view screen. A combination of long exposures sufficed to remove them, however – this is a combination of HDR (5*±0.7EV) and pixel-shift (4*1px offset) for optimal dynamic range and resolution.