New Toy: Meet the Wobbleometer(TM)

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I’ve had my eye on the Raspberry Shake seismometer for a couple of years now. Last week, I finally succumbed and bought both a new Raspberry Pi (just a 4B 2GB RAM – cheap yet more than adequate) and a Shake 1-D.

The 1-D is a simple seismometer, responding only in the up/down direction. Other products are available…

Mine arrived as a kit, that even I was able to stick together in under half an hour (thanks to a youtube video showing what most of the screws and things were for).

I installed and levelled it on the downstairs windowsill and plugged it directly into the main ADSL router – when you’re uploading a hundred samples per second, minimizing latency is essential.

Obviously, being based in mainland Scotland, I don’t expect to see that many significant earthquakes. We get a handful of ~magnitude 2.5 around the country every couple of years if we’re lucky. However, recently YouTube has sent me down a rabbit-hole of geological analyses of goings-on in Iceland’s Reykjanes peninsula – the recent sequence of volcanic eruptions alternating with tiny earthquakes as the magma chamber refills.

The very first night, I spotted a magnitude 3.6 quake in Iceland.

Since then, the live data stream has sadly been unavailable for about 5 days, but when it works, the ability to select a quake event and then click on a station and see the station’s raw data really rocks.

There was another magnitude 3.7 earthquake along the Mid-Atlantic Ridge offshore a few miles south-west of Grindavik yesterday. The live-data view is currently working in the mobile app, leading to this analysis – showing the P and S waves propagating from the event.

As monitoring equipment goes, I’m impressed. It’s a wonderful device, very sensitive yet easy to set up and works well. I’ll continue to watch for all quakes nearby and larger ones further afield, if only to be able to say “I saw it” 🙂

Around Comrie

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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:

Noctilucent Clouds 2021-06-05

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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

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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:

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods

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

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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.

 

Approach to Dundurn Parish Church
  • 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.

Summer Evenings

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Two photos from a stroll down the road on a warm summer evening

  • Lovely dark ominous clouds, throwing the bright golden sunlight on crop fields into sharp relief.
  • A small flock of crows takes off into the sunlight.

Prints of The Leader are available from my photography website, ShinyPhoto.

Partial Lunar Eclipse 20190716

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A year or so ago there had been a drone pilots’ meet-up on the shores of Loch Leven in Kinross. Late Tuesday afternoon showed indications from TPE3D and Windy suggesting the light would be pleasant, clipping the surrounding hills around sunset. Further alerts from Twitter reminded me of a partial lunar eclipse, with optimum effect around 2235hrs; again, checking TPE3D I saw the moon would rise in the ESE beside / over Benarty Hill across Loch Leven. 

Arriving a little early, I hunted a composition: the obvious jetties by the carpark at the end of the road have locked gates, as does a track along the shore; walking further round, it’s obvious there’s scenery to be had but the path is surrounded by a 5′ hence making it incredibly frustrating to find a composition. In the end I settled for a “layby” with three concrete plinth benches, just tall enough to see over the hedge and just wide enough for the tripod legs. 

With half an hour to kill before the lighting and lunar eclipse kicked-in, I flew the drone to survey the surroundings.

 

  • Loch Leven Castle remains and Bishop’s Hill in Fife from Kinross
  • Kinross House – symmetrical formal gardens, how ghastly.

Around 10pm the moon sneaked out from behind a cloud-bank over Benarty Hill, a perfect orange-red half-jaffa-cake in the Earth’s Shadow.

The last photo of the evening is still my favourite: can’t beat a few hazy clouds diffusing the glow of the still-red moon.

Loch Rannoch Sunset

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A few photos from Sunday afternoon’s explorations around Loch Rannoch.

We walked through the Black Woods; whilst flying the drone near Camghouran I discovered remains of a building – a pile of stones and hints of mounds in the earth possibly in the shape of a former but’n’ben croft? – in a clearing in the forest.

  • Walking along the path through the woods, one comes across this clearing just off to the south; quite photogenic from ground level, it becomes even more interesting from 100m up in the air as the beautiful pale tree is apparently stuck on the end of a pile of stome rubble, the remains of some kind of building.
  • The impressively tall fir trees of Camghouran / Croiscraig from above the Black Woods of Rannoch
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Sunset on the shore was beautiful; contrasting deep blue ominous dark blue clouds and vibrant orange sunset across the water.

  • Beautiful glowing colours: warm yellow, orange and red sunset light contrasting with the thick passing clouds near Camghouran, Loch Rannoch
  • Beautiful glowing sunset gold and blue colours, near Camghouran, Loch Rannoch
  • Beautiful glowing sunset gold and blue colours, near Camghouran, Loch Rannoch
  • Beautiful glowing colours: warm yellow, orange and red sunset light contrasting with the thick passing clouds near Camghouran, Loch Rannoch
  • Beautiful glowing sunset gold and blue colours, near Camghouran, Loch Rannoch

Prints of some of these photos will be available through my ShinyPhoto website: photos around Loch Rannoch.

First Munro

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I’ve been over 3000′ twice before now – but for one I stopped short of the summit, and for the other we took the ski-lift up, so neither really counts as Munro-bagging.

In the Christmas/New-Year holiday week, friends and I spent a happy day climbing Schiehallion – a mountain we’ve known and photographed for a long time, but actually climbing it was a first, at least for some of us.

We couldn’t have asked for better conditions: fresh but basically dry, all the way up with mist blowing around the summit.

The top third is a tricky scramble over large boulders, but the view was totally worth it – my first Munro, my first glory and Brocken Spectre all in one.

Glory and Brocken Spectre, Schiehallion. Awesome!

On the way down we paused to admire the surroundings – an interplay of light, mist, undulating lochs and landscape and more mountains.


  • Views found whilst descending Schiehallion: abstract patterns of large white fluffy clouds catching the sunlight.
  • Hints of misty cloud blowing gently away across the landscape.
  • Views found whilst descending Schiehallion: abstract patterns of large white fluffy clouds catching the sunlight.
  • Sunlit Rockery
  • Views found whilst descending Schiehallion: abstract patterns of large white fluffy clouds catching the sunlight.
  • Views found whilst descending Schiehallion: abstract patterns of large white fluffy clouds catching the sunlight.

Bring on the mountains – I have climbing to be doing 🙂

Life in Shades of Green

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I used to make a point of closeup nature photos, simplifying the complexity of plant structure down to a few lines, in dull light. For the first time in ages, I spent most of yesterday afternoon with just the old Helios 58mm lens attached, walking around, seeing what could be seen.
Didn’t expect ladybirds to feature at this time of year.

  • Detail of broom seedpods
  • Tree structure
  • A cluster of ladybirds in a broom bush twig junction
  • Tree structure
  • Detail of broom seedpods

Winter around Rannoch

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We made it up to the Rannoch area mid-afternoon in time to admire the pure calm stillness and misty distant mountain reflections on Loch Rannoch.

Beautiful simplicity: flat calm, mirror reflections on Loch Rannoch.

(Obligatory plug – the above image is now uploaded to my main fine-art / landscape website: Blue Stillness, Loch Rannoch.)

Drone photos also happened – flying around inversion layers over the Black Woods of Rannoch.

  • Patches of mist above Loch Rannoch near Croiscraig / Camghouran.
  • ..then we went for a stroll underneath all that mist, too.

And the forest was its usual welcoming self, albeit in subdued winter mode:

  • Black Woods of Rannoch late in the day – hints of mist rising in the distance, colours turned cool. It’s interesting how this end of the Black Woods is so much more densely planted – even though the Scots Pine is a native species, it’s still not naturally evolved. Indeed the history of the Black Woods includes attempts to log the forest – one can only presume this was an attempt to replant, with native species, but still with some potential degree of profit in mind.
  • Black Woods of Rannoch

Birnam Hill: Winter

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A couple of weeks ago in the middle of December, we were treated to a quick overnight blast of snow. It remains my favourite season for photography, so I staggered up Birnam Hill to fly in the late afternoon light.

Landscapes:

  • Snow-capped hills either side of the Highland Boundary Fault line – catching the last warm rays of sunset in the distance.
  • Snow-capped hills either side of the Highland Boundary Fault line – catching the last warm rays of sunset in the distance.

Straight-down abstracts – trees and outlines of the Birnam Burn flowing through the snow:

  • Wiggly shapes – the Birnam Burn running down past Stare Bridge viewpoint.
  • Wiggly shapes – the Birnam Burn running down past Stare Bridge viewpoint.

Ground-level tree abstracts:

  • Detail of tree twigs and filigree – lichen-covered branches silhouetted against the low winter sun.
  • Detail of tree twigs and filigree – lichen-covered branches silhouetted against the low winter sun.

As an experiment to help learn my way around the Shotcut video editor, I made a short video of the area too:

Lady Mary’s Walk, Crieff

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A few photos from an afternoon stroll around Lady Mary’s Walk outside Crieff, and up Laggan Hill.

River-bank shenanigins:

  • Views from the riverbank: washed-up plant matter dangling as light reflects across the water.
  • I’m pretty sure this is evidence of beavers on the River Earn – tree bark removed up to about 2.5′ above the ground with a fine repetitive chisel marking pattern remaining.
  • Sparseness: a few bright red berries remaining on bare twigs
  • I’m pretty sure this is evidence of beavers on the River Earn – tree bark removed up to about 2.5′ above the ground with a fine repetitive chisel marking pattern remaining.

Along an avenue of Beech trees

  • Details that catch one’s eye even in a well-known location: the avenue of beech trees along Lady Mary’s Walk outside Crieff
  • A well-known scene: the avenue of beech trees along Lady Mary’s Walk outside Crieff
  • A well-known scene: the avenue of beech trees along Lady Mary’s Walk outside Crieff
  • A simple silhouette: almost-bare beech tree branches and twigs, a filigree against the sky beyond.

And a favourite tree – always think it looks italicised, leaning at that angle.

One of my favourite trees up Laggan Hill – there’s something aesthetically pleasing about the way this old tree leans –