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.

In Inverary

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This past Saturday was the Word-wide Photo Walk; as has become an occasional habit, I attended the Inverary walk.

There was a trip around the Inverary Jail:

  • It’s ALIIIVE!! Rather too-closeup detail of a wax model at Inverary Jail.
  • Winter is coming(TM) Two sides of a barred doorway Inverary Jail, taken on the Worldwide Photo-Walk 2019
  • What shall we do with this one? Looking back it does seem somewhere between crazy and barbaric, acts that were considered crimes in previous centuries, their understanding and severity fuelled by basic superstition.
  • Detail of keys on a keyring, Inverary Jailer’s uniform closeup
  • Black paint, white plaster: original piping for gas lighting installed in 1841. Technologies come and go…
  • Our illustrious host for the Worldwide Photo Walk in Inverary, 2019 One of the challenges for the group was to take a photo of someone we spoke with on the day.

and around the town front and Castle:

  • Detail of a fallen leaf amongst stones in the River Ary with Inverary Castle in the distance
  • An ornate stone bridge over the River Ary in the grounds of Inverary Castle.
  • An awesome grey stone lump in Gothic Revival style – dating from 1743, replacing an earlier castle of a couple of centuries previous.
  • Scotland’s last working Clyde Puffer, the Vital Spark of Glasgow, berhted at Inverary harbour.

and early-autumn scenery around Dubh Loch:

  • The beginnings of autumn: no rich leaf colour yet, but shades of yellow and green (equal parts conifer needles and tree-beard lichen) taken across Dubh Loch.
  • Small boat parked above the jetty beside the boathouse, Dubh Loch.
  • A mostly overcast grey end of the day, but with a little subtle direction to the light illuminating the underside of the bridge beautifully.

Some of these are available as prints over on ShinyPhoto.

Evening Stroll Photos

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In the words of a twitter friend of mine: A few photos made whilst walking for approximately half an hour with the dog.

Nothing special – just nice low evening light and details of the pastoral landscape around.

  • Photos made whilst walking the dog for approximately half an hour in golden evening sunshine.
  • Photos made whilst walking the dog for approximately half an hour in golden evening sunshine.
  • Photos made whilst walking the dog for approximately half an hour in golden evening sunshine.
  • Photos made whilst walking the dog for approximately half an hour in golden evening sunshine.
  • Photos made whilst walking the dog for approximately half an hour in golden evening sunshine.
  • Photos made whilst walking the dog for approximately half an hour in golden evening sunshine.
  • Photos made whilst walking the dog for approximately half an hour in golden evening sunshine.
  • Photos made whilst walking the dog for approximately half an hour in golden evening sunshine.
  • Photos made whilst walking the dog for approximately half an hour in golden evening sunshine.

Driving the A9

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Saturday’s involved driving much of the length of the A9 from Perthshire to Inverness and beyond to the Nice Place™, and back down again.

On the return, I broke the journey in two locations I’ve previously admired but never stopped at: one, outside Bunchrew outside Inverness, to admire the clear view along the river estuary to the Kessock Bridge:

  • Many years ago I made a photo of this bridge spanning the river mouth from the shores much closer in Inverness. Since then the road along the south of the river out of the city has become a favourite drive, with its easy straights, gentle bends and occasional views back to the Kessock Bridge in the distance.
  • Many years ago I made a photo of this bridge spanning the river mouth from the shores much closer in Inverness. Since then the road along the south of the river out of the city has become a favourite drive, with its easy straights, gentle bends and occasional views back to the Kessock Bridge in the distance.

Odd: I’ve lived around Perthshire for over a decade and driven this stretch of the A9 many many times, but never explored Ruthven Barracks before. I was fortunate enough to arrive just as the moon was rising in the north-east – a lot larger by eye than it appeared in the photos, but it made a good backdrop to the ruined buildings. Otherwise, in the cold late afternoon light, the ground covered in a dusting of snow, it all looked rather bleak…


  • A view from behind the well-known Ruthven Barracks ruin looking straight up the Inshes along the River Spey to the moon rising in the distance.
  • Classic use for a drone – fling it up and over a ruin and admire the former Ruthven Barracks innards from on high.
  • Ruthven Barracks, near Kingussie, Speyside.

For a final subject, just as I was packing up the drone to leave Ruthven Barracks, I noticed a splash of soft light on very low clouds clipping the Cairngorm mountains in the distance. Long lens; click; got it.

  • No eagles found flying this day – but the distant gorge is on Creag na h’Iolaire in the Cairngorms. An interesting photo to make – I had been standing beside the road, flying the drone around the adjacent ruins, when I spotted the low cloud and soft light in the distance. On closer inspection, one can just about make out the snow-covered slopes of the adjacent a’Chailleach peeking through the cloud.
  • No eagles found flying this day – but the distant gorge is on Creag na h’Iolaire in the Cairngorms. An interesting photo to make – I had been standing beside the road, flying the drone around the adjacent ruins, when I spotted the low cloud and soft light in the distance. On closer inspection, one can just about make out the snow-covered slopes of the adjacent a’Chailleach peeking through the cloud.

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 –

Caithness Holiday Day 5: Badbea Clearance Village

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An unusual choice of place to visit on the last day of one’s holidays, but an important monument to Highland/Caithness history nonetheless, and one ideally suited to a bleak cold foggy day, too.

Forced off the land as part of the Highland Clearances, people from the surrounding areas (Ousdale, Auchencraig) sought refuge at Badbea. Not the most hospitable area to try and make home, situated right on perilous cliff-tops in a location so windy the cattle and even children had to be tied down to stop them being blown away.

The bleakness certainly suits black and white.

Autumn at the Hermitage

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I spent a happy several hours wandering around The Hermitage by Dunkeld over the weekend, taking in very much the end of nature’s autumn displays – tree foliage fallen and fading, the light dull overcast all afternoon (and mostly raining, at that).

First, a few conventional scenes beside the River Braan and the Black Linn waterfalls from the bridge, as one does:

From there I explored a new direction away from the river, up through the Craigvinean woods to the Pine Cone viewpoint. The weather descended – from bright sunshine strolling through the colourful larches, it turned completely dreich grey and mist arose from the trees reducing visibility to barely 50yd. Quite spooky 🙂

On the way back, a particular beech tree caught my attention; with a bit of work, the 18mm prime revealed a particularly strong composition, illustrating the tree’s curving trunk. An unusual use for focus-stacking, too: it was so dark when I started the sequence, the camera was at 30s, ISO 400 even at f/2.0; by the time I finished 8 minutes layer, it was completely pitch black night.

 

 

Autumn in Glen Lyon

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A few photos from a trip to Glen Lyon in autumn. An ideal route for an afternoon walk-with-Dog took in 3 distinct kinds of woodland: artificial monoculture (spruce etc, clear barren ground) (fortunately being felled with a view to replacement with native trees), some birch and oak, and (another artificial) an avenue of beech trees.

Anthropocene influence:

Very natural native flora basking in the golden light:

An avenue of beech trees looking quite spooky

Caithness Holiday 1

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I had a few days’ holiday at the end of May.

The first day started in Perthshire and finished on the far north coast of Scotland – almost as far north as one can be – at St John’s Point, Caithness, looking north to Stroma and Orkney (disappearing as the distance haze turned to haar) and west to the setting sun.

Autumn Years: Abandoned A93 Road, Craighall Gorge

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On a recent excursion elsewhere, a friend tipped me off to the existence of the gorge at Craighall, through which runs the remains of the abandoned A93 road from Blairgowrie to Glenshee.

It’s funny to think that the bridge was constructed in 1994 and the road decommissioned in 2008, both of which are well within my lifetime – and given how I visited Glenshee several times in my early years having just moved up to Perth in 2004/5, it’s entirely possible I might have used the old road unawares.

These days it’s little more than a 40-minute saunter for dog walkers – almost like wandering through a woodland but with crash-barriers beside and the occasional painted stripe of a white line former road marking peeking through the inch-deep mud and moss.

With the leaves turning gold in autumn, it’s a post-urban delight in its own way.

Inverary: A Tale of Three Techniques

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In August I called in on an old friend in Inverary for a small guided tour around the local forests with camera in hand.

There was one particular photo I had in mind – ever since I first saw an old ruined barn with disused farm machinery, it was crying-out for the bokeh-panorama (aka Brenizer) technique – instead of one straight shot composed with the final focal-length in mind, one uses a longer lens (preferably a fast prime) and stitches the results into a panorama, to give an image with narrower DoF than was possible at the focal length in question.

Here’s the straight scene, taken on the Fuji X-H1 on the 16-50mm f/2.8 at 18mm – even wide open there’s no significant blurring in the background.

So here’s the stitched result, taken using a Helios 56mm f/2 wide open – drastic focus drop-off:

It took 100 frames at source – 2.4Gpx – but the result would be the equivalent of an 18mm lens at f/0.6. 

The second technique was keystone/perspective adjustment. On seeing a stone waterworks in the woods, my friend challenged me to get a view of it straight-on without using the drone. That’s simple enough – even though it’s several feet above head-height.

The third technique was simple long exposure: night had long fallen before I left the town but the clouds moving across Loch Fyne/Shira looked pleasantly ominous. Keeping base ISO, f/6.4 gave a 7s base exposure – with HDR 5*±2/3EV this became 7+18+30+27+10 = 92s combined total, retaining exposure from brightest point of clouds into shadowy areas in the mountainsides. (Contrast is not just a daytime problem!)

Several long exposures blended together into an HDR image of clouds and smooth water, Loch Shira from Inverary.

Another day… another sunset

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“Slight chance of convective weather” is rapidly becoming my new favourite weather alert, especially coming at the end of the day where it signals turbulent blends of low sun, rain and thick clouds.
It doesn’t get much better than last night, either. With sunset happening just after dinner… perfect 🙂

And my favoured view of the receding hills into Strathearn was looking particularly lovely in orange-pink tones too:

Sunset and showers – beautiful warm pink light despite the rain pouring down.

Gear Change Time

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Back in May I had a bit of a holiday. Figured the primary camera would be occupied taking timelapse video sequences for a couple of the evenings, and what happens if I find something else to take a photo of? So a friend suggested I get a Fuji X-T20.

Loved it.

Sold the K-1 dSLR and all the other Pentax kit, bought a Fuji X-H1 and some nice lenses to augment it.

Having spent all last Friday having the day off for the purposes of swapping the gear, I called in at Portknockie to make some photos of the well-known Bow Fiddle rock. The tide was low, requiring more care scrambling over the rocks.

Getting a bit more artistic, a long exposure view of the clouds passing by and a toned and tweaked edit:

The Zeiss 12mm f/2.8 Touit Fuji X-mount lens is a beauty. Being for APS-C crop-sensor only, it’s comparatively small, but elegantly formed with the curves flowing from lens-hood to body where the aperture and focus rings are smooth rubber perfectly integrated into the body.

I still maintain the most interesting views are to be found within the caves beside Bow Fiddle, not just staring at the lump itself. This is the first test image made with the Zeiss lens – sitting inside one of the caves, looking out, an HDR composite of 5 frames ±2/3EV each and even so it took a delicate touch getting the best RAW conversion and blend (haven’t used LuminanceHDR in ages!).

Testing my newly acquired Zeiss 12mm f/2.8 Touit lens – inside one of the caves looking out, of necessity a 5-shot HDR ±2/3EV. That lens is awesomely sharp, even with slightly elevated ISO around 640-1600.

Finally, one to relax with: the most serene simple composition of blue-grey sky with warm crepuscular rays spreading from behind a cloud. Light and sea, what more does one need?

Beautiful simplicity: a very cool blue-grey sky with orange crepuscular rays in the distance.

In Kinclaven

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I was so awed at the sheer acreage of bluebells (harebells?) at Kinclaven woods on my first visit with friends, I went back a couple of days later with the parents as well. Photos happened. It was still awesome. Also cool – a lovely place to just wander through dappled light amongst the trees. Yay.

Lovely atmosphere:

Great light:

Around Here: testing the Fuji X-T20

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A couple of weeks ago it occurred to me that, with a holiday looming and desires of taking lots of long timelapse photos of an evening, should I wish to take other scenes while timelapse was recording I’d be out of luck with just the one camera. And so on a whim I followed a friend’s advice and bought a second shooter, a Fuji X-T20.

It’s totally amazing – “the Little Camera that Can™” – personified. Diametrically opposite to everything I’ve become accustomed to with the Pentax K-1: custom user-modes do not encapsulate drive modes such as burst-rate, bracketing or intervalometers, just some rudimentary exposure (auto)-ISO settings and things; and the JPEGs are absolutely stunning, with targets defined within colour-space not by intended purpose (“landscape”, “portrait”) but rather by film-emulation.

It’s so good I’ve reworked my entire RAW-processing workflow such that images from both cameras now look like the Fuji’s out-of-camera JPEGs whilst emulating Fuji Provia slide film of old. Quite some drastic changes required over and above the default RawTherapee profile – most notably yellow-greens are dramatically deeper and greener and there’s a “Fuji red” going off. It’s nice to have a point of reference in colour-space, so I know what’s “normal” and where processing deviates from it.

Anyway. Some quick snaps taken one lunchtime stroll through nearby woods:

And my favourite of all, a partial 22º solar halo – the first photo of the walk:

Having just returned from the holiday that prompted the acquisition, it’s interesting just how fast it’s become my primary choice of camera if only for reasons of lighter-weight whilst travelling.