It feels like millenia ago, but back in late Spring this year I spent a happy afternoon strolling across one of the bridges in Perth, to see what I could see.
Tag Archives: Water
A Day in Argyll (3): Catching a Ferry
Late in the afternoon I caught a ferry from Oban out to Mull.
Several times in the voyage, the light was just amazing.
Leaving Oban with sunlight and clouds over Kerrera:
An epic vibrant complete double-rainbow seeming to hover just 50yd behind the ferry:
Stunning light approaching Mull:
There’s something relaxing just simply watching the low sunlight reflecting off the bow-waves around the boat:
Detail of soft sunlight reflecting on the sea and bow-waves from the ferry.
Glen Turret: Wet Stuff
A short study in water – taken on a stroll along the side of Loch Turret.
Portknockie (1/3): an unusual view
This is by way of a little tease. The Interwebs are full of photos of this lump of rock taken from a few yards to the right; I thought it would be more interesting to see it through the mouth of an adjacent cave instead.
Dunnottar Castle
Dunnottar Castle is a ruined medieval fortress located upon a rocky headland on the north-east coast of Scotland, about 2 miles south of Stonehaven. The current ruins date from the 15th and 16th centuries, but there is believed to have been fortification on the site since the Early Middle Ages.
The ruins of the castle are surrounded by steep cliffs that drop to the North Sea, 50 metres (160 ft) below. A narrow strip of land joins the headland to the mainland, with a steep path leading up to the gatehouse.
I made these photos over the course of a couple of hours after the eclipse in March, partly because I know the place well, partly because I was reminded of it by a photo in the local photo-club, and partly because I wanted to reshoot it at greater quality with newer processing techniques. It’s a pity the path down to the shore is so muddy – perhaps I should revisit either in winter or early spring instead.
For the record, the workflow for these is:
- tripod, SRB ND1000 filter, multiple frames around 8s shutter-speed at source
- RAW conversion in Photivo
- HDR panorama in Hugin + enfuse
- tonemapping in LuminanceHDR
- post-processing in darktable
- further post-processing in Gimp:
- colour toning
- film emulation (vintage, Ilford Pan-F or Rollei black and white film emulation)
- wavelet sharpening
- organization (tagging + metadata) in digiKam
- bulk resizing with ImageMagick.
Glen Clunie: Landscape Details
Three photos from a pleasant afternoon’s stroll along the Baddoch Burn in Glen Clunie, just up the road from Glenshee.
Rocks can be so colourful at times, can’t they? 🙂
Falls of Bruar: Flow
One Saturday lunchtime several years ago, I spent a happy hour bugging the assistants in my local favourite camera shop, trying to find the ideal tripod.
Having visited the Falls of Bruar the weekend previously, I had a particular photo of the waterfalls flowing around the rocks in mind.
As usual, Manfrotto was the most recommended make. I tried to believe in them, honestly, but with no combination of legs, invertible centre-column and 3-dimensional head being sturdy enough for the camera of the time, I emerged with a Slik. (This process has been repeated with the same outcome a few times since.)
That afternoon, I went back to Bruar with my new tripod and totally failed to get the photo I wanted, but by dint of pointing the camera the other way staring down the gorge after sunset had happened and the light was fading – what’s come to be known as the blue hour – I wound up with a photo that would be my No.1 most-popular on Flickr for about 5 years.
That was “Raw“.
The first of these is “Flow”, the photo I intended to make in the first place.
Water close-ups
A small series of closeup studies in flowing water, taken on a stroll around the Falls of Bruar.
I’ve admired the striation lines in the psammite riverbed below the lower bridge at the Falls many times – yet every visit they’re still fascinating every time.
Glen Affric: abstracts from reality
There’s an art to this kind of abstract – seeing, reducing the scene to an interplay of lines and shapes and seeking a kind of balanced visual weight across the frame. Hence, spatial distribution – nothing so crass as having one subject on which the eye can focus, but a pleasing arrangement nonetheless.
Loch Ard
A well-known view, complete with leading-lines fence and everything…
Obligatory Zig-Zag
I remember when I first saw a contact of mine on Flickr produce a photo of this scene, quite a few years ago now – and it’s become quite the cliché since.
So, take your pick: wide-angle 16:9 or 5:4 aspect ratio similar to large-format? Black and white or colour (not so often used in longer exposures)?
Me, I liked the light – cool shades of dusk on one side of the concrete break-water, remains of a sunny afternoon on the other.
Perth by Night
A handful of photos taken after dark from the Queen’s Bridge in town, waiting for the fireworks to happen.
Around Kilchurn Castle
It seems a while ago now, but last September I spent a weekend trundling around Argyll. The light on the Saturday morning was absolutely beautiful – so I spent a happy couple of hours standing on the shores of Loch Awe admiring the sunlight and mist on Ben Cruachan and Kilchurn Castle, as one does.
Stillness: the Pass of Brander
The reflections of Creag an Aonaich in Loch Awe on a calm day take some beating.
Only question is: with or without the boat?
Around St Fillan’s
Loch Earn is still an idyllic scene despite everyone stopping to take photos in St Fillan’s. Herewith, two obvious views:
Personally, I like this view instead:
People Watching / People Watching
There’s a time-/context-axis running from the far distance – first there was the landscape, then there was Robert Mulholland’s statue Still, then there’s people taking photos of it, then there’s me shooting them. All things considered, a bit “meta”.