Saturday 28 February 2015

Suffolk with a Point & Shoot

For a short while I'm without my DSLR - it's been traded in for a new one and I'm awaiting delivery. So whilst I staying in Suffolk for a few days I've been using my superb little Canon S95. I've had it for several years and know just how good it is. Here is a small selection which demonstrate that if one doesn't need large images, say greater than about A4 in print or for any web use, then there's almost no need for a camera of more than about 10MP. The two St Edmundsbury images are stitched from 6 and 7 handheld images.
Click on any image to see full size views of the day's set of images.
The Nave Ceiling - Lavenham Church
Hinge
St Edmundsbury Cathedral - Bury St Edmunds - The Choir
St Edmundsbury Cathedral - Bury St Edmunds - Altar and Crossing
Wicken Fen - Old Water Pump
Wicken Fen - New Water Pump





Thursday 19 February 2015

Progress on Photohiking the Thames Path

I've now completed 19 days and about 118 miles of my project to hike the full length of The Thames Path - in both directions. It's 184 miles one way - so 368 miles both ways. Each day that I hike I'm going 'there and back', so I've covered about 236 miles so far. Each hiking day I start at the point where I finished the previous time. I hike out for half a day then hike back to my starting point. It's proving to be a productive, challenging, enjoyable and at times frustrating experience. All of the good things come from the hiking, the photography and the progressive achievement of building a coherent body of work. What will success look like to me? I'm still not sure, but it feels like things are going well. And the frustrations so far ... there's one definite one, it's the struggles at times hiking on some lengthy sections of the path which are so thick with sticky, glutinous, slippery mud that it takes all the pleasure out of the exercise. I have to watch every step to ensure that I know where I'm placing each foot to be certain not to slip and fall. Somehow, so far, I've not fallen in the mud! And the other frustration is that now that I'm in the latter stages of the hike, I'm also much further away from home, which means that each of my hiking days is much further to travel before I can start the hike - and, of course, much further to travel to get home afterwards.

At my current rate of progress I have about another 11 hiking days to go to cover the remaining 66 (132) miles. So, I hope to be finished by about July this year.



Thursday 12 February 2015

Demise of my Darkroom

I set up my darkroom at home over 23 years ago and for a few years enjoyed playing at printing. But, unlike some people who achieved a real mastery of the darkroom, I could never manage to reach that level and was never satisfied with my printed output. The advent of digital processing was for me a revelation. I took to it like the proverbial duck to water. I got Photoshop in 2001, along with my first scanner and ink printer and haven't looked back since. Since then digital image capture has taken over too. For me this has all been good. So, I finally decided it was time to let go of my darkroom. It all went this week in two ebay sales to two darkroom enthusiasts where hopefully it will bring them years of pleasure. And it has provided some funds towards replacing my aging digital camera and lenses!