Hi Everyone!
The past week has been absolutely brilliant for photography in the park. I had 3 amazing morning wanders with my camera. Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday were all absolutely gorgeous. Fortunately Tuesday was also the last day of my current animation contract, which is a bonus as I don't need to rush back from the park to be at my desk for 9.30. The number of times I've had to leg it home when the light has been amazing are too many to count...
November is also the start of the deer cull in the park. This means that the park is completely locked overnight. Officially the pedestrian gates are opened at 7.30am during this time, which is clearly useless when sunrise is at 7. But the gates are always opened before that and generally open around 6.30ish.
On Tuesday I decided to be optimistic and I arrived at the gate at about 6.20. The man eventually arrived in his van to let people in at 6.45, by which point I was absolutely frozen as it was sub-zero. I think that some of the locks had been frozen so it had taken longer than usual to get around the various pedestrian gates to let people in. By now there was no time to walk into the middle of the park before sunrise, so I locked up my bike at the gate and walked to the brook instead.
It was really frosty and everywhere looked sugar coated. It was also super misty and these are 2 of my favourite combinations. I set up a composition that I've taken before.
ISO 100, 65mm, f/16 1/5sec
I really like the geometric shape of this felled tree trunk. Obviously I'd prefer it if the tree was still there, but in it's absence, I like the sharp cut, and the chunk missing in the middle. It contrasts nicely with the naturalness of the river banks.
I wandered a little further along and took this photograph. I was drawn to the beautiful shapes of the bank that were emphasised by the heavy frost.
ISO 100, 55mm, f/16, 1/5 sec.
The light suddenly got very interesting as the sun rose above the horizon....
It's amazing how phones deal with high dynamic range these days.
I grabbed a shot because who doesn't love the sun blasting through mist and trees...?
This shot is bracketed and is a blend of 3 exposures, to accommodate the high dynamic range of the light in the scene.
And this concludes the first part of my photo adventures from this week. I have some more photos to share from this day, and from Wednesday and Friday. There is also the sorry tale of the demise of one of my favourite willow trees...
I'll finish with some footage which I took out of frustration of being locked out of the park, when the light inside was absolutely amazing.....
Have a good weekend everyone and thanks for reading!
