We often take the familiar things for granted. I have to admit the farm track at the end of my road fell firmly into this category. Over the years I've enjoyed the occasional evening or weekend walk and even ventured out to catch the odd sunrise.
Stapleford Sunrise
Ron's Bench
Double Trouble
However, since the start of Covid-19 lock-down it's kept me sane. Every day I went out for a walk and the view was slightly different. People running, cycling, walking, the changing light and weather, even the crops as they grew.
As soon as lock-down rules relaxed allowing multiple trips out per day I decided to start work on a timelapse. The aim was to capture the farm track and the people who used it from dawn to dusk. A few weeks later and over 3000 images shot I've finished.
Hopefully it will not stop here and I will continue to enjoy the farm track as it changes through the seasons.
I've not been out much recently so it was really good to get a text from a good friend Phil asking if I wanted to pop out into Cambridge early on Sunday morning. The weather forecast was for a heavy frost and clear skies. Sunrise was not likely to amount to much, but nice frosty conditions can be really photogenic.
I arrived in town at just after 7:15am, Phil about 2 minutes later. We parked up just the other side of the river (free until 9am) and headed over to Jesus Green and the fabulous avenue of London Plane trees.
Jesus Green avenue of trees
We only had a few minutes before the streetlamps switched off. There were a few hardy folk out and about. The following shot is 3 images combined. One at iso3200 to catch the man walking and then two iso100 shots blended into a hrd image.
Morning stroll
It was very cold (car had reported -6 on the way into town), but there was no ice on the Cam. I've only seen ice on the Cam twice in 10 yrs.
Spot the punt
The shot above was the fist I've taken with my new Kase filters. I used a 0.6 soft ND grad for this one to balance the sky. The Kase filters replaced some rather scratched Hitech resin ones which have lasted well, but seen better days.
Heading into town I was able to capture an obligatory bike shot.
Locked up
After wandering around town seeking inspiration we headed back towards the cars. The sun was starting to burn through a slight mist over Midsummer Common.
Midsummer joggers
It was fast approaching 9am and time to head home for a cup of tea and some breakfast. A lovely if slightly chilly morning to be out and about.
After many years deliberating I finally decided to sign up for Cambridge Open Studios (COS) back in December last year. COS is a group of over 500 artists living and working in the Cambridge area. The highlight of the year is open studios where over 350 of the artists open their studios & homes to display their work during the weekends of July.
I've opted to open up my home during the first 2 weekends in July (7-8th & 14-15th) from 11am to 6pm Saturday & Sunday.
For the last few months I've been thinking about which photos & products to display and sell. I've also spent some time procrastinating the logistics of transforming my kitchen / dinning room into a gallery space suitable for showcasing my work.
To date I've designed and printed some greetings cards and fitted an Artiteq hanging system along part of one wall. Now comes the difficult part of image selection, frames, sizes finishes etc.
Greetings cards
I will have a variety of work on display from classic Cambridge shots to a variety of UK landscapes from the Lake District, Norfolk & Suffolk, Cornwall & Scotland.
Please do pop in and say hello It would be lovely to welcome old friends and new.
My original website was launched back in October 2006 and remained largely unchanged through to 2011. It then had a bit of a face lift, but the underlying code was very similar. Plain old html, basic CSS and some Server Side Includes to glue it all together.
My original Website
Over the last few years I've come to accept that a responsive site would be a big step forward. My old design did work on a phone, but everything was tiny and when I tried to scale if for mobiles it didn't look pretty on the desktop.
For the last 18 months or so I've been going round in circles. I tried WordPress, Drupal and various others content management systems (the names of which now escape me), I looked at SquareSpace and one or two other hosted managed solutions. I also downloaded various CSS templates.
I found myself creating a few pages which didn't really work very well then I would give up and try something new. I kept coming back to Wordpress, but I just couldn't figure out how to create the gallery pages and payment integration. Fast forward 12 months and I came across w3schools.com at first I started working through some of their tutorials. I then stumbled on their templates. Some templates were great other not so great, but there were elements of a number which were really appealing. I downloaded their main style sheet and started to unpick it. It then became apparent all of their templates used the same CSS sheet, so I could pick and choose the bits which I wanted.
After building up a front page and thinking carefully about the structure I set about working on populating the back-end. The most efficient way would have been a database, but I had already decided this was not the route for me. I eventually settled on making the best use of Server Side Includes and creating a set of simple pages which could be easily duplicated and edited in notepad++.
Fresh new look
All in all I'm a bit of a luddite when it comes to new technology, but hopefully my fresh new design will stand the test of time and be usable on mobile phones at long last!
There have been some quite striking sunrises the last few weeks in Cambridge, but as always the challenge is to be at the right place at the right time. In the winter a 7:30 to 8am start is positively civilised.
I'm often sitting in my kitchen eating breakfast watching a great sunrise while I tuck into my fruit and fibre. Sometimes I jump up and dash out, down the road and then 50 yards down the farm track to try and grab a shot.
Stapleford cracking sunrise
Other times I don't quite make it in time, the moment has passed or rather it never really came.
The farm track disappointing light
B&W 6 stop ND filter (long exposure)
In these circumstances I frequently use my B&W 6 stop or 10 stop ND filter. Lengthening the exposure often brings out the colours in the sky. It also seems to reduce the dynamic range a little meaning you are less likely to clip the highlights. Reds are always the first to clip on Canon cameras, so it's good to check the RGB histogram on your cameras rear screen not just the highlights and shadows.
A little further from home requires a bit more effort. 10 Minutes in the car gets me to Grantchester.
Grantchester dawn
Persistence usually pays off . I always check the weather forecast, favouring times when it looks changeable around sunrise. Two weeks ago I was convinced all was looking good, a frost during the night, clear skies clouding up just around dawn and while driving over to Grantchester in the dark there was a hint of greater things. Alas sunrise came and went without any photo opportunities. I took 3 photos of a frosty puddle then headed home. Last Saturday Phil (a photo friend) had arranged a quick shoot before the Men's Breakfast at Church. We needed to be close to Church which was a little limiting, but what a cracking sunrise.
River Cam sunrise
Despite being early and seeing the colour develop I couldn't decide on a good composition. I tried out a few shots looking across Midsummer Common down to the river, but it just wasn't working. In the end I quickly composed a 2 shot panorama looking down the Cam. Later on, back at home, I decided to go for a square crop to exclude the white minibus on the left bank. I was a little disappointed I hadn't been in a better location, but the breakfast made up for it!
I'm still striving for the perfect Cambridge location for sunrise, a few others I've tried out recently include:
Mullard radio telescopes - just beyond Barton
The Cambridge Backs & Colleges
Ditton Meadows on a frosty morning
Beyond all else I need to get out more, especially during the winter when sunrise is at a civilised hour. All the times I've stood around in the dull, cold and wet are eclipsed when the sky lights up with a cracking sunrise.
Grantchester Meadows is one of my favourite landscape photo locations close to Cambridge. I've now managed to "get lucky" with the weather on a few occasions and I thought I would share a few photos taken over the last few years.
Dec 2007 was my first early morning visit, nice frosty morning, but not much in the way of cloud cover.
Grantchester trees
River Cam
After some heavy snowfall in Dec 2010 I visited mid morning.
Snowy Grantchester
Winter wonderland
Jump forward to Jan 2014 and a near perfect morning. Frosty with some light cloud cover which picked up the sunrise colours really nicely.
Fire in the sky Grantchester trees
Frosty ditch
Long exposure shot of the sun rising
Frosty molehills
Jan 2015, after carefully studying the weather forecast I made a good call and was lucky with conditions again, nice frosty morning a little cloud cover and a bit of mist rising off the fields.
Classic Grantchester meadows
Glowing tree
Sun's up
Looking through my shots over the last 7 years is quite interesting. My equipment has changed very little, a camera upgrade from a Canon 5d to a 5d mk2, but my lens selection (for all the shots above) has stayed the same. Another change is my switch to Lightroom in 2012, but probably more significant than these minor adjustments is my ability to learn. I certainly feel my style has developed and improved over the years and that's what drives me on in photography.
I look forward to doing a similar review in another 7 yrs time, now that's a scary thought!
Back in August last year I was contacted by Cambridge Fire Station to see if I would be able to provide some images "To adorn the rather dull expanse of magnolia corridors in the Parkside Fire Station". I had assumed that they would simply want a handful of shots, but after a few emails had been exchanged it transpired it was 36 large framed prints they were after. A few weeks went by while we were agreeing on image selection, print size etc. and then the order was placed.
The only slight problem was the time scale. "As discussed, the fire station is taking part in the OpenCambridge event on the weekend of the 13th and 14th Sept, so it wouldbe great to have at least some of the prints ready to display forthis." This gave me one weekend and a few evenings to mount and frame 36 photos. A mild panic ensued. First off I ordered the pictures, frames & some additional mount-board. The frames were the first to arrive at work on a pallet, I couldn't believe how big the box was. Even after unpacking all of them I only managed to fit 30 in the car in one go! The photos arrived the next day closely followed by the mount-board. Once I had transported all this home the lounge looked like it had turned into a factory.
Cutting card, with logan cutter
First off I produced a template for the cutting the card to the right dimensions. I usually measure, mark then cut each mount by hand, but I needed to speed the whole process up. Template complete, card marked I started cutting away in earnest. After cutting all 36 mounts I decided to take a break and started sticking the pictures down onto the self adhesive backing board. 35 photos stuck then the 36th got a bubble in which turned into a crease. The print was discarded and photo re-ordered.
I then started fitting the photos behind the cut mounts, the first one was a little too big, oh dear, then the second, then the third. At that point I was getting just a little stressed, the template I had cut was right on the edge, a millimeter one way and the mount was just a tiny bit too large. Major panic having just cut up 36 sheets of card! A big lesson to learn, check, check and double check. Thankfully I was able to salvage around 20 mounts, just as well I had ordered more mount-board.
work in progress....
Next job was fitting in the frames, I had chosen Nielsen Apollo black frames and decided to opt for 70x50cm so that the mount size was a little broader than I normally cut, this gave the photos a bit more "breathing space" which I feel worked really well. After about 18 hours in total (I kept a tally of my time) I was all done. I just needed to fit them all in the car so I could drop them off at the Fire Station. This time I managed to fit all 36 in spread between the back seats and the boot, it was a tight fit and I did drive rather cautiously on the drop off.
Although I made the open day deadline I'm not sure they were all hung in time. The official opening by Princess Anne happened a week ago and I've only just been along to take a few snaps of the final photos on the walls.
Some of the final framed photos hanging on the wall
the walls aren't curved, but it's tricky to get a shot!
My largest single order to date, just a shame the Fire Station isn't readily open to the public. However, you can see quite a few shots if you peer in through the doors and I'm sure if you mention my name you can get in and have a quick peak down the main corridor. I have provided digital images of all the photos which I'm told will be displayed on a large digital screen some time soon. Resources: www.cambridgeimages.co.uk
Almost a year ago Simon Wincott approached me with an interesting concept, to use my Cambridge photographs on a pack of high quality playing cards. 54 different images across the deck. This was an interesting and unique project and I was keen to be involved.
After a number of prototypes to hone both the colours and design we settled on a supplier who could produce a really nice quality pack of cards. The cards not only felt nice in your hand, but the colours really popped in the photographs.
The first few stockists have been signed up and include: City Hotel, Heffers, the Round Church and the Holiday Inn. More to be added soon.
Simon who heads up British Culture Cards plans to roll out a series of themed packs including Great Cities, Great Counties, Great Estates & Great Regions. The Cambridge pack was set to be the first. I'm also hoping to be featured in a Lake District set soon so watch this space!
Why not buy a pack for Christmas or as a great long lasting souvenir of Cambridge. Heffers are selling the cards for £5.99 per pack.
I've been meaning to have a go at timelapse photography for some time, but not willing to sacrifice my 5d mk2 to so many shutter actuations. Collecting dust on a shelf I've got a 5d and a 400d both of which are about 7 years old now. The 400d has been used less than a dozen times and I should have really sold it on Ebay, but it's hardly worth it. It's a good little camera a bit fiddly to use and the viewfinder is positively tunnel like. Just over a year ago I saw a cheap intervoltmeter on Amazon compatible with the 400d and added it to my wish list. I often add stuff to my wish list I find interesting or for reference (I have since created a private wish for such things now). A few weeks later to my surprise my mother-in-law had bought it for me and it arrived in the post. Having read the instructions I did a few test shots then put it back in my computer cupboard to gather dust along with the cameras. I'm notoriously impatient when it comes to photography and the idea of taking hundreds of photos to do a load of post processing on and convert into a video dampened my enthusiasm somewhat. Three weeks ago when my daughter was out punting with pathfinders (youth group from church) I decided to bite the bullet and give it a go. It was a disaster, for the following reasons:
A poorly framed photo will not make a good timelapse
You need lots of photos, 30, 40 or 50 is a complete waste of time.
Movement in the frame is good (it goes without saying) and setting the right interval is key
Landscape images only please! At one stage I found myself taking a portrait timelapse because that was more pleasing framing, 16x9 video for screen doesn't work in portrait!
Have a decent sized memory card, I was shooting Raw on an old 2gb card I had kicking around
Charge your battery properly (not 15 minutes before you leave!) and take spares
Switch everything to manual and switch off autofocus (this is one mistake I didn't make)
So after learning the hard way, I decided to do a little more planning, charged up my batteries broke out a few 4gb cards (i've now bought some 8's) and set off to the Lion Yard car park roof on a nice sunny day. First off I found that the nice puffy clouds were moving quite slowly, I opted for an 8 second interval, but in hindsight 10 seconds would have probably been a bit better. 33 minutes later and 250 RAW shots in the bag I hot footed it off to my next spot. Parkers Piece was covered in lots of activity setting up for the Big Weekend, not sure I wanted to capture all the railings and hoardings so I headed over closer to the Fire Station and started off another timelapse. I set the interval to 2 seconds since there were quite a few people walking around.
After amassing 500 photos from a very short period of time I had to decide how to process them.
I downloaded the lot into Lightroom made some simple adjustments to the first image, copied develop settings then pasted these settings to the next 249 shots. Exported them as .jpg full res.
Lightroom interface
I now had my first batch of jpgs and needed to find some software to create a timelapse. After a bit of googeling I came across Panolapse http://www.panolapse360.com/ in the blurb it describes it's self as :
"Add motion to timelapse videos. Panolapse uses perspective correction to create real-world rotational panning through your scene. Also zoom, deflicker, blend RAW metadata, auto-exposure, create videos, and more."
Sounded promising so I downloaded the free copy which has a few of the bells and whistles turned off, but as a start was perfectly adequate. It's quite basic, easy to use and the video quality isn't half bad. At some stage I will certainly buy a copy so I can step up to full hd. Free version only allows output at 720p.
PanoLapse interface
After processing my first 250 shots at 24fps with deflicker switched on I opened up my video in media player and sat back for 10.4 seconds. Flipping birds every 2 or 3 seconds which just appeared as black dots on a single frame! Back to Lightroom and the spot healing brush, some time later all the birds had gone.....
After a few more lunchtime trips and a stack more photos I hit the next technical challenge, tripod movement! I was up on the top of Great St Mary's and the only place I could fit my tripod was on the benches you stand on to view over the railings. Half way through a time lapse sequence someone stood on the bench and shifted the image by a few pixels for a few shots then they stepped off. After some more googeling I came across Hugin and a command line tool which is bundled in with the distribution align_image_stack. Playing around with some settings and yet more googeling I managed to run the following command:
d:\align_image_stack -a out img_001.jpg img_002.jpg img_003.jpg img_004.jpg..........
To get the list of images I piped them into a text file and then edited this in excel, a bit of a faff, but it did the job. About an hour later I had a whole stack of out*.tif files. I've not found a way of using align_image_stack to output .jpg so I needed to batch convert these back to jpg for Panolapse to read them, I used FastStone Image Viewer for this.
Finally I was left with 8 Short timelapse movies, ranging between 150 & 300 shots each, now I needed to get them all joined together. Microsoft Movie maker is another free tool, easy to use after just a few minutes clicking on menu options.
Finally I was ready to upload my first timelapse to YouTube. I've still got a lot to learn, but I now have a set of tools I can work with when I take on my next timelapse project.
Cambridge E-luminate festival is in full swing again http://www.e-luminatefestivals.co.uk/ I have to admit it passed me by in previous years, but when Phil one of my photo buddies suggested we went to take a look how could I refuse! The weather seems to have consisted of rain, rain and more rain so after checking the weather we decided to plumb for Tuesday evening after work.
We met up on the top floor of Lion Yard car park, still hoping for a decent sunset from here, but to date I've been refused.
View from Lion Yard car park
This shot was taken a few moths back, there was a little bit of a sunset, but it was way off to the left.
After a few "test shots" we headed over to Kings. The screens were lit up rather nicely and the light was just starting to fade, there was a bit of cloud cover and the rain held off ideal shooting conditions.
Kings College
Rainbow Kings
Every so often the colours would fade from purple to rainbow across the screens, sometimes this was little frustrating since it was in the middle of an exposure, but generally quite predictable.
I tried to adjust the perspective in Lightroom with varied degrees of success using the "Auto" button, so in most of the shots I did a little extra work in Photoshop with a combination of perspective, skew and warp transformations.
Ominous colours - this could be out of Harry Potter!
Next stop along Kings Parade was Senate House, this was a little more tricky since the light display was changing rapidly and there were lots of people on the road either walking, cycling or stopping to take snaps with their phones. After 5 or so minutes the road cleared and with a higher ISO I grabbed this shot. The image on Senate House isn't that sharp, but you get the idea.
Senate House
Pretty in pink
By 6pm the sky was getting a little dark. This shot of Johns Tower was taken from the junction of Trinity Street & Sidney Street. The colours here are completely natural it was very, very pink.
Phil and I then wandered down to the Mathematical Bridge, but unfortunately it wasn't lit up even though it was mentioned on the e-luminate website.
