Dark Days at Lacock Abbey

Another Sunday evening post, as opposed to a morning blog post. Been very busy today, but would not fail to blog on Sunday as standard. It was a very tough choice for a picture to post today. I feel like I am moving on a bit now from the recent batch of Poland and Eastbourne pictures, and now looking for new subjects. I decided to go back a few months to when I visited Lacock Abbey in Wiltshire.

I processed today's picture nearly 4 months and honestly never imagined I would publish it online. It was intended as an artistic experiment really, because I don't believe I have ever (actually I think I have once before) used the 'Burnt Sienna' filter in Nik Color Efex Pro. It is a very unique filter and I imagine would only be used with a very specific type of image. I don't necessarily know what that type is, but nonetheless I took a photo of the front of the abbey, put it through the Burnt Sienna filter, played around with the sliders, and then worked on the picture even more in Lightroom. Having been looking at some of the pictures in my digital collection, my wife and my brother both said they liked this picture, so then I began to get curious what other people may think about it.

It was intended as a rather dark picture (despite the fact it was actually quite bright that day), and while I was processing it, I had the idea of naming it something related to Dante's book (from The Divine Comedy) Inferno. I thought this was unfair however, because A) I have never read Inferno (it's on the reading list) and B) I didn't think it was fair to label a religious building with a connotation of Hell. It has that artistic 'look' that I often try to get from my pictures though, and it has definitely grown on me over the months.

The Country Life of the Cotswolds

Often seen as one of the most desirable places to live in the British Isles, the Cotswolds is an area of land that mainly encompasses Gloucestershire and Wiltshire, and is a designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. There are 2 villages within the Cotswolds, Bibury and Castle Combe, that I have posted photos of for well over a year now. The villages that you find in the Cotswolds are largely untouched by time and architecturally date back hundreds of years. For this reason they are very often used as sets in period movies and TV programmes. There are many villages to be found in the Cotswolds though, and include the subject of today's picture, Lacock, which was the latest of the Cotswold villages I have visited.

This is an HDR shot, though rather than use bracketed images, I sometimes just use a single RAW file, such as today's picture. This arguably (tediously as well) means it is or is not an HDR image, but it really doesn't matter. I like to put photos through the Photomatix works, as I still find that whatever you are trying to achieve, it helps the picture come to life a lot; adding superb colour and detail.

I'm now back from my busy couple of weekends abroad, but expect to be busy still for over a month, as the days begin to count now until my wedding in late September. I may take a break for a couple of weeks around that time, to get my priorities right (and take a break for taking a break's sake), but until then will continue to blog as usual 3 times a week.

It's Summer so Let's Play!

Well I hope the weather in England, indeed wherever you are, is fantastic today because it's less than a week now until the end of August and the beginning of autumn. Not that autumn isn't a great time for the photographer, indeed some rate it as the best season. As I said on Thursday, I am currently in Poland this weekend, returning tomorrow. In fact, I'm writing this on Wednesday, so it wasn't really said on Thursday at all. This has gone all Back to the Future, so I'll quit while I'm ahead.

This another picture I took within the grounds of Lacock Abbey in Wiltshire. No one including myself can resist picking up a Croquet mallet, should it be lying on the ground waiting to be played, and indeed it is what I did after I took this picture. Croquet is such a uniquely summer game, that it seems a shame looking at it now, knowing that the on/off (mainly off) summer we had in England is shortly to be gone. Oh well, here's to what's left of the summer, hope you had a great one!

How much are you learning Photography?

I've discovered a new joy recently. It seems quite a lazy pursuit at first, as it involves sitting in front of my TV but it has a massive plus side to it. I've figured out how to watch YouTube clips through my TV in glorious HD (else it wouldn't look that good). This is something you can do through the TV service I have, which is Virgin Media, but I'm sure is available on all the other platforms in some way. Anyway, the great thing about this is I don't have to watch 'normal' TV! Of course, I have programmes that I like and I watched a huge amount of the recent Olympic games, but there isn't much I try to 'catch'. There is even less I find to watch when I'm flicking through channels. But the opportunity to watch endless photography seminars and technique videos (and as I mentioned in HD), now you're talking! This is literally what I do when I sit down to relax now, put on a photography video on YouTube. I've never been one to sit at my computer screen and watch loads of YouTube clips (I just lose focus after a while) but watching them on my TV is much more how I like to do it. I've been watching seminars recently from Scott Kelby, Trey Ratcliff and Rick Sammon to name a few, as well as tips & tricks videos etc. This is entertaining and highly educational for me, as I am picking up lots of little nuggets of information every time I sit down to watch a new 'programme' on YouTube. The picture below for instance is one I processed after watching a video clip by Rick Sammon, giving out some helpful hints about processing with Topaz Labs:

The top picture (of Lacock village) was created using the Portrait Drama preset in Topaz Adjust, something I rarely if ever used, because I normally only used Topaz Adjust in company with HDR pictures (and normally only to bring more detail or 'pop' as some like to call it). The below picture is as you can guess the RAW file before being processed in Topaz Adjust. I love how the Portrait Drama brings out the colour of the sky and brings the picture to life somewhat. It's just learning to use little things like this that make watching these clips on YouTube a great new tool in my development as a photographer.

Which brings me to the question at the top of the page. How much are you learning photography? Youtube clips work great for me and the other great source I use are books. I do read photographic magazines and find them inspiring, but after a while the information seems to get repeated, if you read for long enough month after month (except for new photos of course). I'm also looking into going on a course this autumn because I want to get better fast at the moment. I can't believe that investing time in learning photography would be anything but a huge pay off down the line. Don't you think?