Cuckmere Gate

First of all, apologies for the blog being so late in the day. I have spent the best part of the last 2 days in Germany and had no wifi access as expected, therefore could not upload a blog. Anyway, I'm sure you are not that interested in that story, so I'll just get on with the photo.

This landscape picture is from Cuckmere Haven in East Sussex. If you read this blog regularly, you will know that the Grass Snake photo I posted on sunday was also taken at Cuckmere Haven. It was for landscape pictures that I went to this place though, and despite visiting during the middle of the day (any advice you read saying you can only take landscape pictures at dawn or dusk should be promptly treated as suspicious, as I think this warrants a crime against your creativity as a photographer), I came away with some pleasing (my opinion of course) photographs. The main attraction is the winding river as it makes its way to the English Channel, which is great to picture from the heights of the surrounding hills. If you stop and look around though, you will find other little gems to picture in the area and this little gate and small waterway made me think of the English countryside, which of course it is a part of.

This is a non-HDR picture, and although I did take 5 bracketed exposures of this scene, I just felt in post-processing that it didn't need the HDR treatment. However, I suppose it wouldn't hurt to find out what it might look like either.....

Finding Salvation

Ever since my blog a few weeks ago about where I want to go with my photography, I've been thinking about going in directions I never thought I would. Since I bought my D700 with a F2.8 24-70mm lens a couple of months ago, it dawned on me that having these 2 bits of equipment means I can become a Nikon registered professional user. I finally did my registration yesterday and am glad to say I am now a professional user but becoming this intrigued me a little. I've spent so much money on my photography (haven't we all!?) and now have professional equipment. Isn't time I started to make some money back? Even just a little? I have always wanted to be good and successful at photography doing what I pretty much have been doing, taking architectural and landscape shots, whilst being creative with them at the image processing stage. I'm in my thirties now and don't live in dreamland (my fiancé will disagree with me on that one), I know that relying solely on this approach could take years to recoup any substantial benefit, though I have sold a few pictures at exhibitions and local shops. But I am drawn now to want to make money from ways I never thought I would such as weddings and events. The idea of wedding photography never really did it for me, but having seen some stunning wedding photography out there (and I particularly recommend Catherine Hall's website catherinehall.net) I really feel that I am starting to get inspired by it. I have taken a few wedding pictures in the past (see my facebook page) but having also seen some local examples of what people pay for, I simply feel that I could offer a lot more. Just thoughts I've been having anyway, I'd be a very happy person to get paid for taking pictures.

Today's picture is another one of mine from Lacock Abbey that I visited last weekend. Having just mentioned getting my D700 recently, I have also learnt with this that I can't really get away with shots that I used to. For instance, I used to do a lot of handheld HDR (often because I would be out with other people and would not want to annoy them or slow everyone down) but with the lack of Vibration Reduction (VR) on the ridiculously expensive lens I bought and the weight of it all now, I can't really get away with doing handheld HDR anymore. The more exposed images simply come out a tad too shaky, which makes the HDR difficult to look sharp. Therefore, I think more single shot images like this one will come out of my Lacock Abbey collection rather than HDR's. The D700 I think will certainly make me a better photographer, as it won't let you take shortcuts to getting a good picture as I probably have in the past with the lighter weight equipment. I am looking at going on some photography courses as well soon, because apart from reading books, it's probably about time I took it seriously and learnt some proper photography!

Photo details: f/4.5, 0.001s, 32mm, ISO 200