Work in Progress*

My niece and nephew are growing up so fast - Iyla will soon be walking!
Owen is a very proud big brother.

From lenses to filters, I have so many new toys to play with! Not only are they in AMAZING condition, to my excitement they are also not digital!! Meaning I will have to use what I have learned over the past year and a half. Watch this space - this is the very beginning of my photographic passion!

has been and gone so quickly… Tonight, I am sitting wondering where the time has gone, I have been organising my scattered files. I did manage to go out and take some photographs and even experiment with some illustration. So all in all quite a productive weekend.

Horses along the bypass between Whitehaven & Distington

Birdies

This week has been one of learning and experimenting!

There are many many shots I’ve taken which are just no good, I am lucky if I have one good photograph out of a possible 500 I’ve taken this week. But it surely is a learning curve and I am certainly not discouraged.

I am going to add, photoshop is a wonderful piece of software, but if you tamper with an image too much it does start to become grossly surreal. Although, saying this, I have been using a new piece of software called Light Room which does do justice to the images - with more controlled subtle settings. The only worry with Photoshop is finding when to stop editing! At least with Light Room you cannot over-do it! (although Light Room does not allow you to re-touch in cloning terms)

Most of my images are saved to my Mac back in Grasmere - I hope to upload more to my flickr account soon. Here is a small selection of images taken this week.

Langdale, edited with Photoshop as you can see there is a halo effect between the sky and fell

Edited with Light Room here I edited the levels and sharpened the details

Edited with Light Room then into Photoshop

Edited with Photoshop using black and white

I am currently looking to buy a new tripod, which is a must have with any kind of photography - so I have recently learned this week.

I have not had my camera very long today - but here is a taste of whats to come - the quality from the Nikon D5000 is outstanding!

Owen France

Owen France, sleepy

Owen France, blue eyes

Clover (Trifolium)

I have decided that tomorrow is the day I get my new camera! A stunning Nikon D5000 - saying I’m excited is certainly an understatement! I won’t be selling my little FujiFilm FinePix S9500 as there are some key features I just love.

Here are just some of my most recent photographs from the beauteous Lake District:

Ambleside

Patterdale near Glenridding

Thirlmere

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With my sisters wedding being only weeks away I have been busy very with my camera.

At the moment I have a FujiFilm FinePix S9500. The great thing about my existing camera is the Macro feature and the fact that it picks up so much vibrancy. The negative is the lens; it is not detachable. The camera itself is amazing and I have learned a great deal but now I am ready to progress to a whole new level. The next stage for me is learning how having a certain lens can effect a subject be it landscape or portrait etc. With that in mind, to google I go, for some camera research!

Although in the past months photography has been my main subject, I have been creating some graphic work which I hope to share soon.

With the knowledge I have gained from my colleagues at nicepond, I have revisited images taken some months ago and done a bit of retouching! The world of photography is like design - it is immense!

You can hold a camera and press a button, but does that make you a photographer? From my experience I would have to say no, not unless you have studied your subject and made some technical & creative choices. It is a skill much like graphic design.

Russell & Corey

Living in Grasmere you can imagine there are many sights to be seen. On Thursday evening, with the fragrant scents of summer, I headed out with my camera and a packet of crisps to Langdale Road…

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What’s it all about? Very sorry you’ll have to wait and see…

I have been doing some graphic design work today, but for some reason I was distracted by my mam making some delicious cakes. I am still not sure which bit is the best - the actual cake mixture before baking or the end result - either way I’ve over indulged slightly today!

More news to come soon…if you have an interesting article or have a piece of work in progress you are eager for people to see why not email me. I would love to get others involved in my blog and reveal their working progress as designers/photographers or any other creatives.