Cold Day at the Office..

Posted on January 10, 2025 by Guthlac

By recent British standards the past few days have been really cold. On a global scale of course it has been just a brush with the cold. Be that as it may, when I go outside it feels bloody cold. be careful what you wish for.

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More Testing…

Posted on January 8, 2025 by Guthlac

Every now and then we all experience a moment of clarity. A moment when many things we had been struggling with just came together. Afterwards life would not be the same again. Today I might have experienced such a moment.

This morning I decided to test my new camera’s capabilities. I planned to use it in a field it probably wasn’t designed for. This didn’t mean it couldn’t capture any images. Rather Sony make cameras that are especially marketed for wildlife photographers. The A7CR isn’t really one of those cameras. Yet it has the latest AI focusing system and is able to capture images at around 5 frames per second. So it should work. Shouldn’t it?

Well of course the answer was yes. For 15 minutes, I pointed the camera and large zoom lens at small birds. The camera delivered the goods. Again and Again and Again! For those interested in the technical details, all of these images were captured by a 600 mm lens. The camera was handheld at 3200 ISO and a shutter speed of 1/640th sec. It was a moment when man and his machine worked in perfect harmony. This camera is exceptional.

I am not going to suggest that more expensive cameras in the Sony range are not worth the money. Instead, just imagine the images that could be captured with their extra capabilities. This of course assumes the photographer knows how to use their camera – hence my continuing testing program.

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Glum…

Posted on January 6, 2025 by Guthlac

One of the joys (?) of where I live is that we never get the best weather. The term ‘best’ is very much a movable feast. In this context I mean weather that adds something to the image. So today instead of snow drifts we get dull. Don’t get me wrong I am not advocating for more dramatic weather. No, in these circumstances I am happy with dull. It just means you have to work a bit harder.

Or you do what I did today and experiment.

PS: The WordPress AI suggests that I should include a conclusion that summarizes the main points: It was dull, I experimented. I give up.

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New Ideas…

Posted on January 3, 2025 by Guthlac

It is strange where inspiration comes from. Somehow it does arrive and then I find I can’t get enough. I find myself enveloped in cascading ideas. The early stage can be overwhelming. Slowly, things settle down. What was inspiration becomes integrated into my normal practice.

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First Day of the Year…

Posted on January 2, 2025 by Guthlac

The first day of 2019 found us in the coastal town of Hunstanton. This is the first real seaside town on the Norfolk coast. Many many years ago I remember going on a bus trip to Hunstanton. I still think that the fish and chips I ate that day were some the best I have ever consumed. Fish and Chips weren’t really on the menu on New Year’s day 2019. Which was a shame but that is life.

On the way home there was wonderful cloud formation over the flat lands of the Fens.

There is something fascinating about remastering images captured some time ago, in this case five years. The Adobe photographic software has improved significantly over this period. Remastering the original digital images gives new life to them. I feel that I am now able to produce the images that I wanted to all those years ago. This of course is a conceit. My memory is fading in a direct inverse of my age. I once was able to rely on my memory. I know write things down to remember them. Another joy of the aging process.

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Cold Toes….

Posted on January 2, 2025 by Guthlac

I guess I got what I wanted. Cold clear weather at dawn. I had to pay for this wonderful light. Today it was my toes.

Of course it was worth it. What is more we might have snow by the weekend. Photographically a great start to the year. For many people 2025 this is not the case. We all moan about this or that but fortunately we don’t know the true horrors of the human condition. Long may it stay that way.

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New Year…

Posted on January 1, 2025 by Guthlac

Tis the season for new beginnings or so we are told. Actually New Year, as we celebrate it [spoiler alert: I don’t] is a modern confection. There is nothing significant about the change between 31st of December to the 1st of January. Don’t believe me? I watched the BBC News channel yesterday. They stated that it will take 26 hours for the whole of the earth to move to the 1st of January. Now you could suggest that this is fake news but please don’t.

The much more significant date up here in the cold and damp north is the winter solstice. From that point, we are slowly marching to long summer days and away from the depression of night lasting many hours more than the day. Of course for those in the southern hemisphere the opposite is true.

To top everything off it is a cold and damp start to the New Year. Yippee.

Ba Humbug.

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Last Day of the Year…

Posted on December 31, 2024 by Guthlac


No one would’ve believed in the last days of the 2nd decade of the 21st century…

{Apologies to HG wells}

New Year’s Eve – 2019.

Looking back at these remastered images from 2019 everything seemed so much simpler. Yes Brexit was a thing as was Prime Minister Boris Johnson. They were known unknowns. What no one knew was that within four months of these images being captured one word would dominate the world. COVID. They were simpler times.

This is one of the advantages of revisiting images from the past. With the benefit of hindsight we can see the pitfalls ahead. No one in these images probably realised that the world would change so much. This transformation happened in just four months.

A sobering thought as we move to another New Year. I hope you and your nearest and dearest have a great New Year. I also hope that 2025 will not be shaped by just one word in the same way that life after 2019 was.

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Was God Listening?….

Posted on December 30, 2024 by Guthlac

For a couple of hours yesterday the gray clouds parted and picture perfect late afternoon winter sun bathed southern Leicestershire. For late December it was also fairly warm. So I guess I didn’t get all I wished for but God moves in mysterious way etc…

It was an afternoon for winter walks, runs and trying out your new electric assisted push bike. Oh, and this being south Leicestershire taking your horse out for a quick hack around the country lanes and bridle paths. No matter I wasn’t in any hurry and happily waited as they clip clopped by before driving on.

I decided to only use one lens, my 70 – 200 mm zoom. This, at times, made for an interesting challenge but much better for that.

The more I use the Sony A7CR the more I realise I am reverting back to an early life. This is caused, in no small part, by the limited use I can get from the screen on the back of the camera. Because we can no longer buy a camera just for stills photography we have to make do with ‘hybrid features‘. On the CR the rear screen is one of those. It swings out so that you can see yourself whilst you ‘vlog’. Thus rendering it next to useless for photography, well at least I find it so. It is small thing but forces me to revert back to my days with early Canon DSLRs. Actually, the more I use this camera I find much older muscle memories resurfacing from much earlier Canon film days. I love it.

I have watched many hours of reviews and set up videos to help me set the camera up. However, my setup is very simple: single shot, RAW, manual ISO, simple auto focus and that is about it. I am interested in the form captured. It can then be shaped on the computer, just as it was in the past in the chemical dark room.

Whether this is the correct approach I haven’t got a clue. It just works for me.

Fn. As I write this the clouds are once more gray and unyielding. We have to be thankful for the light relief we get every now and then. It must be really boring having constant sunny days. I’m sure I’d get used to such things but it wouldn’t be the same. I’m British and so it is written in my DNA to moan about the weather whilst at the same time to enjoy its lumpiness. We are strange people!

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Rising Damp…

Posted on December 29, 2024 by Guthlac

It has been a damp few days. However, nothing is going to stop me getting out and capturing a few images.

The more I use my new camera the more I enjoy the luxury of a 61 Megapixels sensor. I have found myself thinking about an image in a totally different way. It also means that just walking around with one lens is so much more practical. This doesn’t mean I’m going to abandon my Zeiss lens. Not a bit of it.

Whilst walking through the mist a damp is atmospheric it would be nice to have some cold and frost days. It is winter afterall!

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