This is part of a series of photographs I have made in and around the Staunton Harold area. It's a view from Dimminsdale across the valley towards the main house...
Simon Marchini LRPS
Web: http://WWW.simonmarchini.co.uk
Showing posts with label Dimminsdale. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dimminsdale. Show all posts
Wednesday, 24 February 2010
Friday, 19 February 2010
Snowdrops...
Well I have survived my encounter with Somme style mud. Actually this is a bit silly, well all right very silly but it was very muddy. It is half term at the moment so the woods at Dimminsdale were alive with parents and grand parents taking their respective off spring to see the snowdrops. The problem was that no one had told the snowdrops - so they continued to sit their without opening their flower heads. It snowed last night so this should have added to the romantic nature but instead it just added to the gloop.
There were quite a few photographers there trying to capture that illusive shot but I seemed to be the only one who was willing to get down and dirty with the pesky flowers - I suspect that this said more about me than the other photographers. I had planned ahead so had old waterproof trousers and jacket on. I also used an old show curtain to tray and reduce the mess - this worked really well considering but I still ended up getting very muddy.
A new problem from the last time I tried to capture the flowers arose this time. People insisted on crouching down near the flowers, I was lying down in the well worn footpath, this meant that many of the snowdrops were trampled under foot. It would be wrong to suggest that many flowers were destroyed as a result of this but people should be careful where they stand or squat.
It too early to say whether the morning was a success - but the early indications are that it went better than expected - lets hope this is borne out by the final photographs.
Mud mud glorious mud...
I am covered in gloopy mud - deep joy! Im after snowdrops again, this time against a covering of snow. Problem is the snowdrops still havn't come out and the snow is turning into slush and, well, mud. Oh the joys of photography.
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Wednesday, 10 February 2010
Snowdrops and Porn...
Not sure if these have gone together before, Snowdrops are the symbol of purity and innocents, the end of winter and the herald of better days ahead. Porn, on the other hand, is, by its nature, a reflection of the most base needs of humanity - certainly not purity and innocents but rather cynicism and exploitation. Nonetheless these two things came together this morning. Let me explain.
I went out this morning to capture some early flourishes of snowdrops in Dimminsdale and was very successful. As I did this I spoke to a number of passing walkers, all of whom had opinions on the snow drops and whether it was too early to take photographs.
So after about an hour or so I started to feel hungry so went to a local cafe for lunch. I had taken the latest issue of BJP with me to read over lunch. So I ordered lunch and sat down to enjoy my BJP and as soon I read the headlines I knew I was in trouble. This issue dealt with the impact of the new erotica. My heart sunk. Here I was sitting amongst respectful elderly middling folk, all women, and I had a magazine full of erotic photographs. I managed to read some of the magazine without going to the more explicit content but it wasn't the relaxing lunch I had expected. Tip to myself - always read the headlines before taking anything out in public.
I had fallen foul of this before when I was working in an office. I was looking at some interesting photographs of strippers, I know I know but it wasn't what you might imagine. This was an article about the exploitation of these women and they all had their clothes on, well enough to cover their modesty. A women walked into the office and accused me of looking at pornography, which was a big no no. I immediately responded that this was not pornography but art and I might have mentioned about there was far worse in the National Gallery - not a good idea. Anyway after a stand off I decided that to stop looking at the magazine would be the best policy - however to this day I regret this. One final thing. The BJP editorial make interesting reading - it takes a none judgemental approach to porn and - well read it and see what you think.
Wednesday, 23 December 2009
Working on the back catalogue....
My good friend David is working on a series of images of Dimminsdale so I was passing the other month and captured this. In truth it wasn't like that at all. I was going to capture tree sparrows and I just happened to pass by the Staunton Harold reservoir when the light appeared just right. However, I have just started working on some of my backlog and saw this and decided to work on it - as with any time I start working on something it doesn't always workout the way I thought it would. This is a HDR shot just after dawn but by the time I finished it has changed into something different. Is this now a photograph I could display and enter into a competition? Well I guess that depends on the rules but I like it which at the moment is all that matters.
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