Morning Light (January 2020)

I am going to finish January’s photography with another selection from Combs Lane. It is location that is close to home and works well in the morning sunlight. I know most of the compositions on the lane due to the frequency of the visits although that doesn’t stop me from trying to find new angle on a familiar subject.

Of course, there is a danger that local photography becomes repetitive and I guess if I lined up all the photographs from this location there would be many similar images. However, local photography is not really about taking ‘different’ images, it is more about the enjoyment of the activity. Simply capturing the morning light is enough for me and remains one of the joys of local photography.

I mentioned at the start of the post about trying new angles on familiar subjects an this is an example. I stood in front of the tree to make more of a feature out of the shadow:

Newark Castle (January 2020)

Newark Castle is a fine structure with a long history dating back to 1135 and was the site of King John’s death in 1215. King John is probably best known as the villain in the Robin Hood films and stories.

Left derelict after the English Civil War it was later restored in the mid 19th Century. A watercolour painted by JMW Turner in 1796 gives an insight to the state of the castle prior to its restoration:

J. M. W. Turner / Public domain

All Turner’s paintings are wonderfully atmospheric and Newark Castle is no exception. I particularly enjoy placement of the people and boats in the composition, the subtle tones of light and shadow, the masterful sky and the wonderful rendering of the river with reflections.

Of course, it is a tough ask to follow Turner’s painting with a set of photographs, but I will give it a go...

The following selection was taken more by chance than design. I happened to be walking near the castle in Newark when there was a change in the light. For a ten minute period the overcast conditions gave way to some lovely afternoon sunshine. I tried to make the most of the opportunity including a few compositions with a similar point of view to Turner’s painting:


                                  

I can’t help but wonder what Turner would have made of photography particularly when I look at his sketchbooks. I note how often he recorded depictions of light which he later translated into his paintings. Perhaps we take for granted today’s technology that allows us to capture a moment of light in the split of a second as demonstrated in this last image of the afternoon, recorded on my phone:

Trail Ice (January 2020)

A lot of rain has fallen in the last two or three months and many of the fields are sodden. The paths to Kirklington and the Hexgreave Estate are thick with mud and more often than not I have preferred to stay on firmer ground. The only time this changed was on a very cold morning. The muddy fields had hardened in the frosty conditions and many of the watery tracks had turned to ice. This provided an opportunity for some abstract ice shots picking out the different shapes and lines created by trapped water and air. These were some of the results and particularly liked the cold cyan blues picked up by the camera which I decided not to correct when processing the images:

Curbar Edge - Part 3 (January 2020)

I did think there would only be two parts to the Curbar Edge photography in January. However, I have few more photographs that are worth showing. I was particularly attracted to the striking colours of the moorland rushes/grasses in the sunshine, both close up and part of a wider view looking across Stoke Flat towards White Edge:

Later, as the sunset, there was a line of sunlight across White Edge...and these were the last photographs of this visit to Curbar Edge: