Burghley House in March 2013

 I have had an ear infection that has restricted my photogrpahy trips this week but it has resulted in more processing time for photos. I am still exploring Silver Effex Pro - here a series of treaments from the more natural to the dynamic - I prefer the middle one.

Hamerton Zoo 2.Mammals

Some of the mammals from our trip to Hamerton. The light as the sun set gave lovely effects.

Hamerton Zoo 1. Birds

 Visited Hamerton Zoo near Sawtry  today on a beautiful sunny day and enjoyed the constant antics of 4-5 Red Kites who have obviously learnt where to get a free meal. As the light was very contrasty, I decided to concentrate on just parts of the captive birds and ended up with this panel of eyes. amazing variety of colours and textures

Cambridge Night Photography

CCC outing to Cambridge yesterday evening to catch the Christmas lights and the general ambience of the city before Christmas. It had rained in the afternoon so lots of reflections about. 'Unfortunately' Kings college was floodlit which gave large exposure problems as the sky darkened but a bit of work on the raw has given a reasonable result. The monochrome is Silver Efex Pro showing what can be brought out from low-light shots. Once all the light had gone, we went onto Garret Hostel Bridge and did some full-night shots - the usual setting of 30sec at f8 ISO 800 worked well. Kings again a problem because of the floodlighting but like this soft version with moon.

Cambridge RUFC versus Shelford RC

 1st and 2nd CRUFC teams played Shelford this afternoon at home. It is the first time they have met in league matches and they turned out to be real battles in every way as expected from a local derby. It was bright and sunny to start with and then heavy cloud reduced the light levels dramatically but got a few shots I like.

Monochrome conversion

 I have a couple of whole day/weekend lecturing commitments in March next year concentrating on monochrome so I thought I better start in good time to prepare some example files/prints showing the 'magic' of using Nik Silver Efex Pro to bring out the best in architectural studies. For the piano, I have provided the original raw conversion, a monochrome conversion using just the raw converter and a final image where SEP has been used. Other examples have the Raw conversion in colour or monochrome followed by the SEP image. The amount of detail that can be extracted is remarkable.

Lakenheath Sunset

Beautiful sunset at Lakenheath RSPB Reserve today completed by views of Hen Harriers and Marsh Harriers coming into roost in the reeds. They were a long way away but still worth an i.d. shot. Top two Marsh Harriers; lower two and left picture male Hen Harriers.

Hundreds of Rooks and other Corvids roost in the poplar trees. The first shot shows them earlier in the evening with the sunlight catching their glossy plumage making them appear to have light areas. The later shot is taken as they come into roost using 1/10th second - interesting shapes as the fly about in the trees.