Framedlight

As I explained in my last blog about my visit to the Hurlers, a couple of stone circles on Bodmin Moor, I took some photographs intending to produce them as black and white images. Here is the set of monochrome pictures. The last three pictures were taken using the Lensbaby lens which tilts so that it has a narrow range of focus.

Finally the day dawned cloudy. In fact so cloudy that there was yet another non-existent sunrise as the rising orb could not penetrate the gloom! In fact, a good day for a visit to the moor! Armed with my book of shortish walks in North Cornwall we set our for Minions, a village on Bodmin Moor very close to a group of two stone circles known as the Hurlers, for obvious reasons. There is a large car park for tourists and I was dismayed to see that it was fairly full, not good for a Thursday morning out of season. Hettie and I equipped ourselves with camera gear, tripod and sandwiches and set out. 200 yards later Hettie pooped and we had to retrace our steps back to the dog bin in the car park. Hettie was unwilling to go back and then when we got to the bin unwilling to go forward. The upshot of which was I became a little short tempered and pulled on her lead too hard causing her to fall over (elderly dogs do not have great balance). This earned me bad looks and tuts from several eld...

After visiting Saltburn we made our way up to Staithes. This place is much photographed and so I was determined to try something a little different, namely the Lensbaby lens which is used like a tilt shift lens to get differential focus across the plane. It was early January so the light was fading pretty fast. The technique itself is also a bit hit and miss so I came away with only four pictures I was fairly happy with. Here they are in colour and then converted to monochrome using Silver Efex Pro 2.

When in Whitby, go to the Abbey. And this is what we did on a cold bright January morning when everything was high contrast. I ended up taking it every which way. Straight, with a Lensbaby and using Tri-X film on the Mamiya 645. First, on the Nikon D800e, straight shots, in colour and then converted to monochrome. The building with the statue in front of it is Cholmley Mansion, built after Henry Vlll dissolved the monasteries in 1539. It now houses the visitor centre. Next, using the lens baby lens, at 35mm. Now, with the Mamiya  645 film camera.