Changing gear

No, not physical photographic gear, but shifting subjects as the season's change. Autumn is when the sheep dog nursery trials begin and I went along to one on a dry(ish) day. for a couple of reasons I couldn't get into it at all. One was that I don't have a long enough lens to focus in on the that venue. The other was that I'd run out of ideas. I suppose it would be quite easy to fill the memory cards with files of cute sheep dogs. Not much of a challenge, or of much meaning no matter how many 'likes' they might get on social media. I left early thinking that I am probably done with the sheep dog scene.

When the weather's been fit, and I've has time, I've been back out wandering locally making more of my boring farmed landscape pictures. Something else I'm finding a bit tedious. I take fewer and fewer photos on my walks round the mosslands these days.

With darkness falling around tea time now it seemed like an idea to resurrect my nocturnal village 'project'. It was a full moon that drew me out the other evening. I was out of practice and had forgotten what settings I'd used in the past. It was also a dry night, and in the past rain or mist has made for more interesting pictures. With the full moon clouds might have helped, but the sky was clear.

On a rare sunny, and still, afternoon I had an aimless drive around some usual haunts and ended up at the nature reserve on the marsh. They never seem to stop tinkering with things there. Some fencing firm or other has been profiting recently.

On a second visit I spied some new signage. I'm a sucker for keep out signs, and these are particularly officious!

So that's it. Gear shifted to local subjects with no real direction to anything, and maybe a few auction mart visits, possibly a poultry show or two, and perhaps a sheep dog trial out of habit (when the weather is fair) to see me through the winter.

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A slow month's catch up

May was very wet, which hampered my wanderings. I still got out round the moss when dry weather and spare time coincided and found some useful photographs. By the end of the month, however, it was obvious that my enthusiasm for following the same routes and photographing pretty much the same things was waning.

I did manage to get a few 'work' pictures, which are more interesting to me than the unpeopled pictures. taking that sort of photo from afar, as the ditches force me to, isn't ideal and I do wonder if they are worth taking because of that. Still they do show what was going on. In this case a low tech way of feeding out insect netting.

Among my pictures of inanimate objects were one of a Mylar strip bird scarer which I think might be 'the one', and a series of pictures of a hoe.

I took a variety of pictures of the how from different angles using different focal lengths and apertures. The one I like best being the simplest one. The overhead shot which showed most clearly the cobbled together nature of the hoe using the insulation tape..

Having brought this project to a conclusion in my usual way (getting bored of it...) there is now a zine in production of a selection of geometric field photos and I should make an effort to put some order into all the photographs I've taken over the last twelve months or more. Maybe even make some prints.

 

The end of May saw dry and sunny weather return and the restarting of sheep dog trials. My enthusiasm for the trials had already begun to dwindle when they were stopped last year but the chance to go and photograph some people from closer range than on the moss wasn't to be turned down.

The trial I planned on going to was a four day event and I had intended to be there every day for a few hours at least and all day for the finals. As it turned out I couldn't make the second day and the first one had proved less than inspiring. The third day I knew I could only manage a few hours and almost didn't bother but got back into the swing of it and got a few pictures which were worth having. In particular the one of the dogs watching the action while a human uses her phone, and one of the event being live-streamed which was a cut above the more pedestrian shots I've taken of this subject. This encouraged me to make it for the fourth day. 

 

 

Unfortunately a combination of the heat, it was the hottest day of the four, and a trial where the close range action at the pen and shedding ring was only every half hour or more lead to a lot of slack time.

In truth the dog/sheep action doesn't really fire me up but there wasn't much else to photograph that I haven't photographed before. Maybe the heat had got to me too as I felt lacking in energy. I ended up sitting most of the day out in my car watching the trial and checking the cricket score from Old Trafford.

 

While I might not have been adding much to my documentary archives this last month what I have been doing is playing around at home with artificial light. I think this was really the result of a bout of retail therapy (or gear acquisition syndrome!) had struck me after selling some lenses. My justification for the spending spree was that I wanted to improve the photographs I occasionally take of the fishing rods I make. After much faffing about and buying the wrong stuff I've managed to get close enough to the results I've wanted to achieve.

I'm sure there are many faults in my results but they are only intended to serve as illustrations of what things look like. In truth the people who see them probably couldn't care less about how good or bad the pictures are. Phone snaps would do well enough!

With this new gear I thought I'd try some selfies. I've been reading threads about studio portraiture and lighting on Talkphotography for years now and have always been baffled by the technicalities and underwhelmed by the results. Having always been a 'learning by doing' kind of person I found messing about with the lights and seeing results much easier to understand than being told an understanding of the inverse square law was essential!

Two other things also became apparent. Firstly I like the kind of flat light that the experts seem to despise. Secondly when dramatic/directional light is used it isn't what makes a portrait work. As I keep trying to tell people, good pictures are not all about the light. No matter how good the light is if the subject is rubbish the picture fails. In the case of portraiture it's expression and gesture that are most important, lighting only serves to improve and already good picture.

While I'd quite like to photograph other people using lights I still don't find this kind of formal portraiture all that engaging. I much prefer a documentary/environmental style where the relationship of the person to the location is important. All I need are some opportunities to take that kind of picture. Which is where I struggle.

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Sheep dogs from a new angle

I've been following Damian Bird's project documenting six farms on Dartmoor for some time and eagerly awaiting publication of the promised book having bought and enjoyed his previous book about south coast fishing, Seabird.

With some 500 photographs this hardback book is great value, and makes me wonder at the  prices of some photobooks these days. Maybe they are printed to higher standards? But for a book such as this which is a valuable document of farming at a potentially pivotal point in history 'fine printing' is less important than having a comprehensive visual record.

This is very much a book of no-nonsense documentary photography. Just my kind of photography.

With the coronavirus pandemic spreading and restrictions on social gatherings being more and more strongly advised I thought last Saturday's sheep dog trial might be the last chance for me to do some of my own documentary photography for some time with events such as this being cancelled in teh near future.

I was keen to get to this trial because it was at a new venue. Not just new to me but new to everyone. After almost getting my car stuck in the entrance to the field and parking it somewhere firmer I was glad I made the journey. The field being used had an interesting topography which gave me plenty of variety in the way of angles and backgrounds. The pen and shedding ring were also well within lens range - although for the action shots I still resorted to cropping a number of frames to improve composition. This is something I am becoming less disturbed by. Better to catch the action and crop than miss the action by trying to get the framing right in camera.

Dogs on quads are irresistible subjects. Better still when there is an interesting background. I took quite a few shots using the rise of the land to give me a lower viewpoint without having to bend my knees or kneel down. Things those knees don't take kindly to these days! By altering my position I was able to hide various distractions in the background while still getting the smoke from a chimney in the shot. The closeness of the field to a former mill town was something that I wanted to bring out in some of my pictures.

A good illustration of how the sheep are separated in the shedding ring is something I've been trying to get for ages. usually it's difficult to get a good angle on the ring, but this time I was more fortunate. Some might find the use of plastic bottles to mark out the ring spoils an idealised vision of a rural pursuit, but I like it. I'm more interested in how old pursuits are carried out today than a romanticised view.

Standing down the slope of the field made it easy to get down to sheep and dog level, which again was an aid to making engaging pictures.

There's the inevitable wider selection of pictures here.

While I was concentrated on the trial I did let my eyes wander, as I always do, looking for pictures. When I spotted some Lonk tups in a nearby field I wondered if I could get a picture I've had in mind for ages. A Lonk with a mill town in the background. Better still this town was Haslingden - the former name of the Lonk was the Improved Haslingden! The sheep wouldn't quite play ball and position themselves where I could line up an obviously industrial background, but it was a start. At least the tups weren't skittish and those near the path didn't run away from me.

As I feared the first virus-related event cancellation was announced yesterday. Great Harwood Show at the end of May as been called off. June's Todmorden Show had already been cancelled for financial reasons. This summer could be bleak for a lot of agricultural societies. They'll no doubt find it safer, financially, to cancel early as they are often run on a hand-to-mouth basis with one rain affected show being a threat to their continued existence. I can't see much show photography being done this year.

While I didn't have anything planned until mid-May other than poultry auctions - which I'll now be giving a miss if they take place - I don't know what I will find to take photographs of if I can't get out and about. Months of self portraits? That'll be a last resort!

A mixed bag

Looking back through the last week's pictures I was struck by a seeming eclecticism if categorised by the accepted photographic genres. A bit of street, some landscape, a couple of events. That's not the way I see them. I see them all as attempts to make pictures of whatever is in front of me. And in most cases add to ever growing collections of pictures.

The Sandgrounding project, which has no real focus other than the pictures being taken in Southport, has ups and downs. It's a sort of sandbox for experimentation.

Wandering the local countryside after heavy rain often adds to my Waterlogged collection, although the pictures are quite repetitive.

There's been lots more rain, again, and Friday was no exception. I had wanted to spend the afternoon slowly wending my way to Hawes, idly snapping as I went, to attend the opening of an exhibition. The relentless rain changed my mind. However around three in the afternoon the rain stopped and being bored I changed my mind about stopping home and set off. The conditions weren't too bad until I passed Ingleton and started to climb. From there to Hawes it was low cloud and rain all the way.

One thing I had wanted to photograph, in an anti-landscape way, was the Ribblehead viaduct. I did stop, cross the road from the car park, take two snaps, and retreat. As I'd only taken the Fuji and the Coolpix A my focal lengths were limited. I used the Fuji.

The exhibition I was going to is Teeswater Year - Farm, Fleece, Fashion at the Dales Countryside Museum which I've been to to see photographs at before. I had no time, and not much inclination, to take photos before it went dark and headed straight to the chippy.

The show is mainly over 100 photographs of Teeswater sheep and their breeders taken by MJ Peakman, Melissa, who I've met at a few Yorkshire shows over the last couple of years. There is also fleece based wall and wearable art by Yvonne Le Mare which incorporates Teeswater locks. The whole thing hangs together well in the unusual round gallery.

When not looking at the works I used the Fuji (mostly) to take some photos. Initially I thought it had been my least successful time taking photographs and couldn't see anything that wasn't just a snap. After a good night's sleep things looked a bit better. The camera is sluggish compared to a DSLR and failed to focus quite a few times. Maybe with more practice using it for this sort of thing I'd find out how to overcome that issue, but I don't think that's going to happen!

For once I found face detection to be helpful.

I tried to utilise some flare to make an arty shot of some art.

The lack of a flip down screen became apparent.

It wasn't raining on Saturday morning but I was a bit knackered. However, with the sun shining for a change I made a very late start to go to the sheep dog trial. This proved to be a mistake. It was bitterly cold with a strong wind which buffeted me at times. Then there was a hail/sleet/snow shower! The angle of the sun wasn't ideal and the sheep were uncooperative. As a picture gathering exercise it was pretty much a failure with just a few remakes worth saving. I easily whittled the 200 plus frames down to 40 or so. Most of which could be trashed without any qualms. One more trial and I think it's time to move on.

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Dogs and the 'Tube'

The weather has been putting a dampener on any outdoor activities still. So much so that I was very close to not setting off to the sheep dog auction on |Friday, and as it got wetter and wetter the closer I got I was close to turning back! Once out of the car the rain seemed lighter so I got a camera out and looked for inspiration. It was a long time coming but turned out to be the rain.

The other subject I chose to concentrate on was the dogs. Not running on the field. I'm tired of that. The dogs waiting to go on the field or in the puppy ring.

There was a BBC camera crew in evidence, along with the requisite notice about opting out of having your image used. I tried a couple of approaches to showing this.

The rain eventually sapped my enthusiasm, particularly when it got heavier, so I left early and missed the sale of a dog for a record price. Not that it would have been particularly visually interesting if last year's record is anything to go by. When I got home, after driving through heavy rain and spray I heard there was flooding near where I'd left. cars stuck in flood type flooding. A few more pictures from my short visit here.

My local wanderings have been limited by the rain, and not very fruitful either. There's still pictures to be found though. It's getting time to start pulling some together into a collection I think.

The zine project is almost complete. I got a couple of proofs printed up and it's looking quite coherent. One picture wasn't working and I had nothing suitable to replace it with so I went out for an hour to the reedbed and came away with a new idea (which didn't fit the project) and one frame which I think will serve to fill the gap. The deadline for production isn't for another five weeks or so. Plenty of time for me to tinker with the project and ruin it!

Youtube photography channels mostly drive me nuts and I try to avoid them. Quite why I've been subjecting myself to the torture of watching some lately is beyond my comprehension. What's even worse is that a couple of them have been by landscape photographers, the others street photography orientated. I guess these two genres are popular for the same reason. Their superficially easy to do. First of all there's not much to decide about subject matter. And in the case of street photography there isn't far to go.

What drives me nuts about landscape photography channels is the photographers giving the avice, and they do take the form of tutorials, are average to crap. They either churn out the same old trite stuff that's been appearing in photo mags for as long as I've been looking in them, or they aren't that good! They advice is all about superficial aspects of picture making.

The street photography vids aren't much different. The better ones (I use the term loosely) seem to also repeat the tropes of the genre. In neither of these types of video have  I yet seen any mention of having a message behind the pictures or building a body of work. There's a load of drivel talked about colour and texture, light and composition, but it's all so shallow. Sure the pictures catch the eye. They don't hold my attention though. There's nothing in them to make me want to see them again. It's like a conveyor belt of initially striking but ultimately vacuous images.

Cynical? Me?

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