Canon CPS+ Wildlife Day – Lingfield

     

There are four galleries of images:

General Observations

The Otters

The Foxes

The Squirrels, a Wildcat and Owls 

This was THE trip I had been waiting for in the series of CPS+ Days Canon has been organising, and the tribulations of the M25 disappeared as soon as I arrived at the venue, knowing the forecast for the weather was good and certainly the trip down had not suggested otherwise. Although I felt I had arrived reasonably early, the Registration area was already thronged with photographers in the de rigeur camouflage jackets with long wide aperture lenses equally camouflaged slung over shoulders all chatting in animated conversation. The only faces I recognised all belonged to Canon, I saw no familiar faces amongst the photographers themselves, but that may in fact due to my failing memory!

Upon registration we acquired wristbands designating groups to make the managing of the numbers work smoothly; we also each were given a timetable and a handy notebook and pencil, though with many of us toting either large bulky lenses, monopods/tripods and in some instances more than one camera body, the opportunity to also take notes was slim, but would certainly come in handy in the future.

The initial Introduction was given by Canon’s Frankie Jim who explained how the day was to be organised; a background to the CPS+ scheme and to let us know that the ‘Toy Shop’ was there to provide us with the full range of bodies and lenses with several staff members there to offer any technical help we might need.

      

My group were the first to set off for live action – the first port of call being the otters followed by followed by the foxes, red and black squirrels and a wild cat, after which we returned to the meeting area for coffee, tea and biscuits and the first of two talks by the speakers for the day, Danny Green and Mark Sisson.

The first talk was given by Mark with some excellent images and the stories behind them taken from his travels around the globe. Here was a man versed in the need to create images that could be used by designers with areas of background that were uncluttered by distracting detail to allow for headlines and paragraphs of copy to fill the pages of magazines.

We then broke for a sandwich lunch before going out to the fields to shoot birds; owls, both static and in flight, returning after this to another talk this time from Danny Green, both notably very different in their styles, and both stressed how much care needs to be taken in preparation, and how sometimes getting the shots they needed may have needed several trips before they were satisfied. Both speakers definitely engaged with their audience with much humour and great interest from the audience.

Altogether, a thoroughly enjoyable and rewarding day that was deservedly appreciated by all who attended – my thanks and compliments to Canon for working so hard to make the day successful.

Another Lucky Day at Brogborough!

I had observed that despite the weather forecasters’ reports of total gloom, the afternoons of late had often brought sporadic sunshine. So it was, that once again, I took a chance and headed for the lake at Brogborough as the other item in the weather bulletin was wind, and I had already noted that in that, they were correct.

When I arrived, there were already a fair number of people setting their boards up, and there was a steady trickle of new arrivals as I got my tripod and gimbal head set up. Looking heavenward, I could already see the glimmerings of a sun behind thinning clouds. These slowly developed into distinct gaps in overall cloud cover and although I started shooting in meagre light, for the rest of the time, the sun appeared and then was swapped for dark clouds , giving me a fair chance of a bit of sparkle to the surfers’ bow waves.

I set up a position where I had at least a chance of sunlight illuminating my subjects and for the first half of my time lakeside there was a steady stream of surfers taking to the water, but not much jumping taking place, but later the situation improved, but they were often in the distance and mostly I was behind them, but every so often I was treated to frontal shots, but several took place when I was following a different person and caught only the tail end of the action. My lack of knowledge as to when someone might attempt to jump did not help my overall statistics, but I was not bereft of luck.

Definitely using the gimbal head this time and with the 150-600mm Tamron lens on the 5D MkIII was a good move, but using the tripod on a slippery slope did have its drawbacks and the wind was doing its best to ensure I had to reset the level of the tripod fairly often.

I was reasonably satisfied with the outcome, but I did still have to rely on cropping in post processing to get a reasonable size of many of the more interesting pictures as much happened in the far distance, making some of the shots look as if the participants were actually running out of space and heading directly for the far shore, such was the foreshortening effect of the long lens and crop combined!

Brogborough – A Chance Visit

Working on the probability that a keen Windsurfer would likely drop everything for a good wind and sunshine at this time of year, I took a similar gamble, as I had both when I left Caddington, and it was not too far north, and very open at Brogborough. As I neared the exit from the M1, I began to think I was on a losing streak as there were some ominous clouds that seemed headed towards the lake.

I pulled into the car park and there was still some sunshine, but by the time the camera was on the tripod, it began to look as if I had the wind, but not its counterpart, the sun. I got in a few shots before the rain came and I needed to cover the camera and lens with a groundsheet, but my trusty bungee was still back in another camera bag at base.

Fellow photographer Barry Rivett, came to the rescue with one  from his car, and it gave me a chance to shoot despite the rain, but the wind and rain got up so much that I had to concede defeat and retire to the Portakabin and shelter. This was a tactical retreat not a rout, and I was back out and blessed with the sun from then till my subjects came in from exhaustion.

My gamble had paid off with some quite reasonable shots for my trouble.

Canon Landscape Day at Beaulieu

The trip around the M25 to reach the M3 on Tuesday was one of the slowest on record for me. I had allowed an extra half-hour for traffic and an equal amount to allow me to arrive early, and only just managed to make it with five minutes to spare. Not an auspicious start!

On the bright side, literally, the weather was wonderful for this time of year, and I did not consider it cold, the parking and meeting up with the welcomers was excellent; the red umbrellas were only needed for recognition, not for fending off British weather for a change. It was suggested could leave our kit in the vehicles to walk to the Treehouse, but with the benefit of hindsight I could have popped a memory card into my pocket. It was interesting to note that the walk to the Treehouse was obviously to inform us that Landscape Photography was always going to involve some trekking; we were not going to expect to take such images by casually leaning out of a car window – an interesting subliminal message to presage the talks to follow.

On this walk I met two other attendees, and upon arrival we were met by another who had stepped out of his car to ask where the venue was, and there was no way we were going to let him think he could park up and just walk in, when we had just made the trip on foot, which gave us a giggle! There was no place to park here I hasten to add.

After a gathering for tea or coffee we headed for the room for the talks, this time for me taking the route via the rope walkway; I am not sure my traverse helped others feel particularly well-balanced and I was reminded of that movie of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge.

The two talks with a break between for food and drinks were both excellently delivered with some magnificent examples of David Noton’s work and his tales and reminiscences from his colleague Jon Gooding were well chosen to illustrate the amount of preparation and understanding of his subject that had gone into what sometimes had been only moments when the scenes could have been captured and present their beauty. Both talks were illuminating and humourous and were much appreciated by the audience whose numerous questions showed their keenness to learn more from this extremely talented yet self-effacing photographer and good speaker.

After queuing to borrow from the vast array of both camera bodies and lenses and in my case to take a brief look at a pre-production EOS7D MkII we set off back to our vehicles for the journey to Pigbush our location for the afternoon. Both David and Jon took small groups to discuss filters and techniques, and a few split up to put their newly-acquired knowledge into practice. I had chosen to borrow a Tilt-Shift lens and a body, both of which were unfamiliar, and this resulted in my missing a rainbow which appeared in the scene I was trying to capture, illustrating the necessity of understanding one’s kit – I promptly decided to continue using kit I knew intimately and the few pictures I subsequently took were a personal disappointment.

However I learned a lot and found the day rewarding despite my personal poor performance. In handing back the borrowed equipment, I also managed to have a chat with Frankie Jim from canon, who was able to tell what fault had developed in my 300mm lens which I had hoped to have delivered for repair. The journey back though not speedy was a vast improvement over the journey down.

Afternoon at Wrest Park

Andy Fox and I had arranged to meet up in the afternoon to pay a photographic visit to Wrest Park. Sadly, I had some computer-related grief that meant I was running extremely late and had to apologise for my delayed departure because it meant we both missed some of the better sunshine. We gathered our kit and headed into the grounds, with Andy giving me background history as we went.

One of the first small statues was of the Gryphon a symbol of the past owners, the de Greys, and the light on it set it off a treat, but before I could dig out the camera, the moment was lost, and a look at the sky suggested it would be a while before the clouds broke again, so I moved into the gardens to capture some of the flowers in the ornamental beds, but hurried back to the Gryphon when the sun broke cover.

We each took shots to our own plans, yet often had to await the right lighting, or for the few visitors to either appear in the right spot or simply walk out of view, at one time we were close enough for us both to fire our shutters simultaneously and we laughed because we had both waited for a particular woman to pass behind a bush! Andy is a wealth of pertinent knowledge, and this meant that in our waiting moments he would keep me informed of some of the history or regale me with tales of his family visits to certain spots. As we headed through the formal gardens towards the Archer Pavilion, I learned of its beginnings as a Hunting Lodge, and I kept stopping as I waited for the building to be lit by the sun, or tried to record the reflections in the still waters of the ornamental ponds.

The de Greys it seemed were very fond of statues, and one in particular caught my eye, and I was lucky with the shading of clouds beyond it in different directions. Eventually we arrived at the pavilion and I was most impressed by its construction with its upper floor bedrooms accessed by stairs, and how their oriel windows were interleaved with those of the main central area, the inside of the dome was also beautifully decorated and the trompe-l’oeil work just below was nicely done.

Our time there was all too short, and we had no time to enter the house itself, but it was a good afternoon spent in good company. I think we were a week late for the best of the flowers however.

Birds of Prey Near Lilley

(Somehow this item, did not make it initially to the Web,  sorry)

I had recorded the Japanese Grand Prix at Suzuka so that I did not have to wait till the evening for the scheduled highlights as I was hoping for an exciting race and an outcome that would extend the Championship lead for Lewis Hamilton by a greater margin than his mere three points that had simply made up for all the bad luck that had bedevilled him. The six o’clock live time was a non-starter, but a delay to a more manageable morning time was my intention, as I still wanted to be out for what might be the last good sunshine of autumn, so I had my breakfast in front of the screen.

The race was exciting barring the two forced waits due to the Phanfone Typhoon’s close pass, but after the result, there was a very downbeat atmosphere due to the tragic accident that befell Jules Bianchi who had aquaplaned at high speed off the circuit and crashed heavily into the very solid vehicle that had been removing the crashed car of Adrian Sutil from the previous lap. All the joy of the race was washed away by this sad incident. I sincerely hope that Jules can recover from his injuries, so my thoughts are with him and all his family and friends in the motor racing fraternity.

After that it was time I gathered my cameras and set off for Tea Green and Lilley Bottom in the hope of photographing red kite, and buzzards. I had spotted a kestrel hovering with intent by the end of Luton’s runway, but by the time I was out of the car, it had moved on! And again when I was on my way down Stony Lane past Tea Green, I spotted a red kite, but again once out of the car with the camera, it had departed for Lilley. I waited awhile, but in vain, so I then turned right at the bottom and drove along Lilley Bottom Lane till I could park below some woods where I knew from past visits the red kite frequented.

It was here that I met a couple of ramblers coming from the other woods and we walked over the road together chatting, and whilst climbing the hill we were graced by the presence of two soaring kite, and I got a couple of shots, we parted, and I thanked them for bring me those birds and asked could they order me a buzzard or two, as we parted and they headed into the woods – they were as good as their word for not two minutes later a couple of buzzards came a-circling, followed later by a female kestrel.

There followed a lull in avian activity, so I then entered the woods, and over into the far valley where I came across a man painting the fence around the cottage known as Butler’s Cottage, next to the Pilkington Estate’s Workshop; we chatted a while and I took a few shots there before returning the way I came, back to my car.

Another Visit to Marsworth's Wildlife

Rather than stay glued to a monitor for the meagre need to do so, and with the autumnal weather due to end imminently, I headed once again for Marsworth, one of the Tring reservoirs. Not unnaturally the area was quiet, with only a few anglers, dog, buggy and children walkers to be seen. Hearing frantic wing flapping behind me I turned just in time to catch a pair of Mallards just as they landed.

When I had settled and set up my camera on a well-strapped and supported monopod, the first observation I made was that dragonflies were still in abundance, and one coupled pair came my way frequently, but on one visit I noticed that the pair were constantly jigging up and down and eventually I twigged what was happening, it would appear that the male (for that was my impression the forward partner to be) was trying to shake the female free, but it was more than that; as far as I could tell as he was diving down he was dashing the female against a small rock jutting from the water, and although difficult to see, this is what I have tried to show in the shots in the gallery.

Later I spotted what I think was a great spotted woodpecker which landed on a high dead branch, and I just barely had the time to open up three full stops as it was against bright white clouds, before it departed as swiftly as it had arrived; it did not return. A Blue tit arrived slightly lower shortly after, seemingly mimicking the woodpecker’s stance! There followed a series of dragonflies which I was unable to capture in flight, but occasionally they landed just within later-cropping distance.

The Robin from the far shore looked less dishevelled than had been the case in my earlier encounters, and the Grey Wagtail made a brief  visit, my patience however was not rewarded by any visiting Kingfishers, but I did manage a couple of shots when I was paid a fleeting visit by a Heron atop the far trees.

On my return walk I got a shot of a Grebe in the late afternoon sun, a Swan heading for shore and an angler who caught three small fish whilst I was watching another Heron that seemed to have his beady eye on a possible catch, but despite waiting in the hope it might be successful, it appeared it was no to be. I walked on returning to the car and home.

Marsworth and a Grey Wagtail

After an early start and a comprehensive cleaning of the house for a viewing mid morning, I just felt I needed to be outside and taking pictures, it was also warming up, with the sun beginning to show, so though I would have been better being at the reservoir much earlier, I took a chance on my getting some meaningful images nevertheless.

Tringford lake had but one angler afloat on the still water, and the level was much lower than on my last visit. As it was a few days since it had rained the woods where the stream entered Startops were dry underfoot, so I chanced  a quiet approach through the undergrowth in case any herons or egrets were on the dry shore, but all I spooked were some waders and ducks. I returned to the path and headed alongside Marsworth lake and the Grand Union Canal, and settled to wait.

Though in all the hours I was there, I only spotted a lone kingfisher in a flyby, I was visited by a squirrel, a heron overflew atop the trees and either an otter or mink gave me a brief visit, but I was twice graced by a lone Grey Wagtail in beautiful condition, and very twitchy. Naturally, collar doves and wood pigeons were noisily around, and my sleek robin only flew over once to the obvious interest to a plump and dishevelled specimen that inhabits the bush on the far shore. I found this slightly surprising as an earlier visitor visitor to the same spot as myself had poured a good amount of seeds for our regular.

When I finished and retraced my steps to the car, the early evening light on a narrowboat moored in the canal caught my eye, so I grabbed a quick shot of that scene.

Very Speedy Visit to Discovery Centre

I thought that since it was Wednesday and the weather was clement, I would take a quick visit to the gardens in the Stockwood Discovery Centre. As I set off I had no idea just how brief it was likely to be.

I had come to the junction and was about to turn right on to the main road when my mobile phone rang; I hastily pulled into the bus stop lay-by and answered – it was BBC Three Counties Radio.

Sarah Jenkins was at the other end of the line and asked whether I might be able to contribute to a phone-in this very afternoon, on the subject of the morality involved in retouching women in advertisements that would be promoting the idea that all young girls should be size zero stick insects, if they ever hoped to look beautiful and attractive, and she even said someone had commented that retouching should become a criminal offence!

She asked a little bit about me and asked whether I had actually done any retouching of that nature, to which I replied that I had retouched photos of numerous actresses and personalities for other photographers and publishers, but not to specifically alter their bodies to conform to skinny and tall, as opposed to natural. I briefly mentioned a few subjects to establish that I could genuinely respond from my experience and said I would be happy to be contacted by the Roberto Perrone Show at 3pm.

I now had even less time to reach the gardens, take some photos and return to get a gallery of them up on the blog! An irony was that as I had set off initially, the wind was chilly so I dived back in to pick up and put on a sweater. Arriving at the centre, the wind had died and the sun was gaining strength and as I went around, I became quite hot and sticky, but I did mention to two gardeners: Jan and Bridey whom I meet there that I was taking part in the phone in, and let on what the subject was – I am not totally without vanity!

I rushed around hurriedly and as I was leaving one of the two, Bridey was sitting in the shade of an arbour unbeknown to me and I heard a familiar voice say: "I think someone maybe in a bit of a hurry!" I turned around, chuckled and grabbed two more shots before I reached the exit.

Although some shots had variants, I used all but one image and the number precisely completed the grid, so no waste, I felt reasonably pleased with the result and had started on the processing as the phone call came through at three o'clock.

Maybe Only a Few on the Brogborough Lake…

The lack of wind and a weak sun meant that few turned up to do any windsurfing this afternoon, but I needed to check out using the monopod with a larger ball head, and try to improve upon the shots I first took of the windsurfers using this new Tamron 150-600mm lens.

Having used the 5D MkIII and this lens entirely handheld at Goodwood, because even the monopod would have been too much of a burden, here was a chance to see whether a larger ballhead than the standard Manfrotto one would be an improvement. When I found where the windsurfers were going to be, I realised it would be way too distant from the clubhouse shore, so decided to drive to the far side of the lake, park up and trek back through the woods till I could locate a safe way down the foreshore.

I found just such a spot, but I soon realised I was still too far off and had a very restricted view, so I walked even further till I came to a break in the cover. This time I was very much higher and would still have to move from side to side to keep clear of the trees, but I was a lot closer and when the pale sun came out, it was a benefit. I will make a note of this location for the future.

I think I managed a few rather nice shots, so the trip was worthwhile, and the Acrotec head on the Manfrotto monopod proved to be a good combination, and a lot less strain than handholding and way less weight than a tripod.

The Goodwood Revival Meeting 2014

(Clicking the header just leads to the Goodwood Trophy Race)

The Full Links List is at the bottom of the text

I was thrilled to be invited once again to the Goodwood Revival Meeting. This time I chose to invite my elder daughter to the join me for the Saturday. We had hoped that both her partner and my younger daughter and son-in-law would be joining us, but they were too late in booking and found that all tickets had sold out due to the popularity of the event.

Catherine and I got ourselves sorted in the Car Park, and headed in, but failed to take adequate notice of where the car was located, which was to prove a problem at the end of the day!

We visited our designated enclosure which has a great vantage point to watch the exit from the Chicane, and settled to watch and photograph the cars as they headed towards us. The first race we watched was for the Goodwood Trophy. Fairly early on, car 27, a light blue Maserati V8RI driven by Josef Otto Rattenmaier started to spin, and I managed to capture  a sequence of shots as he spun through 180 degrees, before completing the full 360 without hitting anything, or being hit!

I gather photographer Jeff Bloxham is known affectionately as the 'Crash Magnet' well I seem to be similarly afflicted, because as I continued watching the Goodwood Trophy Race, Rob Huff driving a light blue Parnell-MG car number 17, found himself in a spin on the exit, close in front of car number 3, an Alfa Romeo Tipo B, driven by Stephan Rattenmaier who was unable to avoid being taken off towards the tyre wall immediately in front of us. The car rode up the wall and overturned, trapping the driver beneath the upturned vehicle; track marshals and a couple of spectators who climbed over the fence, joined forces to attempt to lift the heavy car enough to get the trapped driver out. Fortunately, this was speedily accomplished and the extricated driver walked from the scene, seemingly none the worse for wear. About four or five years back a similar crash occurred in the same spot, but that driver was less fortunate receiving several cuts to his face and head.

Although we did venture elsewhere we returned to this area for several of the races; the Pits were far too crowded to afford us a reasonable viewpoint to take photos. Once again, this year I did visit the Earls Court Motor Show, which Catherine thoroughly enjoyed as she dreamed of owning several of the cars on display within! I always enjoy the challenge of taking photos of the cars and some of their design details in such low light levels and without any flash.

The Aircraft that displayed were the World War Two Spitfires, Hurricane, a Mustang P51, a German fighter, and the two Lancasters; one of which was the one that had taken the long haul flight via Iceland from its base in Canada, and a Canberra and two Hawker Hunter twin-seat trainers.

A friend of longstanding, Simon Diffey, provided added interest in two of the races, driving a Bugatti Type 51 for entrant, Richard Collier in the Goodwood Trophy Race, and his own Formula Ford 20 in the Chichester Cup. It is a shot of him driving the Bugatti that heads this piece.

The galleries are organised by race and incidentals which cover some of the aircraft flight displays.

Click the individual names below for their Gallery Links:

Goodwood Trophy
Chichester Cup
St Mary's Trophy Part 1
Barry Sheene Memorial Trophy
Shelby Cup
Lavant Cup
Whitsun Trophy
Incidentals

Warm September at Tring Reservoirs

Had the wind been stronger, and Windsurfers been on the water at Brogborough, I would have headed north and tried to improve upon the shots I took on my last visit, but a call to Sam Barnes forewarned me that no one was on the lake, so I went south to Tring reservoirs, in the hope that despite it being afternoon I might catch sight of kingfishers.

I did catch sight of a pair, but they were in Exocet mode; theirs was a non-stop flight, so any chance of capturing them was a non-starter. I did however spend a while at Tringford with the Water Bailiff as he mended anchor ropes and checked for leaks and rotting boards as I concentrated on taking shots of dragonflies in flight as they were in good supply.

Heading past Startops End I cautiously approached a heron, alongside a couple of egrets, but he took off before I was close and spooked both egrets, though I did manage to capture both in flight, later I was to see two robins, one familiar friend a very sleek and well-groomed one, and a slightly chubbier one, also a blue tit and what I think were spotted flycatchers. I was also visited by a squirrel on two occasions, as well as a flock of Canada Geese with two Greylags along for the flight.

So a reasonably satisfactory afternoon's shooting.

Tall Ships – Island Gardens

Colin Bowles, a fellow photographer and I met up to travel to London to see what we could capture of the Tall Ships that had arrived at Greenwich from Falmouth, via the Isle of Wight.

We parked in the Westfield Centre so we could use the DLR from Stratford to reach Island Gardens, the last stop before Greenwich, since we felt we would be in the best position to get shots of even the moored craft. In the early part of the morning the one missing ingredient was sunshine. Also we found only four vessels moored up, just across from us, in front of the Old Royal Naval College, Greenwich.

Upriver from us was moored the vast floating town, the Cruise Ship, Europa, which was soon approached by a Fire tug as it loosed its moorings to depart. We had walked out of the DLR station across the road, passing the entrance to the Foot Tunnel to Greenwich, before finding ourselves a spot by the railings. To give myself a solid platform to support my camera and long lens (once again the Tamron 150-600mm!), I extended the monopod to the ground, and fastened a bungee tightly to these railings, and set the camera in the quick release adapter and adjusted the height to suit my eye-level. I then slung the other body with my standard zoom lens around my neck; I was ready for most situations now.

Colin reminded me of the ball dropping at midday, but in fact it was one o'clock, and we were unsure whether that was Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) or British Standard Summer Time (BST) – turns out it was 1pm BST! But we set alarms for each hour from 11.00 BST, and due to our chatting, very nearly missed the crucial correct time! Fortunately, a man nearby who had learned that we intended to capture this event, broke in to remind us of the time, just as it began its slow climb to the top of its pole!

The mist slowly dispersed, but the sun was vary late to arrive, but there was quite a lot of more general activity, including the arrival of the Royal Barge, that had carried the Queen and Prince Philip on the occasion of her Sixtieth Anniversary – there were rowers, but that was for show, as it gently motored against the tide! The public soon began to fill the space at the railings, and we learned that many of the Tall Ships were moored elsewhere, at the O2 Arena and Canary Wharf, though soon they began to arrive between us and Greenwich, though sadly not under full sail, so not as regal as offshore at the Isle of Wight or Falmouth.

We broke off for a snack lunch under the trees in the park, before I gathered my gear and began walking beyond the gardens in an easterly direction, and as we set off the sun finally burned off some of the cloud cover to give us a pale blue sky, and it became warmer.

Along the way we met and chatted to other members of the public and at one stage were hailed with: "Aren't you going to photograph an Eighty-Nine-Year-old Man on his Birthday?" I turned around and fired off a shot as I replied, "Certainly!" Then turned the camera around to show them the shot and handed the trio a card so that they could view it once I had created the gallery – they were thrilled.

A short while later, a bit further along the path, we spotted a female beachcomber, and I soon managed a shot or two as she searched the foreshore, as we came along that part of the beach she had come back up to the path,so we were able to enquire as to what she had found, and I was able to own up to taking photos, with ease as the husband said: "We spotted you earlier, and said I think that chap is photographing my wife!" It was said with such charm, I took the opportunity to show all three of that party just what I had captured. The lady had been collecting portions of bricks and tiles with French names moulded in the fragments, and before we parted finally and headed back to the DLR, we both helped to add to her collection.

We got directions from the husband to Crossharbour and took our return trip to Stratford and home, having had a thoroughly enjoyable day by the river.

Long-lensed Flowers at Stockwood Discovery Centre

I took a chance on the weather and collecting the Tamron 150-600mm and a monopod, set off to see how practical it would be taking photos at the Stockwood Discovery Centre Gardens.

I did find that there were fewer natural scenes to hand, because the flowers there were in a fair profusion and often closely packed, but here and there I was able to isolate one or two, and occasionally groups that hitherto I would have ignored. Now such shots made sense because of the flattening effect of using the lens at the maximum extension of 600mm.

But it was very cumbersome trying to support the lens using the monopod, especially for portrait shots, but it was rewarding as the separation from the background made for a different style of image from those I might take on a macro lens to separate the flower from its background.

I did also bring along the 24-105mm lens to capture some of the other subjects that came my way, especially in the greenhouse.

The conclusions I am drawing from the use of this long zoom lens is that it is very versatile, and will be used far more than I had initially envisaged, and I definitely have no regrets in making the purchase.

Stapleton Hall Road and Mount View

It was a warm and brightish day in North London on both the Saturday and Sunday, Saturday gave me a few flowers in the garden where I was staying, and the Sunday gave me a chance to take a walk up Stapleton Hall Road then along to the end of its continuation, Mount View.

The idea behind taking the long zoom lens on the walk was to capture possibly the London city skyline, but although I did take some shots in that direction, it was shrouded in haze, whereas to the north there were views of Alexander Palace, occasionally to be seen in sunlight, so much of the walk was spent looking at flowers in the gardens that line the long road.

But with a lens of 600mm, the flower shots were different, often giving a wonderfully soft background to isolate the main image, but correspondingly harder to capture than when working with 90 or 100mm macro, and the slightest breeze meant waiting for the flowers to settle, which sometimes meant the sun disappearing!

It was very apparent just how heavy the combination of Canon 5D MkIII, 150-600mm Tamron and a monopod becomes and in the warmth you can certainly work up a sweat! It was however very rewarding.