With four siblings, being raised on a farm, we were “close to the animals”

We had freedom of the countryside and spent most of our days playing outside

A variety of art skills run in our family. My mother was particularly well known for her flower arranging talents. However, art was not viewed as a career choice, so it was the business world for me where I had the good fortune for my job to involve travel to USA, China and Europe

My enjoyment of photography began during two years in Canada where the snow and the forest made a great background for images of our four beautiful dogs.

Back in England, I enjoyed expanding my photographic skills at our local camera club.

With the intention gaining a photography degree, I took a foundation course in Art and Design (2014/15), focussing on Fine Art.

Between my art course finishing and my photography course starting, I became very involved in landscaping and gardening on our family farm, which happens to be a beautiful Country Estate with a number of listed buildings. The landscaping took over and I turned down the course a week before my start date.

My enjoyment of photography and art combined and expanded further through my involvement in the online Flickr community where I gained much encouragement and learned about a variety of photographic software programs, opening up a new world of digital art.

My preferred area of interest was in macro photography. Being able to see such small detail, that was generally unseen, is fascinating to me.

In contrast, my landscape gardening is on rather a large scale along a two-thirds mile long drive, where shape, form and colour are important as well as working with the natural land features. I combine the two elements by ensuring the essential elements, of either shape, form and colour are in harmony.

Generally, a photograph is a poor substitute for the experience of seeing the real thing. My digital processing takes on a life of its’ own. I feel like a facilitator for the final image to reveal itself, recreating the feeling I get when enjoying the sight of the wonders of nature.