twitter @mark_twells

I've been pressing shutter buttons for the last 45 years, having started with a Halina 35mm camera processing my own B&W film. I grew up with my Dad doing our own Ektachrome E4 in the kitchen sink, progressing through Jobo drums, expensive chemistry and Cibachrome - and took the plunge in about 2004 to go digital, selling my old Nikon bodies and buying a D50 - rapidly upped to a D200, now a D700. I kept most of my old lenses, and still love them - they're optically much better than the modern things.

Digital in general, and flickr in particular, have re-awakened my interest. Because it doesn't cost me a dollar a shot any more, I take more, and I learn more. Flickr has also replaced those awful old postal critique circles I used to hang around in.

Pictures best viewed as sets - because I do lots of different types of picture.

Amateur Photographer, like nature - landscapes, macros, patterns, textures. Now digital but been taking pictures for years. Mainly Shropshire and N Wales, but do get out elsewhere.

I don't believe in (or do!) a huge amount of digital manipulation: these pics have largely only been cropped, straightened and a bit of adjustment of colour balance. Nothing else.

I do a lot of hillwalking, and enjoy scenic desolation, if I can put it that way. And light.

Usual kit is either a Nikon D700, or a Panasonic GH2 and a tripod