View allAll Photos Tagged APpicoftheweek

For more black & white photography, visit www.monochromeframes.com — where I occasionally ramble about photos, places, and the odd historical rabbit hole.

Lost in an unfamiliar section of woodland. I turned back…

Bee-eater, Merops apiaster. 27 May 2022. Bulgaria.

 

Please contact me to arrange the use of any of my images. They are copyright, all rights reserved.

ICM sunset

#appicoftheweek

Bee-eaters, Merops apiaster. 27 May 2022. Bulgaria.

 

Please contact me to arrange the use of any of my images. They are copyright, all rights reserved.

Watching me all the way and finally it flew off - male kestrel.

The tree now looks to be in full leaf, very different from last month. Still no idea what the crop is.

A classic image to represent Spring. It's not the easiest task to find an accessible rapeseed field as I first thought, and not always the easiest to photograph. I quite like the contrast of the blue sky against the yellow rapeseed, as long as the light isn't too harsh. This was taken with a 10 stop ND filter, which was mainly to get some motion in the clouds, but I ended up also liking the motion of the rapeseed blowing in the wind.

Glasshouse and vegetable garden.

RHS Hyde Hall, Essex UK

Nice and empty early on a Sunday.

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House on the edge of Rutland water just before the rain started. shoot with long exposure.

Volcanic rocks stretching out into the Atlantic - no characteristic blue in the water on this day - sky saturated with Calima (Sahara sand)

 

Flowers, puffins - who could ask for more?

Not quite as much fog as predicted but by the 3rd day we really got it. Lasted beyond noon. This is a favourite area of mine in Epping Forest with a mix of ancient beech with younger silver birch.

Raspberry and Lemonade Cupcake on a plate with raspberrys.

Part of my 'Duffus Castle through the seasons' project.

 

The castle is situated on the Laich of Moray, a fertile plain that was once the swampy foreshore of Spynie Loch. This was originally a more defensive position than it appears today, long after the loch was drained.

 

The motte is a huge man-made mound, with steep sides and a wide ditch separating it from the bailey. The whole site is enclosed by a water-filled ditch, which is more a mark of its boundary than it is a serious defensive measure.

Duffus Castle was built by a Flemish man named Freskin, who came to Scotland in the first half of the 1100s. After an uprising by the ‘men of Moray’ against David I in 1130, the king sent Freskin north as a representative of royal authority.

 

He was given the estate of Duffus, and here he built an earthwork-and-timber castle. Freskin’s son William adopted the title of ‘de Moravia’ – of Moray. By 1200, the family had become the most influential noble family in northern Scotland, giving rise to the earls of Sutherland and Clan Murray.

In about 1270, the castle passed to Sir Reginald Cheyne the Elder, Lord of Inverugie. He probably built the square stone keep on top of the motte, and the curtain wall encircling the bailey. In 1305, the invading King Edward I of England gave him a grant of 200 oaks from the royal forests of Darnaway and Longmorn, which were probably used for the castle’s floors and roofs.

 

By 1350, the castle had passed to a younger son of the Earl of Sutherland through marriage. It may have been then that the keep was abandoned, possibly because it was beginning to slip down the mound, and a new residence established at the north of the bailey.

 

Viscount Dundee, leader of the first Jacobite Rising, dined in the castle as a guest of James, Lord Duffus in 1689, prior to his victory against King William II’s government forces at Killiecrankie. Soon after, Lord Duffus moved to the nearby Duffus House. The castle quickly fell into decay.

 

I'm putting a lot of content online during lockdown. If you're enjoying it and would like to buy me a coffee and can afford to, please do!....

Buy me a drink here- www.buymeacoffee.com/tommcpherson

  

Fishing boats waiting on the shingle shore at Aldeburgh in suffolk. From a great workshop I attended one on one with Justin Minns

#appicoftheweek

Lesser Stichwort A wildflower that forms low clumps amongst grasses.

When I was driving down Snake Pass I saw the fog moving through Lady Clough Forest and had to pull over into a lay-by to grab a shot.

farm across the fields with line of poppies

At south landing, Flamborough

From a day out at Paradise Wildlife Park, Broxbourne, UK taken from the walkway above the new lion enclosure.

Here's the thing with roses. You plant them (under your wife's supervision in my case), nurture them, then wait. And watch. And even though it's your garden and you should remember where everything is you still get surprises...

 

10 of my rose shots are printed and adorn our walls. Now we're gonna need to find another space...

 

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I pretty much nailed the exposure SOOC. There were some blemishes and little background distractions removed, then a small shadows adjustment. And there’s a faint vignette, all to better reflect what you’re now looking at.

A view through one of the tiny windows at one end of the shipping container to the other... sounds accompany the display (sirens and voices) and the lights flicker and and intensify from time to time... quite eerie but fascinating.

 

Happy Saturday!

Don't know if this activity was down to Storm Ciara but it got quite wild off the northern coast of Tenerife yesterday. Even had to put a jumper on.

Virginia City Nevada.

In God We Trust…

1976 USA Bicentennial 2 dollar bill. I was living in that wonderful country back then.

 

Experimentation in handheld lighting and WB, sort of a sepia effect? Well, kind of… A green glow certainly which doesn’t trouble me at all.

From the Richard Harvey Studio One.

A modification of an earlier image - mycena (bonnets) festooning a dead beech stump in Epping Forest.

Field in the morning sun light

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