Landscape Photography – A Personal View

Still enjoying the short journey home over the hills from Felindre, the local Welsh landscape is beautiful and it’s got nothing to do with the current good weather, honest!

My work over the years has taken me all over South Wales and although this has meant a lot of driving, it has also given me the opportunity to see different aspects of the landscape in all sorts of conditions. Whether it is local or more distant, you have to be there to really appreciate it. Photography can do only so much. Artists can capture moods of a scene with which you can best identify if you have been there or somewhere like it.

I do not describe the photography I do as landscape photography. Although much of it involves the landscape, the photography I do for StillWalks, I describe as environmental – natural and man-made. If you google landscape photography, you will be presented with any amount of spectacular photographs produced by a range of more or less well known photographers who have done all the “right” things in terms of framing the shot and finding the right angle, waiting for the light, etc.

Some of the scenes from around the world (both near and far) are truly amazing . . . yes, there is a but coming . . . but, some of the shots I see seem to me to be almost unreal or super-real, a bit like photo-realism in painting – it’s almost beyond belief. It seems as though there is no texture in the scenes and texture is something I am interested in, no doubt due to my other life as a tapestry weaver. It may be that in these textureless images, there has been some over-use of pixel smoothing techniques but I know of one photographer who does not make this mistake, if it can be called that.

Victor Rakmil is a photographer whose work I greatly admire and he writes an excellent blog much of which I would entirely agree with and learn from regarding technique. Take a look to see the texture that remains in his landscape scenes as well as the other photographic genres he covers.

I took the shots below on my way home over some of the lower lying Welsh hills. It was a hot a hazy day and for me, give a true (photographic) representation of the landscape as it was at that time in those conditions. Tomorrow I’ll have some more!

These and more photos can be seen and purchased at StillWalks PhotoShelter.

Bont Hills Bont Hills

Valleys Regional Park – Aberdulais Falls Water Wheel

This week I spent two days at the Valleys Regional Park Community Tourism Conference. Included in the conference were a choice trips to various tourist sites in the South Wales valleys.

Aberdulais Falls I have passed this so many times over the years but not, until now, actually visited. It’s a fascinating place but if you would like to see the falls, you’ll have to come back tomorrow! The first thing I looked at was this iron staircase set against the rocks. I guess it is my interest in metal that led me from this to the water wheel and my interest in field recording that prompted me to record the changing sound of the water as it was channelled to the wheel with the falls in the background.

IMG_7524 Aberdulais Falls Water Wheel

Aberdulais Falls Water Wheel

Aberdulais Falls Water Wheel

Aberdulais Falls Water Wheel

Before and After

As a follow up to yesterday’s post, I have to report a change to one of my favourite locations, namely the old St Teilo’s Churchyard.

St Teilo's Churchyard

St Teilo's Churchyard - Before

St Teilo's Churchyard - After

St Teilo's Churchyard - After

Something is missing!

St Teilo's Churchyard - Previously

St Teilo's Churchyard - Previously

It won’t look like this in the Summer anymore! I am very glad my StillWalk of the churchyard features it in this happier state rather than the current state. These large, well established trees were cut down in order to renovate a wall. :-/

Sunny Sunday and Week 5 Marsh Wood Birds

At last – sunshine in amongst all the drizzle and mist in South Wales. It’s a couple of days ago now and, of course, we were straight back to the drizzle on Monday but the memory remains.

Saturday was at least dry and allowed me to get out to record week 5 of the birds down at the marsh woods. Listen to the clip below. This is a 2 minute clip but I could have sat and listened through the cans for a lot more than the 7 minutes of the full clip. Remember, if you’re reading this in an email, you’ll have to click the title above or the http link at the bottom to see the full blog entry with sound clips . . . or you could click the comment button.

And then in the woods the birds were arguing over territory again – or was it food? The two things guaranteed to make birds or humans argue. Listen below.

Marshes

Marshes

Robin

This Robin's keeping an eye on me

Old Railway Track

Old railway track through the woods

Sunday AM

At last, a bright day. At least for today there would be no SAD. I took a walk down to the old St Teilo’s Churchyard and had to take my coat off in the warmth – I love this place and have done a StillWalks there, a Summer sample of which you can see here – Old Churchyard Walk. Here are a few pics from Sunday AM.

Marsh Grasses

Marsh Grasses

St Teilo's Churchyard

St Teilo's Churchyard

St Teilo's Churchyard

St Teilo's Churchyard

River loughor

River Loughor - Down on the Marshes

Sunday PM

With the sun still shining, a trip to Cardiff was called for to take Ellen back to Uni – she had come down to Swansea to go and see the National Dance Company of Wales (NDCWales) at the Taliesin Arts Centre with us. They were awesome 🙂 Anyway, not wanting to waste the sunshine, we had a walk in Roath Park and got a cuppa in the cafe there. We were reminded what a popular place it is . . . with birds and people alike. Whoops! How did I manage to miss both people and birds off these shots – I wouldn’t have thought it possible lol. The sound clips at the bottom prove they were there though.

Roath Park

Roath Park

Roath Park Crocuses

Roath Park Crocuses

Roath Park

Roath Park

Remember, if you’re reading this in an email, you’ll have to click the title above or the http link below to see the full blog entry with sound clips . . . or you could click the comment button.