From White Peak Walk to Darkroom Course

Yesterday Jan and I walked from Elton near Wirksworth to Robin Hoods Stride, Lathkill Dale from Youlgreave to Middleton, Long Dale and Grattan Dale back to Elton. About 11 miles in total in 5 hours.

I didn't take the camera as my bad back needs looking after. Lots of photos that I would have taken if I had one though, so will go back another time for photos.

Grattan Dale was interesting. About a foot or so of water in the bottom of the dale as the trail follows the river. No trail in places made it interesting. Mostly dry and sunny, just a few spots of rain around lunch time.

Today I'm running a darkroom course for Warren from Hong Kong, his second course with me. Starting anytime now.

Tomorrow I walk to the Gallery in the Gardens in Buxton for a day running the Gallery. Trying to improve fitness for walking from Shap to Danby Wiske along Wainwright Coast to Coast from Tuesday to Saturday next week with good friend Al from Gloucester.

Wet and Dry in the Peak District

Heavy showers in the Peak District. Also some good spells of sunshine.

Jan's sister Lynne and husband Peter were staying the weekend so went for walk to 3 Shire Heads. Much less water at the falls than 2 weeks ago.

Then on to Church Inn in Chelmorton. Tonight we walked over Eccles Pike to Old Hall Inn to meet Rob and Annie. Heavy rain on way as well as good rainbows.

Photo taken on Samsung Galaxy S2 mobile. Too colourful for my proper camera!

Olympic Badger Race

Tonight we had a very enjoyable evening with best friends Rob and Annie. It involved Snecklifter at the Shepherd's in Whaley, a very nice meal on their canal boat, a couple of pints of Landlord at the Navigation, followed by a brisk walk over the hill to get home, in the dark.

As Jan and I were walking home we heard a clicking noise behind.Before we could work it out a badger raced past us going uphill, it's claws clicking against the tarmac. Obviously racing home to see the end of the London Olympics opening ceremony!

Great Dome Art Fair in Buxton

The Great Dome Art Fair is on this weekend, Sat 21st and Sun 22nd July 2012, 10am to 4.30pm, free entry, in the Buxton Devonshire Dome. The venue is spectacular, with one of the largest unsupported domes in Europe, bigger than St Paul's. Very strange acoustics though. You have to be very careful what you say or someone on the other side of the building can hear every word!

We have a large stand with several hundred photographs from £5 to £270 as well as my 3 books on offer.

I have just received a small allocation of a new calendar of my photographs; Cities of the World 2013. This is only available in North America but I have 9 copies available at £15 each. It actually has 13 photographs as it has 1 extra image for the 4 months from Sept to Dec 2012, so it's a 16 month calendar. If you would like one come to the fair and pick one up; I won't be getting any more. The only other way to get one is to buy from a bookseller in the USA or Canada.

New London Photos

I have also added several more London photos from our trip in April (coincided with the London Marathon). For the next month they will be in the Recently Added Gallery but here is the permanent link to photos of London.

Here are a few examples:

New Moon Pub in Leadenhall Market

London New City Hall and Tower Bridge at Night

Gherkin from Mitre Street

Bank of England and Bus

Leeds Arcades and Canal - New Images

I have added some new images to my web site from our trip to Leeds at the end of April. They include some of the arcades, the canal and a night shot from an airy viewpoint above Eastgate. There are a few more on the web site on the Recently Added Gallery page. The permanent link to Leeds photos is here.

Leeds at Night

Leeds Thornton's Arcade Roof

Leeds Granary Wharf and Canal

Leeds Civic Hall

Amsterdam Canals, Bridges and Rooftops

Yesterday was our second day in Amsterdam and it was a hot one at 26°C.

We had a late start after the late night of photography on Tuesday. We actually returned to some of the locations from Tuesday so that I could re-take them with blue sky and a few clouds.

Jan dragged my camera case, in cities I use a Peli 1510 wheelie case. It easily holds my 2 Mamiya 7 cameras and 4 lenses.

If I had known Amsterdam had mostly cobbled and brick streets which make dragging a case difficult I would probably have used my usual carry case and a rucsac.

I've taken 16 rolls of Ilford FP4 120 film so far. Hopefully a few more today but more clouds.

We walked miles. Most of the good shots were in the south and west. It was dull in the centre when we were there.

I took quite a few rooftops with the short telephoto, 150mm lens. I don't often use it but it was good for these.

Last of all I wanted to repeat the bridge shots from Tuesday. It was too dark when we reached the best location and I wanted more detail in the buildings behind the bridges.

The bridge and street lights came on at about 10.30pm. It was a lighter evening than Tuesday so I could take the shots I wanted and have more detail in the shadows.

Another late night, finishing after midnight. I much prefer doing night shots in the winter, I can start at 4pm and be finished by 6pm!

Today the forecast was for clouds and it's sunny. A bonus day!

Amsterdam Day and Night

We are on a short photo trip to Amsterdam. It's quite a few years since I was last here but Jan had meetings here in 2011.

It was an early start yesterday to catch the 7am from Manchester. The day was mixed with some sunshine in the afternoon, the odd shower of rain and quite a lot of cloudy periods.

Mostly the shots were of the canals and their bridges, with a few buildings thrown in for good measure. Lots of walking in warm humid weather.

Jan found us a very nice restaurant that she knew then, at 10am, it was time to start the night photography as it was starting to go dark.

I had several canal bridge shots lined up but all but one weren't lit up fully. They all have strings of light bulbs outlining the bridge but quite a few were unlit. One of the problems of not being able to do night photography until most people are in bed! Not many boats moving around after 10pm so not much need for illuminated bridges.

We finished about midnight. Round 2 today. Overcast now so I will look for smaller bits in the landscape and keep the big views for when the sun comes out later.

Will try and find some wifi too so that I can pick up emails and post this to my blog. In Starbucks with free wifi so fingers crossed this goes.