Daily Blog

A little late posting today. The day was for the most part very cloudy and not great for landscape photography. But this afternoon I met with a very interesting gentleman. Ray Cooper lives just outside Kiltimagh and has embarked on a project to renew a small stretch of the Glore River, and has done amazing work clearing a long stretch of the river bank. But he also has built four labyrinths in his back garden. Here is a picture of Ray walking the labyrinth, it was taken late this evening with a high 1600 iso to allow for the lack of light.

Very cloudy today, and I was not inspired to take any photos. I am in the Mayo Photography Club this evening giving a demonstration on how to use Lightroom so I have had to spend some time this afternoon preparing for that.
Here is an image made a couple of weeks ago on Achill Island.

I got out for a short time early this morning. There was a very think fog, so i went looking for trees to concentrate on shapes, the fog was really thick and I got a few images that had promise. But on my way home I stopped to watch these ponies and got my favourite picture of the day. The ponies are a distance from me. I am using a 200mm lens but the fog has both softened the image and muted the colours, and I liked it enough to share.

I know to is only a few days since I posted this picture before, but I got word today that it won a Gold award in the January round of the SWPP monthly competitions for Landscape. I enter these competitions every month as a means of trying to keep improving.

I am teaching an photography beginners class this evening in Kiltimagh. We are still grappling with the whole notion of exposure and how to get it right in the camera, detail in the highlights and detail in the shadows etc. I thought of my "students" this morning when I took this picture on the road between Knock and Kiltimagh, its the kind of picture that if I had left the camera to shoot it automatically it would have got it hopelessly wrong. But very simple adjustments get the exposure right!

I am teaching an photography beginners class this evening in Kiltimagh. We are still grappling with the whole notion of exposure and how to get it right in the camera, detail in the highlights and detail in the shadows etc. I thought of my "students" this morning when I took this picture on the road between Knock and Kiltimagh, its the kind of picture that if I had left the camera to shoot it automatically it would have got it hopelessly wrong. But very simple adjustments get the exposure right!

I usually like to shoot my pictures into the light, and generally avoid blue sky sun behind me kind of pictures. But sometimes you just have to take the picture, I was cycling with Patricia along the Great Western Greenway on Sunday afternoon when this view of Bellacragher Bay simply grabbed my attention. But sometimes its only when we stop that we really see things, after taking this image I noticed some movement in the water to the left of the scene and then spent ten minutes watching an otter, he was too small to photograph as I was too far away but it still felt like a privilege to watch him.

I was up for the sunrise this morning, but did not see the sun. it was a lovely morning though. About an hour after sunrise I took the dog for a walk on the beach, I had been thinking of going somewhere else for a picture this morning, because I have posted a lot from Mulranny and especially of Croagh Patrick. But the beach this morning was really peaceful, so calm and gentle, and the sun was doing its very best to get through the clouds and I thought it just lovely.

Today is St Brigid's day, traditionally held as the first day of spring in Ireland. Of course these days children are taught that the first day of spring is 1st March, due to the higher temperatures. Anyway I went out for the sunrise this morning and was not disappointed the sun coming over the horizon certainly heralded a new day, and I thought it special enough to herald a new season as well!. The rest of the day certainly felt like spring, a beautiful calm day, and warm, in the sun, but very cold in the shade.

Today is St Brigid's day, traditionally held as the first day of spring in Ireland. Of course these days children are taught that the first day of spring is 1st March, due to the higher temperatures. Anyway I went out for the sunrise this morning and was not disappointed the sun coming over the horizon certainly heralded a new day, and I thought it special enough to herald a new season as well!. The rest of the day certainly felt like spring, a beautiful calm day, and warm, in the sun, but very cold in the shade.

It was a lovely day in Mayo but with some very heavy hail showers . This evening I had made an arrangement to photograph the sunset with my friend and fellow photographer Colin. Colin arrived in Mulranny on time for us to have a cup of coffee and watch a particularly heavy fall of hail from the house before we headed out. It looked very unlikely that we would be successful in our quest for photographs as the clouds were very heavy and threatening. However we stuck to the plan and got to our destination on time for the sunset. however the sun did not actually appear, but it did its very best and this resulted in a dark scene but with lovely colours in the clouds. We had ten minutes or so of usable light before we had to find shelter behind rocks as the skies opened above us.

It is blowing up a storm outside as I write this. This evening I had to go to the hardware store, the nearest is on Achill Island so I headed off on my errand. When I had finished , and because it was blowing a gale,I decided to drive the extra ten minutes to Cloughmore to see the waves, it was raining and snowing as I approached but the sun broke through and for about ten minutes the light was just incredible, it was SO windy however that I was unable to stand to take the pictures!. I sat back into the car to take this one. Not bad from a trip to the hardware store, where else in the world could you combine such mundane task with such stunning scenery, they don't call it the " Wild Atlantic Way " for nothing!!

Had a great day today. Patrick a photographer from Co Cavan came for a one to one photography training day. Patrick has been a few times before so really does not need a lot of training, but wanted to practice some water pictures using slow shutter speeds to show motion and high speeds to freeze action. The weather when we set out in the morning was pretty awful, we had planned to get the sunrise on Mulranny beach but the sun failed to appear and we had to run from the rain. We travelled to North mayo however and visited Downpatrick Head , the sea at Dunbriste was wild, and it was not raining! So we spent a couple of hours at the cliffs, the power of the water was just amazing, as can be seen in this image as it crashed around the inside of one of the caves.

A little late posting today. Here is something completely different from what I would normally do. In the Mayo Photographic Club this evening we had a competition entitled "ORANGE" This was my interpretation on the theme.

Lots of rain this morning , so here is a pre dawn picture taken a couple of weeks ago near Claremorris.

It is nearly a week now since I actually went out with the camera in a planned way to take pictures. But the advantage of always carrying a camera with you is that you can respond quickly to what you see in the "everyday". I was driving through Manilla a couple of mornings ago, when for a few minutes around sunrise time the sky behind me coloured up. So I just kept a look out for a potential foreground to show off the sky. When I spotted these trees I stopped for just a minute or two.

People have always been inspired by mountains. Croagh Patrick in Co Mayo has always been a place of spiritual importance even before its current role as a place of Christian Pilgrimage. I imagine ,myself ,that its constant on the horizon from so many places in Mayo of itself was probably a reassuring site. I find myself looking towards the mountain lots of times and can't resist including it in my photographs. We can judge the weather by how clear the view of Croagh Patrick is, or if it can be see at all, or perhaps what colour it is. So as I looked across in the direction of Croagh Patrick yesterday morning I must admit experiencing a kind of thrill to see this very familiar object make just fleeting appearances through the ever moving clouds, as if to say, "Its OK I'm still here"

Once again I got no new pictures today, so here is another taken last week .This fiery colour lasted only a few moments just as the sun appeared over the horizon , about two minutes later the colour was gone and the sun did not actually break through the clouds, but it was amazing while it lasted.

Today was my third day in a row not getting out with the camera, things are getting serious!
I am starting an 8 week beginners photography class in Kiltimagh tomorrow evening from 7.30, there are just a couple of places available , if you would like to attend send me a message.
I took this picture of Mulranny beach on last Friday morning about fifteen minutes after sunrise.

I did not get out again today, a bad dose of man-flu has taken hold,so a second day indoors.
Here is a somewhat different picture from me. I am a member of the Mayo Photographic Club and every month they organise a club competition, its one of the great things about being in a club, the competitions force you to look behind what you might normally do. The theme for this month is "Orange" so you can imagine as I am out and about I am always looking for something orange to photograph. As a result I noticed the rusty water tank used for filling the steam engines on the now closed Great Western Railway. This tank is behind the Mulranny Park Hotel, which in its time, was a Great Western Hotel, owned by the railway company. Now of course I have seen the tank before and thought it pretty but because of my added interest in finding things "orange" I stopped to have a closer look. I concluded that it is a really lovely structure with the water tank complete with a gauge down one side and I wondered how I had not stopped to have a proper look before now. We probably only see, I mean REALLY see, a small portion of what is around us, sometimes it pays to stop and take a closer look. By the way I don't think this one will make the competition.