Ramsey 1940s Weekend

A few images from the annual 1940s re-enactment weekend held in Ramsey. This year it was held at a new and bigger venue. I visited on Sunday afternoon, which coincided with the strongest sunshine of the whole weekend, making some of the shots rather tricky. It did give me a chance to use my new Nissin flashgun for some fill flash.

Northampton Balloon Festival - Night Glow

Saturday evening I visited the Northampton Balloon Festival to see the 'Night Glow'. Frankly it wasn't quite as good as I had hoped. The balloons were in quite a small area, surrounded by a funfair and far too many parked cars. Plus the event didn't start until it was much darker than I would have preferred. Still, I persevered with a few shots.

Getting the colour balance of these shots right has proved tricky. The auto setting of the camera gave too orange a hue, but a full correction in Lightroom took away all of the glow from the flames. I settled for a manual compromise that reduced the colour temperature slightly.

Hoverflies

A couple of hoverflies photographed at the weekend on a stroll around Grafham Water.

Inveraray Highland Games

I was recently up in Scotland, staying in Kinlochleven, for a pal's 40th birthday. The weather was rather mixed and photography wasn't the purpose of the trip, so I didn't get many shots. However, on the way home a few of us stopped at the Highland Games being held at Inveraray. This was my first experience of a traditional Highland games. I spent much of the day moving between the different events trying to get shots that best captured the spirit of the place.

Demolition Site

This old factory is not far from Vic's house in Preston. It's slowly being demolished to make way for houses that, in this economic climate, might never be built. We were able to get some shots of the exterior from outside the fence. I would loved to have explored inside, but that would have been nether legal not safe!

Salford Quays

The weather forecast on the second day of my recent visit to Vic wasn't promising so we decided against another day in the Lakes. Instead we spent the day at Salford Quays. This is home to some impressive buildings; the Lowry, the Imperial War Museum North and MediaCity, which will be the new home of to much of BBC television. This was my first visit and on a dull and rainy day the area gave a lot of opportunities for interesting and varied images. I would certainly like to go back there again some time.

Another Lakeland walk

I've had no internet access for the last week, thanks to a dead cable modem. Now I am back on-line with some catching up to do.

The weekend end before last I was up north visiting my friend Vic for one of our usual beer and hillwalking weekends (funny how those two activities seem to go together). The weather was rather mixed, so we only managed one day in the Lakes, opting to do a circuit of 5 of the less popular hills around Ullswater. The walk gave several good pieces of foreground interest for shots.

The first image shows Ullswater from Bonscale Tower and required us to wait out a rain shower. After half an hour or so we were rewarded an interesting sky and some good light.