Nicholas Crane at the EWT AGM

On Saturday I was up at Walton-On-The-Naze to photograph the Essex Wildlife Trust AGM, which amongst other things had Nick Crane as guest speaker, and saw the official opening of the Crag Walk, a defence system to preserve the heritage of the Naze.

After last year's AGM, when Chris Packham was the special guest, I was really looking forward to this event, and it turned out to be a great one again, with even more people and an equally enjoyable talk by Nick.  It was especially nice to see so many people down on the beach after the Crag Walk opening too.

Here are a few photos from the day, many more have been forwarded to Essex Wildlife Trust for their publications.


Pentax K-5, DA*300mm lens @ f/4, 1/250s, ISO400, handheld.


Pentax K-5, Sigma 105mm lens @ f/4, 1/350s, ISO400, handheld.


Pentax K-5, DA*300mm lens @ f/4, 1/250s, ISO400, handheld.


Pentax K-5, DA16-45mm lens @ 16mm, f/9.5, 1/180s, ISO100, fill-flash, handheld.

And for something a bit more normal for me, the day before I was providing some 1-2-1 photography tuition at Hylands Park in Chelmsford, and took this photo of a Echinacea flower.


Pentax K-5, DA*300mm lens @ 6.7, 1/125s, ISO200, Tripod.

One thing I noticed when sorting this flower photo for the web, is how much better Firefox is for viewing images than Internet Explorer or Chrome.  The colours look just as I want them, whereas they're a bit intense with the others.  One of the problems with design for the internet, so many variables...

Recommended Camera Shops

I'm often asked which camera shops I would recommend, so I thought I'd pop a few down here.

Cameraworld (Chelmsford)

Found in the High Chelmer shopping centre, this (like the other shops mentioned here) is a proper camera shop, with friendly, knowledgeable staff, and decent prices.  They also have a good stock of secondhand cameras and lenses, which is nice to see.  They've been very good to me over the last few years, happy to promote my tuition and host my free advice days, but I wouldn't be happy returning the favour unless I thought they were as good as they are.

My only reservation is that they don't stock Pentax anymore, which means customers don't have a full choice of DSLRs, but most camera shops these days seem to not stock at least one of the major brands.

London Camera Exchange (Colchester)

A little tucked away along Eld Lane in Colchester, LCE is a small shop (I think my lounge is bigger), but it has a good range of equipment, and that all important friendly atmosphere.  It's where I bought my Pentax K-5, and when there was a problem with it that meant it had to be sent away, I couldn't have asked for a better service, which I think is the true measure of a good supplier.

SRS Microsystems (Watford)

A bit further away from me, but still local to many of my customers, SRS is the place to go to handle Pentax gear (even stocking the 645D digital Medium Format camera), but they carry most other main brands too (not Sony).  Like Cameraworld, SRS are internet retailers too, and you can be confident buying from either online.


So those are the main shops I tend to recommend, simply because I know them and can vouch for their service and integrity.  You can almost certainly get some things cheaper from other retailers, especially online, but I'd much rather spend a few pounds more and know that if there's a problem, I can get it sorted with little fuss, talking to real people.  I also remember the day when nearly every town had an independent, good camera shop on the high street, and I think we have to help the ones we have left before we lose all chance of handling goods before we buy them.

If you have any other suggestions, perhaps for shops in your area, please leave them as a comment!

Attention All Customers!

Unfortunately, in the heavy rain yesterday my mobile phone got a drenching and has now died a death.  The big problem is that it stores my calendar, which I regularly back up to my computer, but I've taken several bookings for 1-2-1 tuition since the last back-up, and I now cannot access these bookings.

If you're booked in for a private tuition session with me, please give me a ring (01277 233448) to confirm the date, time and location.

Apologies for the inconvenience.  It's a timely reminder to everyone to back-up anything they don't want to lose, whether that's appointments, contacts or photos.  I'm now off to see if I can find a decent waterproof mobile...

EDIT: My phone has now been revived enough to retrieve all appointments, so all is well!

New Tuition Leaflet

I've finally completed the update for my new tuition leaflet, and they've now been printed (all 2500 of them) and will be with me on Monday, all being well.  First to receive them will be Cameraworld in Chelmsford, as they've run out of the old version, and I don't have any more myself now.  I'll pop some into Hanningfield Reservoir on my way back from Chelmsford too.






The hardest part about the design was choosing the photos for it, and although some, such as the driftwood shot and beetle, were quite easy choices, others were a more drawn out affair, especially that of the cover image.  As I'd spent so much time choosing them, I thought I'd run through what I'd picked, and why I'd decided on these ones.


Pentax K10D, Pentax DA16-45mm @ 26mm, 1/250s, f/4, ISO200, handheld.

This silver birch trunk, surrounded by ferns, was in the Birkett Long Millennium Walk at Marks Hall, near Coggeshall.  The estate at Marks Hall is wonderful for photography, with formal planting, woodland, a walled garden, lakes and a river.  I like the rich colours and the stark contrast between the tree and the surrounding foliage, and the composition fitted the placement in the leaflet.  It was the last of the three 'inside' shots to be chosen, so the colour was a factor for me too.



Pentax K10D, Pentax DA*300mm, 1/90s, f/5.6, ISO100, tripod.

Shot on the beach at Minsmere, this was taken when we stopped over whilst on our way up to Norfolk last Spring.  It was a very wet day (you can see the rain in the photo), so it limited me to using just my 300mm lens, the only weatherproof one I had at the time.  I like the simplicity of this image, and I can almost see an odd figure in the wood - it just appeals to me.



Pentax K10D, Sigma 105mm Macro, 1/250s, f/3.5, ISO200, handheld.

Taken at Colchester Zoo last year, this has been converted to a high contrast black and white image, with the background burned in quite strongly to concentrate the view on the Lion.  I wanted one monochrome photo on the leaflet this time, and this is one of my favourites, and fairly eye-catching too, I think.



Pentax K10D, Sigma 105mm Macro, 1/10s, f/6.7, ISO200, handheld.

Whilst running a macro workshop at Thorndon Park in May 2009, I noticed there were several of these Longhorn beetles around.  They had the advantage of freezing whenever you got close to them, making composition and focusing relatively easy.  I like to include at least one high magnification macro shot on the leaflet, as that's particularly relevant to what I do.



Pentax K10D, Sigma 105mm Macro, 1/2s, f/11, ISO100, tripod.

Again, shot at Thorndon Park, this time whilst I was providing some 1-2-1 tuition, I was attracted to the hole in this fallen leaf, and knew it would record as a deep black due to the contrast range exceeding the capabilities of the camera sensor.  Choosing this image was largely due to needing one that would make a good background for the text whilst remaining interesting in itself.



Pentax K10D, Sigma 105mm Macro, 2/3s, f/13, ISO100, tripod, polariser.

The choice that caused me most problems, I was keen to have something other than an insect or an animal on the cover of this leaflet, so spent a lot of time looking through fungi and plant shots before finally settling on this fern.  I particularly wanted a clean, simple image for the cover, yet some of the choices (including this Orchid) seemed too stark.  I eventually remembered this fern photo, taken by Llyn Geirionydd in July 2007.  It has been one of my favourite images ever since, but for some reason, didn't immediately spring to mind when I was picking a photo for the leaflet.

So those are the photos and why I chose them - keep an eye out for them in a camera shop or EWT visitor centre near you!