Category: Photos

Every year Hebden Bridge throws a wonderful, quirky parade where everyone wears handmade, fantastical costumes. The procession marches through the town, dancing and interacting with the audience that lines the streets, to the sound of drums and brass instruments. This years theme was “Not just endangered, but brought back to life”, featuring everything from dodos to whales. I took these images with my X-E1 paired with the 18mm, 60mm and 50-230mm zoom.

I love Fuji’s Velvia film simulation, with its strongly saturated colours and punchy contrast. Since the most recent Lightroom update finally made it possible for RAW shooters to fully benefit from the film simulations, I’ve found myself using it quite a bit. As you can imagine it was a match made in heaven when it came to photographing the vibrant costumes of the parade.

A brief pause in the procession gave me the opportunity to get this low angle shot of this incredible ‘bicycle fish’. A person at the back peddles with their hands to make the fish’s body undulate as if it were swimming, while the person upfront tows it along. The trick to using the 18mm well at this kind of event is to get close to your subject to avoid getting a shot mostly full of spectators.

The 60mm really shines at f2.4 in terms of image quality, but the focus speed can sometimes let you down. Perhaps the phase detect AF of the X-E2 or X-T1 would help if anyone has one lying around they feel like donating to a good home 😉

The 18mm gave great perspective to this high angled shot of a stilt walker. At this kind of distance you don’t get that much subject isolation from the 18mm, but f2 was just enough to throw the background out of focus. In hindsight I should have used a bit of fill flash to brighten the subject’s face.

Here’s another shot of the chap from above, but here from a little further away. Looking up from a low angle with a wide lens helps to emphasise the height of the stilts.

The huge muskox complete with be-horned drummer on its back was one of the most impressive floats of this years parade, preceded by energetic local band Drum Machine.

The parade finishes in Calder Holmes Park where each section gives one final lively show to the assembled audience and the large puppets and floats are lined up so everyone can get a good look at them. My thanks to the organisers for putting on such a great show again this year, I can’t wait for 2015’s parade!

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I’m quite fond of shooting black and white – it has a certain charm and character that can turn a scene that looks mundane in colour into something with impact. Although I use my camera in RAW mode, I often use the black and white film simulation so what I see on the screen and in the viewfinder is not in colour. Since I’m shooting RAW I can always process the image in colour later on, but limiting things to black and white at the point of capture helps focus my attention. It makes you acutely aware of how the light falls on your subject, the shadows that it forms and the contrast between them.

Here’s a selection of some of my favourite black and white shots taken over the past few years, I hope you enjoy them. The featured image above was taken in York and shows one of the historic shops that now serves as a café.

The Angel of the North is an amazing piece of art. Although the sky was interesting when I took this shot, the light itself was rather flat. The stark (and I’m going to be using that word a lot here) metal work vs. the fluffy clouds makes for a nice contrast. This is a shot taken with the Samyang 8mm fisheye, note how keeping the subject level and dead centre avoids almost all obvious distortion in it but lets the foreground curve wildly.

I saw this young guy while waiting for a tram in Manchester, he was totally engrossed in whatever he was listening to and focused on his iPod. The light was flat and boring but I was close enough to make good use of the 60mm’s creamy bokeh for some nice subject separation.

This is an older shot from my archive taken with my last Nikon DSLR. Returning from a friend’s wedding on a cold November morning, the bright sunlight and interesting details of the station along with my friends somewhat eccentric dress sense made for a nice shot. The slightly sinister figure in the background adds a bit of intrigue as well.

Markets are often full of photographic opportunities, but this is the one shot I was really pleased with after spending some time going around Leeds’ indoor market. I’m still not very good at getting in people’s faces to do street work, but I like to think that the nice light and interesting shadows make up for the turned backs in this one.

These are the market stalls in Hebden Bridge after all the traders have cleared up and gone home for the evening. The stark, angular nature of the subject lends itself well to black and white.

Peering into a dilapidated old farm building with my X-E1. These kinds of spaces are always interesting when full of old junk, strong light from the window picks out the details nicely.

I took this shot of the pier on a grey day in Whitby. The stark lines created by the planks nicely lead your eye into the shot. As the shot is split pretty much 50/50 between seascape and sky, I like how only the beacon breaches the skyline.

Ice and snowy scenes make for excellent black and white shots, using punchy contrast helps to emphasise the fine details. I took this shot in Horsehold using my old 135mm Takumar. The stream that cascades down the gorge there was full of amazing icicles. With such a long lens, in less than perfect shooting conditions, a tripod was essential. I often lug a tripod out and don’t end up using it, but this was one of those times I was really thankful I’d brought it along.

Light snowfall is great for picking out the details in a scene, in this case nicely outlining the chimney pots and pipes in a stonemason’s yard.

Finally, this is a shot of local landmark Stoodley Pike, in the snow against a dramatic sky. If you’ve enjoyed looking at these photos please consider supporting me by contributing on Patreon on by purchasing a print from the shop.

After a long, wet and wild winter it’s nice that the evenings are drawing out once again and it’s getting a little warmer and sunnier. Spring always has a wonderful freshness to it, all the greens are that bit brighter, the sky bluer than its been in months and flowers blossoming everywhere you look. Here’s a selection of photos I’ve taken over the last month.

A Manchester bound train pulls into Hebden Bridge station. Despite all the wonderful greenery that surrounds us, we’re still well connected to the all the big northern cities, less than an hour from both Manchester and Leeds.

A precarious narrow ledge beneath the main path above afforded this nice view.

High up above Cragg Vale on the moors, the ruined Red Dykes farmhouse is looking a little worse for ware since I last visited it a year ago, when more of the roof was still intact. Here I’ve used my Samyang fisheye and corrected the vertical distortion in software using FishEye Hemi.

The fishseye lens offers a wide perspective on this lock gate just outside Hebden Bridge. Unlike the last image I’ve not corrected the distortion here. Although I got a little flare in this image it wasn’t too noticeable and was quite easy to clone out.

Easter means it’s Pace Egging time here in Yorkshire. The Pace Egg play is held in various places on Good Friday every year, the above shot taken at Heptonstall. It’s a tradition dating back centuries, where good vanquishes evil in a silly, slapstick way. Various challengers come out to clash swords with King George. Here I’ve used my newly acquired 50-230mm. As you can see you can get pretty good subject separation even at f6. Look out for a review in the coming months.

One of the Hill Millies morris dancing group, also performing at the Pace Egg in Heptonstall. The 60mm shows off again that its a great portrait lens, f2.4 gives good separation and keeps your subject nice and crisp.