Simon Hendy's Photo Blog

CLOSING DOWN!

2011-06-27T13:46:00.001-07:00

I've moved my blog over to a Wordpress blog hosted with my website, so this one won't be used any more.

Flat Holm

2011-06-26T14:14:00.000-07:00

I went to Flat Holm today - an island in the Bristol Channel for those that don't know.

There are some fairly interesting Victorian gun emplacements, and it's particularly notable for a substantial colony of aggressive seagulls that will dive-bomb you with poo if you get too close to their nests and chicks. Couldn't have asked for a better day - the hottest day of the year so far, and completely calm for the crossing.

The boat goes from Penarth, just by the Cardiff Bay barrage - this is the counterweight for one of the bridges.

As seen previously, I'm always a sucker for lighthouses, and this one came with a nice rusty gun as well.

This one was taken from down in one of the old gun emplacements

A load of the flying crap factories. I didn't get pooed on fortunately, but it was close a couple of times.

Next month I'm going to Steep Holm, which is nearby and apparently steeper than Flat Holm.

Dorset

2011-05-15T03:47:00.000-07:00

We spent a couple of nights in Dorset last week - the first night happened to coincide with the 20th anniversary of our moving in together, which was nice. We stayed in Burton Bradstock on the Jurassic Coast, also the home to Billy Bragg. I thoroughly recommend the B&B we stayed at - Chesil Beach Lodge.

We didn't really do much for the time we were there, not venturing away from the beach during the day and no further than the village for dinner in the evening. I also took quite a lot of photos...

The sandstone cliffs are really photogenic, particularly when combined with a blue sky and some light cloud.

This is a fence that's been built on top of the cliff to stop people using the old bit of the coastal path - erosion and rockfalls mean that the cliff edge tends to move inland somewhat, and there's quite a drop over that edge.

Due to enjoying dinner, we didn't quite make the most of the sunsets - we missed it completely on the first night, and could probably have done with being there a bit earlier on the second. I think what you really need is to be there earlier in the year when the setting sun shines directly onto the cliffs, as the warm light on the cliffs would be superb.

Someone had been mildly creative with the stones on the beach...

On Friday, we went over to Portland Bill before coming home, and you can't beat a nice red and white lighthouse in the sunshine against a blue sky.

I spend some time playing around with my 10-stop ND filter again, blurring out the waves.

This one was 30 seconds at f22, taken at 3pm.

4 seconds at f6.7

3 seconds at f32 (3-stop ND filter)

28 seconds at f22

8 seconds at f22, 9:20pm

I did start to experiment with some really long exposures in the evening, but only got 2 minutes into a 3 minute exposure when the battery gave up.

And finally, on the last night, I got round to experimenting with photographing the stars.

283 secs @ f5.6

314secs @ f5.6

This was intended to be a much longer exposure, but my second battery ran out after about 5 minutes - the other one was still re-charging after the beach shots above. I was a bit annoyed by this as I'd only used it for about 15 minutes of exposures - reading on t'interweb suggests I should be able to get 80 minutes. I've had the camera and batteries for just over 5 years and have taken somewhere in the region of 15,000 photos, so it could well be that they're reaching the end of their useful life. Thinking about it, I should probably have been turning off the image stabilisation for the long shots (especially as I've been using a tripod) as that uses a bit of juice, but surely not that much?

Looks like I need to get a new battery or two, as I want to do more star photography in France in the summer.

All hail Adobe, for they are geniuses.

2011-04-14T12:19:00.000-07:00

Oh my.

A couple of minutes in Lightroom with the Clone tool, and look at this. Au revoir smudge!

Gnaargh!

2011-04-12T14:04:00.000-07:00

So, I'd got this smudge on the sensor, which buggered up a few reasonable photos. I also discovered a downside to the long exposures - the longer you leave the shutter open, the more chance of dust landing on the sensor.

I spent the afternoon at Buscot Park in Oxfordshire, and at one point it clouded over a bit - this shot is a 1 minute exposure and is pretty much everything I wanted to achieve with the 10-stop filter - you get the movement of the clouds and the water smooths itself out.

And a couple of bloody great dust sports.

I really like the picture, but it's been ruined by dust and the mystery smear.

Been a while...

2011-04-12T13:56:00.000-07:00

Been a while since I posted - mainly explained because I haven't taken any photos...

Anyway, I recently invested in a 10-stop ND filter - it only lets through 1/1000th of the light, so a 1/30sec exposure becomes 30secs, making it easy to get long exposures in broad daylight.

I spent Monday morning wandering along the Grand Union Canal just outside Northampton. Took me ages to find it, as the roads bear no relation to what they were when I last went (probably about 25 years ago), and it's mainly a big set of distribution centres. It's one of the places I can genuinely look at and say "I can remember when all this was fields".

A 15 second exposure

30 seconds - really annoyed by the smudge top-centre. I cleaned the sensor before the rugby on Sunday and still ended up with it. Really annoying.

As the canal passed under the M1, there was an interesting juxtaposition of the old canal and the stark modern bridge.

Confit

2010-12-18T09:46:00.000-08:00

We've spent the last couple of weeks making duck and goose confit.

Aldi has been selling frozen ducks and geese at pretty reasonable prices, and Asda have taken to selling duck legs for £2.70 a pair.

Makes a change from chutney - on which subject, SWMBO cooked up a huge vat of green bean chutney using our entire green bean crop from this summer. And then threw it all away as it wasn't at all nice...

First up, dissect your bird - separate the legs and breast, and perhaps the wings if there's a bit of meat on them.

Marinade in salt, oil, pepper, thyme, bay leaves and juniper berries.

After a couple of days stewing in the marinade, clear off the salt and vegetation and sear the meat.

Put it in a casserole dish, cover with goose fat and cook at 150 degrees C for a couple of hours. Yes, all that liquid is goose fat.

Then put it in jars and cover with lashings of goose grease.

End result - one of my favourite foods. No, strike that. My absolute favourite food.

Roast it in a moderately hot oven on a rack so that the fat drips off and the skin goes crispy.

Serve with reblochonade - sliced potatoes baked with a piece of reblochon cheese on top so that it melts through it.

Can you feel your arteries hardening just reading this?

Concorde

2010-09-19T06:00:00.001-07:00

On Friday we went to have a look at Concorde at Filton - hurry if you want to go and see it, as it closes at the end of the month and there is no guarantee that it will ever re-open.

A fantastic looking aircraft, and a friend of our neighbour designed bits of it - he worked on the air intakes (surprisingly important) and the wings. He was in a BBC documentary a few years ago, and they showed him stood underneath pointing at bits going "I did that bit, and that, and that..."

Elan Valley

2010-09-19T05:54:00.000-07:00

We finished off our trip to the sunny delights of North Wales by driving down through the Elan Valley - a series of dams and reservoirs built to provide water for Birmingham.

SWMBO was trying to convince me that the feral sheep of the Elan Valley were meat eaters. Mind you, this one was staring at me for quite some time.

This tower is apparently the point where water is extracted for Birmingham. There was a real temptation to add my own personal donation...

Waterfalls

2010-09-19T05:45:00.000-07:00

Heading back from Bodnant across Snowdonia, we stopped at a couple of waterfalls.

The first was the Ogwyn Falls, at the western end of Lyn (lake) Ogwyn - we just happened to notice it from the car and stopped for a look.

The second was the more well known Swallow Falls in Betws-y-coed. As there had been a reasonable amount of rain, there was quite a decent flow over the falls.

Bodnant

2010-09-19T05:30:00.000-07:00

Having said that the weather on the Friday was awful, it was in parts. Fortunately we had decided to head to the north coast, and ended up at Bodnant Gardens - the weather had cleared up as we passed (we were originally headed for Penryn Castle because some of it was indoors) so we decided to go in. And what a good decision that was - one of the best gardens I've been to. Thoroughly recommended.

It's made up of several levels. At the top, there's a fairly traditional formal flower garden

With more butterflies!

Below that, there's a rose garden, then there's this lily pond

And below that, there's *another* lily pond

And then below all that, there's a path through the woods, with a stream.

And a particularly photogenic waterfall.

Snowdon

2010-09-19T05:21:00.001-07:00

The Snowdon Mountain Railway gets booked up, so there's very little chance of being able to turn up and go. This means that you fork out your £25 (!) for the train without really knowing what the weather will be like.

We passed through Llanberis on the Wednesday, a beautiful sunny day, and booked for the following day. Thursday was really nice in Llanberis, and most of the way up Snowdon.

As we got about 3/4 of the way up, we found a bit of cloud - this was the view back down to the Llanberis pass.

And by the time we reached the summit, we could see absolutely sod all - this is the new visitors centre from the summit.

A pair of overly optimistic photographers...

This is one of the trains making its way up.

I did think about asking for a partial refund - not because of the weather, but because we had a diesel train, not a steam one.

Still, we were lucky - the weather the next day was spectacularly awful. We drove through Blaeuau Ffestiniog with the windscreen wipers going and headlights on. It wasn't raining - we were just driving through thick cloud. I expect that Llanberis was covered in cloud, so I dread to think what the conditions were like up on the mountain!

I am not a number...

2010-09-19T04:49:00.000-07:00

We managed to visit Portmeirion without seeing anyone in a white-trimmed jacket. We visited there several years ago, and my recollection was that it was much quite an interesting place - at odds with my impression this time...

And no, no balloon chasing people down the estuary either...

North Wales

2010-09-19T04:22:00.001-07:00

We had a few days pootling around bits of North Wales.

We were based in Porthmadog, which turned out to be a really good base for getting around. Home of course to the Ffestiniog railway.

This is the evening sun breaking through the clouds onto the Snowdonia hills behind Porthmadog.

While much of Snowdonia is beautiful, you can't escape the industrial background of some parts. This is in Llanberis, and I think the Dinorwig hydro power station is in that hill.

One of these hills is apparently Snowdon - taken from the road between Beddgelert and Llanberis.

One really annoying part of Snowdonia is the lack of places to stop by the road and take photos of the views. The road down the Llanberis pass has great scenery but only about 2 places to stop.

There was plenty of military jet activity. Unfortunately, by far the best view of a plane was one that appeared out of nowhere and passed very low overhead - no time at all to stop the car, let alone get the camera out of the boot.

There were loads of butterflies around - I've not seen many for years now, so it was quite a novelty. And it made a change to take close-ups of them rather than bees.

We had a wander up to Anglesey - I'll see your Menai Suspension Bridge and raise you a Clifton Suspension Bridge. Brunel 1, Telford 0.

No, I'm not even going to try. I'd need a really long run up, and I'm not sure I can produce enough phlegm to cope with a double "ll"

Tyntesfield

2010-09-19T04:11:00.000-07:00

In lieu of a "proper" summer holiday this year, I had a couple of weeks off and we pottered about a bit. We had a week in Wales (pics to follow), but started off with a visit to Tyntesfield

The National Trust have done a massive amount of restoration since they acquired the property in 2002, and the whole building is currently covered in a mass of scaffolding. Interestingly, they've built a viewing platform, so you can actually go up and see what's going on. It's fascinating to be able to look out over the roof!

The garden had an excellent array of flowers in bloom, so out came the Panasonic compact camera in macro mode.

I'm told they're dahlias. To me, the natural world consists of lilies, roses, tulips and "flowers".

Walcot v Brixham

2010-09-18T10:58:00.000-07:00

More than 10 years ago now, I took a fair few photos at Walcot RFC in Bath - a colleague was initially captain, subsequently chairman and is now secretary. The old (film!) photos are on my sports website.

Anyway, I was asked to go to their first home game of the season (against Brixham) to take some photos for them to use on their website.

It was a decently sunny day, which always helps the quality of the photos - it was just a shame about the result, as Brixham racked up 40 points. Walcot are in black and white, Brixham in the rather fetching pink.

It's still possible to be a bit creative when taking sports photos.

This is undoubtedly the shot of the day - the Walcot winger taking out his opposite number high and in the air as he went up for a high ball. It was very obvious, but amazingly the referee and touch judges all missed it - the only people there who did. Brixham were up in arms about it, and to be honest, pretty justifiably.

Beckford's Tower

2010-09-18T10:48:00.001-07:00

Just before going to photograph a rugby match (see next post), I stopped off at Beckford's Tower on the edge of Bath. Far easier to climb up than Alfred's Tower at Stourhead - apparently Beckford built it when he was in his 60s, so that might explain why it's so much wider and less steep!

The views from the top weren't anything to write home about, but I did quite like the spiral stairs.

More Flinty Red

2010-09-18T10:39:00.001-07:00

Flinty Red asked me in recently to take some shots in the kitchen for them to use to publicise their Outside Catering service.

Some Creme Brulees (or should that be Cremes Brulee?) in the foreground, with Max the (temporary) chef in the background.

Crostini, ready to be loaded up with Marsala-cooked onions on Ricotta.

This was actually the (really nice) staff dinner - pork, beans, herbs and some of the Marsala onions.

Onglet with courgettes. I think the yellow ones came from Matt the chef's own garden.

Fresh haloumi cheese

I had an email yesterday from someone at the BBC (yes, that BBC), asking for photos of Flinty Red to use in one of their food magazines. Coo!

Garden

2010-08-22T07:58:00.000-07:00

I had an amble around the garden this morning, and took a few photos of the flowers. OK, not just the flowers - vegetables as well!

King Alfred's Tower

2010-08-22T07:50:00.001-07:00

I've been to Stourhead a couple of times before, but have never got round to going to the nearby King Alfred's Tower.

It's 205 steps up to the top, so Mother decided against it and sat in the car and snoozed.

When I got up there (wheezing slightly, legs like jelly), it was cloudy and with rain clearly falling nearby.

Within about 20 minutes, it all cleared up, so I was able to take photos of dark skies and blue sky & fluffy clouds within a very short time!

Stourhead

2010-08-22T07:33:00.000-07:00

Mother came to stay for a few days, and while SWMBO entertained her for most of the time (Tyntesfield and Concorde [only open until the end of September]), I felt morally obliged to take a day off work and take her somewhere.

We ended up going to Stourhead, somewhere she'd not been before, and one of the best known landscaped gardens. Fortunately, we managed to avoid the rain - the heavens opened just as we got back to the shop & tea room, which was a perfect excuse for a slice of cake.

I think this is one of the nicest views there is - it looks completely natural, but you just know that a landowner with a firm opinion of his place in history combined with a egomaniacal landscape gardener probably uprooted several small villages and converted a small hill into a substantial lake. He probably then decided that he didn't like the colour of the water and had the landscaper shot. Or something like that...

The thingy in the background is the Temple of Apollo.

Getting all Historical

2010-05-14T14:49:00.000-07:00

Thinking about published photos of mine, it reminded me of by far and away my most successful picture.

This is legendary Australian fast bowler Dennis Lillee being carried off the pitch in Northampton in 1988, after he'd slipped and knackered his ankle ligaments.

Basically, I scooped the world on this one. I was the only person on the ground with a camera on a fairly dull day in a match against Leicestershire.

I offered the photo to the resident journalist from the Chronicle and Echo, and they published it on the front page. It was also printed in Wisden and Cricketer magazines. I must have made all of £30-40 out of it. Mind you, to a student 22 years ago, that was a decent bit of cash!

And it's in Lillee's autobiography "Menace".

When the book came out, I just happened to see it in Borders and had a flick through. And blimey, there was one of my photos! I rang up the publishers and explained that they were using a picture without permission from the copyright holder - they were fine, explained that the picture had been supplied by Lillee (he'd had copies of the print at the time) and asked me to send proof that the picture was mine. I sent them a copy of the Chron's front page (which, of course, I'd kept) and they paid me for it - another £25 or so - and bunged in a copy of the paperback version of the book, complete with credit.

There's big money in photography...

Flinty Red

2010-05-14T11:45:00.001-07:00

Forgot to post this lot.

I've been developing the website for Flinty Red, the restaurant opened by wine merchants Dominic and Rachel from Corks of Cotham and chefs Matt and Claire (formerly of the Lido and QV), and went along in January to take photos for it.

I started with an exterior, based on the shot of the Corks frontage that the late Pete Chinn did for them - you can see the final cropped version on the "how to find us" page of the website.

It was an ideal opportunity to take the photo as the Indian restaurant over the road was closed for refurbishment, and the neon lights in their window reflected in Flinty Red's - it was impossible to get a shot without a garish purple reflection somewhere.

We then moved on to an interior shot, which took several goes to get the waitress blurred but still visible. Really pleased with this one, which appears on the front page of the website.

Then some attempts at something slightly different. In the end, this is nice but didn't quite work - if I twist the picture to straighten up the glass, the picture isn't straight. I think this is because the camera was pointed upwards a bit. Or down. One of the two.

And something to emphasise the importance that wine plays at Flinty Red. And we got to drink the contents of the glasses...

Got it right with this one - a nice balance between the wine glass and the restaurant side of things. Nice composition (rule of thirds!) and it works well. A cropped version of this appears on the Wine by the Glass page.

This one didn't work so well. I think it's unbalanced, and the previous one is far better.

And what reminded me about these? SWMBO was flicking through the new 2010 issue of Venue Magazine's "Eating Out West" supplement and noticed that the piece about Flinty Red has two of my photos in it - the blurred waitress and the single glass of wine.

They look really good, properly printed on glossy paper, and if I may say so myself are better than some of the photos used to plug other restaurants.

Welsh Wales

2010-05-13T12:58:00.001-07:00

We've been spending a few days in Welsh Wales - the weather has been pretty good, but it's been damn cold. It's bloody May - it shouldn't be this flamin' cold!

First up was Manorbier in Pembrokeshire. We've heard how lovely it is - it wasn't. Might have been something to do with the Arctic gale blowing, but we didn't hang around for very long. There's a surprisingly pristine castle, but it's not National Trust so we were buggered if we were going to pay to get in...

After that, we went to Colby Woodland Garden, which *is* National Trust. Quite nice, with a reasonable walled garden, but nothing desperately exciting.

When we were in Wales in September, SWMBO was trying to find a beach on the Cardigan Bay coast that she visited as a child. We've been to about half a dozen of the damn things now, and we still haven't found it. I suspect that the passage of 30 years has merged bits of several different beaches into is a mythical place that only exists in her memory/imagination.

Today we tried the wonderfully named Mwnt. Nope, that wasn't the one either. Nice though - probably really nice when it's warm. Which it wasn't. National Trust car-park though, so we parked for free! Cheap? Us?

Finally, we went back to Llanerchaeron, near Aberaeron (see post from last September). Yes, it's National Trust...

The vegetable plots in the walled garden are just starting to get going - blossom on the fruit trees, potato plants just starting to come up, that sort of thing.

I quite like this shot of one of their espaliered apple trees - shot from very low down with the very wide-angle lens.

We went back to see the pigs as well, and they're much too big to lay in the food trough now.

Are there left-handed and right-handed pigs, based on which way their tails curl?

Getting creative

2010-05-13T12:46:00.001-07:00

A bit of experimentation following a chat with a friend - try and photograph water drops.

Pretty easy to do - poke a small hole in the lid of a plastic bottle and an even smaller one in the bottom of it - that provides the drips. Gaffer tape it to a tripod that's sat over a bowl of water.

A single flash off to the side works pretty well, and then a bit of colour from some card/paper under and behind the bowl.

It worked pretty well, but looked a little bland. The stroke of genius was adding orange squash into the water! Another way to do it is apparently to drip milk into ordinary water.

Setting it all up is pretty easy - the hard bits are first of all focusing correctly and then getting the timing right. But, once you work out the timing, you can get really good results...

Wedding photos

2010-04-28T13:09:00.001-07:00

Pretty much the only non-rugby photography I've done recently was at a friend's wedding in February. I wasn't the official photographer or anything like that - I just did my normal thing and took loads of photos.

I think it's only the second wedding I've taken any serious photos at - the first was an odd one. I was involved in a sort of informal photography club at a previous job, and one lady in it asked me to go to her wedding and wander around taking photos. It was a slightly surreal experience - you had people asking "do you know the bride or groom", and I had to honestly answer "neither"! The photos came out really nicely and Nicky was happy, so that's the main thing.

I don't normally take many pictures of people, so the candid part of it is probably what appeals to me.

Caroline & Dom's wedding was at Tortworth Court in Gloucestershire - next door to Leyhill Open Prison. Fortunately it was a lovely day, and really quite picturesque with a bit of snow on the ground - not that you can see it in this photo!

I spent some time trying to get a shot of the detailing on the back of Caroline's dress - which of course led to accusations from SWMBO that I was just trying to photograph her bum...

I was trying some slightly different views, to give take something that they might not get from the main photographer. I also had a play around with the images on the computer afterwards, and really quite like the black and white conversion with a bit of softness - if gives it a bit of a "glow". It's probably very cliched, but I like it...

By the way, Dominic the groom baked his own wedding cake - really nice!

And this is him on the receiving end of the Best Man's speech ("The Brother, The Man, The Legend").

Obligatory confetti shot...

And there was dancing in the rather impressive Orangery. Oh God, the dancing. Enough alcohol was consumed for me to end up on the dancefloor, and that really doesn't happen very often.

And this is my manager Graeme strutting his funky stuff on the dancefloor. I suspect he would have preferred it if there was some Motorhead playing.

All in all, I reckon it was the best wedding I've been to. OK, I've not been to very many, but that's not to say that it wasn't a good day.

i-team.cc Mark Brookes Memorial Ride

2010-04-25T13:43:00.000-07:00

Two postings in a day - you lucky people.

Well, I say "you lucky people", but does anyone actually read this blog?

Today was the i-team.cc (my cycling club) Century Day - the aim is to get as many of the club as possible riding 100 miles on the same day. It also ties in with a ride and meet at Gloucester Docks in memory of i-team member Mark Brookes who died too young a few years ago.

Not having ridden my bike since November, I wasn't riding, but fulfilled my role as unofficial club photographer.

This is the full bunch of reprobates who met in Gloucester. Most of them are from the Portsmouth branch of the club, who drove to Hungerford and rode from there. Special credit to Jon Skidmore and Phil Freeman who rode solo from Bristol and Shrewbury respectively.

The Portsmouth branch then headed back via Birdlip Hill, which is a bit of a beast - particularly near the top with a nasty 1:6 section. Congrats to Howard and Andy who got to the top first.

There was a bit more suffering as the rest came in...

Well done to all of the riders. Must get back on my bike, and I really must do this ride one day. Without Birdlip Hill, anyway!

Saints v Saracens, 25/04/2010

2010-04-25T13:28:00.000-07:00

Last home game of the season, Saints v Saracens in the 4th meeting of the season - and with potentially another one to come in the playoff semi-finals!

A glorious sunny day, and a cracking game of rugby - the only problem being the final result - 28-27 to Saracens. Saints had a chance to win it, missing a conversion with only 2 minutes left. To be fair, Saracens played really well, and looked massively dangerous with the ball in hand - which is a major change compared to how they played at the start of the season.

Lots of good photos this week, with the good light really helping.

Some nice acrobatic stuff, as Jon Clarke doesn't quite get it right under a high ball

Ben Foden and Bruce Reihana

Dylan Hartley flattens Neil de Kock just as he gets the ball away

Lee Dickson gets hit pretty damn hard

Euan Murray and Dylan Hartley prepare for the forthcoming collision.

Bruce Reihana

And finally, a couple that I don't really want to put up, but have to because they're really nice photos. It's Saracens scoring the winning try. Really well taken, right in the corner.

The full set, and there's quite a few of them are on my website.

Bath v Saints

2010-04-21T11:42:00.001-07:00

See, I said I'd try and post more - and here I am back again in less than a week!

Another Saints game, this time a midweek trip to Bath for a catch-up from a January postponement. Not good to have 3 games in a week at such a crucial stage of the season.

Saints made 12 changes from Saturday's match, while Bath only made about 3. Saints had a number of top players on the bench, and they made a significant difference in the second half. Unfortunately Bath held out 21-20, but it was a very good performance from a bit of an ad-hoc Saints side.

The light wasn't good at the Rec, so no particularly startling photos - I'll just post up the best one.

The full set are on my website

Saints v Gloucester

2010-04-18T08:56:00.000-07:00

Is it really 3 months since I've posted on here? Oops.

I've not really taken much other than rugby since then - and there's been nothing hugely exciting in those either.

Anyway, a lovely sunny day on the terrace at Franklin's Gardens in Northampton as the Saints took on Gloucester in the Premiership. The two teams met recently in the LV= final - that was a cracking game, and so was this. And we won both of them!

The pick pick of the pics:

Stephen Myler gets an uncomfortable boot

This one is more out of historical interest than because it's a particularly good photo - Phil Dowson is a back-row forward, not a hooker, so why is he throwing into the lineout? Dylan Hartley was in the sin bin, and there hadn't been a scrum so we hadn't brought on a front row replacement. Up steps Dowson, he throws to Juandre Kruger in the lineout and promptly joins the maul to get back on with his day job. No problem.

And finally, Bruce Reihana - his break led to our bonus-point try, with less than a minute on the clock. He could and should have scored himself, but he gave the ball to Chris Ashton for him to finish off his hat-trick. The Saints are very much a team if nothing else.

Northampton Saints v Perpignan

2010-01-19T10:44:00.000-08:00

A Sunday afternoon match in the Heineken European Cup, and a must-win match for the Saints if they are to qualify for the knockout stages. Fortunately, Perpignan can't qualify and therefore sent a weakened team.

It has to be said that the first half wasn't the greatest I've ever seen, ending a mere 6-0 to the Saints. I managed to get a couple of decent photos in the good light - one of the better lineout shots I've taken (Juandre Kruger), and one of the rare situations where one of the better best shots of the day is of the opposition!

The second half was much better, with the Saints scoring 3 tries in the first 15 minutes. The first came from another dazzling break by Ben Foden, who shipped it on to the try scoring machine that is Chris Ashton. I managed to keep track of this one, leading to quite a good scoring shot.

After the third try (which took place exactly behind the posts - I took the best ever photo I've taken of the posts), the Saints relaxed a bit and took a few key players off for a rest ahead of Friday's game in Munster, allowing Perpignan back into the game. We spent the rest of the half defending - rather well it has to be said - until we managed to turn the ball over with no time left on the clock. Next time the ball went dead, the game as over. But, in the never-say-die style that has already given us 2 last-minute wins in the last month, the players kept attacking. Suddenly the ball was shipped out wide, quickly making its way to Jon Clarke. He reminded us that he's no slouch and scooted down the touchline towards the try line, jinking back inside the last defender to touch down for the bonus-point try - pretty much right in front of me, thank you very much.

So, a 34-0 thumping of the reigning French champions just leaves the Saints with the small matter of going to Munster on Friday night (which is not long enough of a rest), knowing that a win puts them in the quarter finals. If they lose, they may well still get through - although their likely opponents would be, um, Munster away...

It never ceases to amaze me how many people leave before the final whistle. That means that in the last month they will have missed game-winning tries in two matches and a last-minute (crucial) bonus point try.

The full set of photos can be found on my website.

January Snow

2010-01-06T10:02:00.001-08:00

I've been living in Bristol for more than 13 years now, and we've had negligible snowfall in most of that time - probably 2 snowy mornings - and I reckon the last decent snow I saw was probably in 1991.

But in the last 12 months, we've had 4 decent snowfalls - 2 in Jan/Feb, one at the end of December and another one today. Being the inveterate snapper that I am (which you wouldn't guess from the amount I've posted to this blog, would you?), I've taken the opportunities to get out and take some photos. These are today's.

The Downs

A bicycle on Whiteladies Road

Snowboarding on Brandon Hill

St Mary Redcliffe

The lump of metal in the foreground is a fairly famous piece of tram track that landed in the grounds during a German bombing raid in WW2

December Snow

2010-01-06T09:59:00.001-08:00

Yes, I know it was a few weeks ago, but I've only just got round to sorting out the photos...

A decent snowfall a few days before Christmas, so I did the usual and walked to The Downs with camera in hand. The snowfall was all overnight, and it turned into a lovely morning.

Pickles

2010-01-06T09:47:00.000-08:00

Once the chutneyfest had been completed, we moved on to pickled onions. In the end, our garage smelled very slightly of vinegar - I wonder why that might be?

We did two batches of onions - one used bog-standard Sarsons pickling vinegar, the second used vinegar "enhanced" by us. My brother is the first to have tried some of these, and reported that while his sinuses were perfectly clear, he appeared to be missing the top of his head. Got them about right then!

Tomatoes

2009-10-20T10:26:00.000-07:00

We cleared down the last of our tomatoes at the weekend, to get them in before any frosts. A lot were still green, but realistically there's no chance that they will ripen now. We picked the small matter of 28lbs of the things!

This is what 28lbs of tomatoes looks like

SWMBO has made a tomato sauce out of the ripe ones, but the rest are going into chutney - and that many tomatoes need a lot of vinegar, apples, onions and sugar!

The brother has suggested that this beast, 1lb in weight, should be made into an individual batch of chutney - much like a single-cask whisky...

A 1lb tomato

Northampton Saints v Munster

2009-10-11T06:56:00.001-07:00

At Franklin's Gardens in Northampton yesterday evening for the Saints first game in this season's European Cup, playing Munster for the first time since we beat them 9-8 in the Heineken Cup Final in May 2000 - 27/05/2000 to be precise, a date firmly embedded in my memory. Also the Saints first match in the Heineken Cup since they were relegated at the end of the 2006/07 season - one season in Division One, and winners of the European Challenge Cup last season.

And what a game it was last night, ending in a 31-27 upset win for the Saints. Munster are one of the best teams in Europe - last season they won the Magners League and were runners up to Leinster in the Heineken Cup Final. They are stuttering a little at the moment, and this was the first game for many of their Lions players, but this was a fantastic win for Northampton against a side packed full of Ireland and Lions internationals. It was also one of the best games of rugby I've ever been to, and by far the best atmosphere at the Gardens I've experienced. There were plenty of Munster fans (up to 2,500 in a sell-out crowd of 13,500) making a lot of noise, but the Saints fans cranked it up several notches to create a fantastic evening. The Munster fans were only really "allowed" one or two full renditions of Fields of Athenry - after that, the "Wendy's" (as in "When The Saints Go Marching In") were fired up to drown them out. A top night!

Plenty of early Saints pressure, this chip through from Geraghty just covered by Munster, with Clarke and Best not far off.

A relatively easy opportunist try for Chris Ashton - there's a decent sequence in the full set showing the lead up to it.

Ronan O'Gara butchering one of Munster's best try-scoring opportunities by failing to hold on to the ball. Again, there's a decent sequence showing this.

Thomas O'Leary scored an excellent individual try to close Munster to within a single point. I had quite a successful night, as there's a few of this as well.
I didn't, however, get anything of Shane Geraghty's outrageous try at the end of the first half, even though it happened right in front of me - everyone expected him to kick the penalty as there was no time left in the half, but an audacious quick tap led to a try.

Anyway, the Saints held out under immense Munster pressure in the last few minutes - Geraghty's penalty extended the lead to 4 points, so Munster had to go for the try.

You can see what it meant to them when the final whistle went.

The full set of photos are on my sports photography website

Claire Jones at Red Hat Photo (well, Green Hat Photo last night as Munster wear red) hired a 400mm f2.8 lens for the game (that's her in the first photo of the full set) - her photos will be on her website at some point (not there at the time of writing), and if they're anything like her usual standard, well worth a look.

Bletchley Park

2009-10-02T11:43:00.001-07:00

We spent Monday at Bletchley Park, home of the wartime code breakers. The following day, it was announced that they were receiving £500,000 of Lottery money - and quite right too. Thoroughly deserving, as an important part of our national history, that is in disgracefully poor condition in parts. Without the geniuses that worked there, we wouldn't be where we are today. Whether that's a good thing just at the moment is a matter for debate...

First up, this just made me smile - somehow I always imagined that Bomber Command would be far more impressive...

This is a real, actual, proper German Enigma machine. It's in a glass case so that no nutter can nick it again. Anyway, why did they give it back to Jeremy Paxman? Stephen Fry must have been gutted.

This is part of a superb slate statue of Alan Turing, father of modern computing. Without him, it is quite possible I would be doing something completely different for a living. Some people might say this would be a good thing.

These last two are of the re-created Colossus computer. If you run the simulation program on a modern 2GHz computer, it takes the same time to crack the codes as Colossus did during WWII. Personally, I think it could do with a few flashing lights before it looks like a *proper* computer.

Oxford

2009-10-02T11:19:00.001-07:00

We spent last Friday wandering round Oxford, having deposited my mother at John Radcliffe hospital for a minor eye operation (all fine, thanks for asking). I think I've only been once before, and that was about 30 years ago when we had a French exchange boy over (well, when I say "exchange", he came over [as did his brother a couple of years later] but we never went to stay with them). There may even be photos of this somewhere in my dad's collection, but it'll take a while to get there as it must have been 1978 or '79 and and I'm only up to 1958...

Anyway, the best shot of the day came from the top of the University Church of St Mary The Virgin, showing the Radcliffe Camera, with All Souls College on the right and Brasenose College on the left. No, that's not a bird above the dome, it's a speck of sodding dust on the sodding sensor, which I haven't had time to clean up yet - it's on loads of the damn pictures...

Nikon D200, Sigma 10-20mm lens, 1/400 @ f11, ISO 320

Llanerchaeron

2009-10-02T11:11:00.001-07:00

The final stop on our Welsh trip was to Llanerchaeron, near Aberaeron - a John Nash house with an enormous pair of walled gardens. These were full of more fruit and vegetable plants than you could imagine.

Panasonic FX-37, 26mm equivalent, 1/500 @ f3.5, ISO 100

There is also a working farm, with some particularly inquisitive pigs!

Panasonic FX-37, 26mm equivalent, 1/500 @ f3.5, ISO 100

Some of the plants in the walled garden were covered with more bees than I've ever seen - I assume they've got a hive or two somewhere. There were also plenty of butterflies - I seem to have hardly seen any since I was a child (and that's going back some way now...). I was surprised by just how close I could get to it with the macro turned on on the compact camera.

Panasonic FX-37, 26mm equivalent, 1/500 @ f3.5, ISO 100

Having mentioned on a previous post about the fogged infra-red film at Dyrham Park and Croombe Park, I was extra careful with the film I shot in Wales. Unfortunately, it wasn't until the film counter reached 38 that I realised the damn film hadn't been winding on. Gnaargh! Mutter, damn, blast...
So, not a successful summer on the infra-red front.

Bosherston

2009-10-02T11:05:00.001-07:00

We also visited Bosherston in Pembrokeshire, where three small valleys were flooded in the 1800s to form a large series of lakes. These are full of water lillies, and look fantastic.

Panasonic FX-37, 26mm equivalent, 1/800 @ f5.6, ISO 100

Having walked for a mile or so along the valley, you suddenly come out at Broad Haven beach - completely unexpected and very picturesque. Without wanting to sound rude, you wouldn't guess it was Wales, would you?
Panasonic FX-37, 26mm equivalent, 1/800 @ f4.4, ISO 100

And on the walk back, we came across this cormorant, which happily sat there for ages while I took photos.

Panasonic FX-37, 130mm equivalent, 1/125 @ f5.9, ISO 200

Llansteffan

2009-10-02T10:52:00.000-07:00

We spent a few days in Wales in early September, which coincided with several days of fantastic weather. For a change, I deliberately left my digital SLR at home and shot a bit of film. I'll post those up when I get them back from processing and scan them - these shots are from my little digital compact.

I'm so impressed by the macro facilities you get with them, making shots like this dead easy.

Panasonic FX-37, 26mm equivalent, 1/640 @ f5.6, ISO 100

Llansteffan was lovely - it was really quiet, and at times all you could hear was a bit of wind and some seagulls. The tide times were just right, which enabled us to walk out surprisingly far onto the sand banks. And yes, we did take care to make sure we weren't cut off.

Panasonic FX-37, 26mm equivalent, 1/800 @ f5, ISO 100

And finally, I resurrected an old family habit of drawing "DON'T PANIC" in the sand (from Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy) - since the early 80's we've done this on endless beaches!

Panasonic FX-37, 26mm equivalent, 1/800 @ f6.3, ISO 100

Abbey House Gardens

2009-10-02T10:45:00.001-07:00

A visit to Abbey House Gardens in Malmesbury in early September. I seem to have taken quite a lot of photos of bees this year, and am quite pleased with these two.

Nikon D200, Cosina 100mm macro lens, 1/250 @ f11, ISO 250

Nikon D200, Cosina 100mm macro lens, 1/320 @ f8, ISO 400

And finally I rather like the colours, light and shadow on this.

Nikon D200, Cosina 100mm macro lens, 1/640 @ f8, ISO 160

Northampton Saints v Rotherham Titans

2009-10-01T14:21:00.001-07:00

To Franklin's Gardens in late August for The Saints pre-season match against Rotherham. This was combined with the club's open day, so the players not involved in the game were hanging around in the "village" area posing for photos and signing autographs. This is Neil Best - I asked if I could take his photo, and he paused and then posed for me. He was the only one to really pose - everyone else just stands there and lets you take the photo. Top bloke!

Nikon D200, Nikon 18-200VR lens at 55mm, 1/125 @ f8, ISO 100

This is prop Soane Tonga'uhia (aka "Tiny" - all 6'3" and 19 stone of him) scoring.

Nikon D200, Nikon 70-300VR at 300mm, 1/125 @ f8, ISO 100

Centre Jon Clarke takes a bit of a hit.

Nikon D200, Nikon 70-300VR lens at 250mm, 1/1600 @ f5.6, ISO 400

"Tiny" might be a big old lump, but he's very athletic and an amazingly good runner. When you watch the pre-match warm-ups, he's also very flexible.

Nikon D200, Nikon 70-300VR lens at 220mm, 1/1250 @ f5.3, ISO 400

This is John Brake, our up-and-coming scrum half. Really nippy around the pitch - still only 21 and hopefully an integral of the squad in years to come.

Nikon D200, Nikon 70-300VR lens at 300mm, 1/1600 @ f5.6, ISO 400

I do really enjoy photographing rugby, but the quality of the photos that Claire Jones takes at the Saints can be quite demoralising at times (in the nicest possible way, Claire!) - see the right-hand side of the page for a link to her web page (Red Hat Photo).

The garden (again)

2009-10-01T14:12:00.000-07:00

Another one from the garden at home, with a bee collecting pollen from, well I don't know, some plant or other. I can identify a rose, a lily and a tulip and that's about it. We had loads of bees in the garden this year (I won't use the term "summer" as we didn't really have one), really good to see.

Nikon D200, Cosina 100mm macro lens, 1/160 @ f6.7, ISO 100

Croombe Park

2009-10-01T14:03:00.000-07:00

This was taken the day after Dyrham Park, at Croombe Park near Malvern. It's one of those big Capability Brown jobs, where the landowner quite happily moved a village out of the way so that he could improve the view.

This is the sort of picture I keep on taking - loads of sky, starburst sun (who needs Cokin Starburst filters?) and some photogenic clouds.

Nikon D200, Sigma 10-20 lens at 10mm, 1/500 @ f11, ISO 100

I did also shoot some infra-red film at Dyrham Park and Croombe Park, but that ended up fogged for some reason. Really infuriating.

The garden

2009-10-01T13:52:00.000-07:00

These were actually taken on the same day as the previous ones, later in the afternoon.

This is a courgette flower, in the evening sunlight at the front of the house.

Panasonic FX-37, 26mm equiv, 1/500 @ f4, ISO 100

One of our lilys - I think the water droplets come from watering rather than rain.

Panasonic FX-37, 26mm equiv, 1/200 @ f2.8, ISO 100

This one is much less arty than the others, but does show just how many vegetables we* were growing! The plants in the blue Ikea bags are green beans, runner beans, peas, mange-tout and petit-pois, while the stuff in the black buckets at the front are potatoes. The metal cages you can make out at the back are supporting the tomatoes. Some of the tomatoes are still going, 6ft tall and with massive fruit. We've already made two batches of green tomato chutney (one of them a huge batch) as well as tomato sauce and tomato soup.

* That's the royal "we" of course. My job in the garden is to cut the lawn and lug bags of compost around.

Panasonic FX-37, 26mm equiv, 1/60 @ f4, ISO 100

First lot - Dyrham Park

2009-10-01T13:34:00.001-07:00

So that I've got something to show, we'll start by going back a bit into the summer.

These are from Dyrham Park near Bath, taken when I had a couple of days off in July.

I'm a bit of a sucker for skies like this, especially when combined with a nice building like that.

Nikon D200, Sigma 10-20mm lens at 10mm, 1/125 @ f11, ISO 100

I thought I'd dig out my (not terribly good) macro lens and get in really close to a few flowers. I really need to buy a decent macro, but that will have to wait.

Anyway, a really vivid yellow.

Nikon D200, Cosina 100mm macro lens, 1/25 @ f11, ISO 100

There were an amazing number of dragonflies buzzing about the gardens. Most of them were small neon blue things, and they seemed to be hanging around in groups, shagging. But, there were a couple of real whoppers as well - totally impossible to photograph in flight, but they did helpfully land on the water occasionally. Just a shame that they landed on the mankiest bit of water...

Nikon D200, Nikon 18-200VR lens at 200mm, 1/50 @ f11. ISO 100

I absolutely love my 10-20mm lens (15-30mm equivalent in 35mm terms) and use it all the time. There's just no other way you could take a shot like this.

Nikon D200, Sigma 10-20mm lens at 10mm, 1/640 @ f5.6, ISO 160

What, another blog?

2009-10-01T13:31:00.001-07:00

Right, inspired by the blog I've set up to show my dad's photos as I gradually scan the hundreds of films and thousands of slides, I thought I'd start one to show *my* photos!