Priory of St John.

The first image taken with the new Canon TS-E 24mm F/3.5L II.

The Priory of St John, Trim, Co Meath taken this morning on a field trip with 12 of my students from the class on Photography I teach. I didn't manage to take a bucket load of image as I was too busy looking after the passing on a few words of wisdom.

When I did take an image. What results. Stunning is all I can say. Centre to edge sharpness is wonderful. Crisp, clear and contrast all wonderful.

Ok the low-res jpeg image here will not do it justice, but the export form Aperture viewed at 100% in Photoshop or Loupe in Aperture looks like is needs not unsharp mask applied.

Back to the image. We had to wait a short while for the sun to come out from behind the clouds all day. This was great for the students as they could see that a difference it makes to their exposure and the way it subject was lit up. Also they also learned position of the sun in the sky plays a important part in a photographers knowledge which no text books can teach you.

I think at the end of the day they all went home very happy campers. Now I have to wait until next Tuesday nights class to see their results.

Black Castle Wicklow

We are now at the end of our Wicklow & Wexford Coastal journey with a photo of Black Castle which stands on a rocky promontory over the sea. We spent a god while here trying to find the best viewpoint and light.

This image above shows whats left of the castle to its best compared to the Google search images found on the Internet in my opinion. It's taken further down the coast than normal along a cliff path. However the foreground interest leads your eye nicely into the image and to the final resting place of the castle itself. We had to wait for some people to move out of the shoot and for the sun to reappear from behind the clouds. This angle of morning light is used to light up the face of the cliff and castle which is again the reason for this viewpoint.

You can possibly get a better image of the castle walls in detail from the other side but would be shooting into the sun and the castle would be in complete shadow. A return visit at a different time in the year is on the cards.

Wicklow Coast Continued....

We continue on our Wicklow & Wexford Coastal tour with the image about. After our wonderful breakfast mentioned in the pervious post and collected the now fully charged batteries form the house we headed south passed Brittas Bay. We found a lovely small bridge and river. Following the river through a field we came out onto the sea front in the image above.

Wonderful line and clouds are the composition in this image. I still had my wellies and over trousers on and kept them on for the whole day. It might not look the prettiest but it gets the job done and I am warm and dry.

I will post the images of the bridge and surroundings during the coming weeks as they are interesting in that : what you can find and photograph when out and about looking and exploring.

Have a good weekend and remember to bring your camera out with you.

For more SkyWatch Friday images Link Here

Brittas Bay Sunrise

We have done a u-turn here and gone south down the Wicklow coast to Brittas Bay for an early morning sunrise. It didn't look like it was going to be any good. We had a big empty beach to play with and some small sand dunes. Instead of pointing the camera into the sunrise to the east I decided that turning and looking north along the beach and use the rising sun to side-light the foreground interest. We started to get some lovely cloud formations which added interest to the sky.

I don't know what happened but my batteries started to loose power very quickly and had to take a couple of images then remove the battery and place it inside my clothing. Just leave it a that and say nothing more on the subject as to the position of the battery. I had a spare backup battery in the car to continue on shooting that day. I presume it was the cold that was effecting the performance of the batteries.

We decided to head back to the house used as our base ( thanks Gavin's Mum & Dad ) and get a complete charge to my dying batteries. Also a good time to get breakfast. A hot coffee and a Full Irish Breakfast Roll down by the harbor. This will bring us nicely onto the final images to be posted during the coming days.

The Monochrome Weekend and many more can be found here .

Kilmichael Strand

We continue on our journey up the Wicklow Coast with an image from the sand dunes behind the beach of Kilmichael Strand. We had a wonderful afternoon sun to play with casting shadows and a warm quality to the light. Using this light to great use in the long grasses in the foreground and lighting up the countryside in the background.

While waiting for the right light, camera setup, check your twitter feed on you phone. How wonderful technology is today that you can be standing in the middle of a beach and still be connected to the world. Alone but not alone, well besides from Gavin standing right next to me that is.

Just after we had taken these images a man on a horse appeared and went straight into the water and that was that. No more reflections in the water. I did manage to get a couple of images of this but I think it does not work as the rider and horse takes away your interest in the light and shadow detail which for me is the image.

I think I have a few more image to show you before we get to the end of our journey in the series on the Wicklow Coast. So come back again and continue your journey with me.