Photography

All the photographs I have used in this website are my own, taken personally by me.  I always had a certain gra for taking photos, as a child, a teen and later into my 20’s, people bought me various little compact cameras for taking snapshots.  The photos I produced were never much good, but I loved trying!

I started my photography journey in earnest in May 2021 by enrolling in the NCFE Level 1 in Photography course and I purchased myself a Canon DSLR.  I joined some groups for beginner photographers on social media and started looking into the rules of composition.  I spent the summer getting out and about taking photos on auto-mode, for I had a terrible fear of the dreaded manual mode and its various settings.  I had a lot of fun and produced some not too terrible photographs as result of my efforts.  I went from strength to strength when the course began a few months later, met new friends and we helped each other on our mission to master the basics of manual mode.  The written assignment was a bit of a pain and at one point I feared I wouldn’t find the motivation to struggle through.  I managed though, and ended the year with a spectacular night in the college where our work was displayed in the Art and Design departments end of year exhibition.

My confidence in my abilities grew the following year with the completion of the Level 2 course.  I upgraded to a mirrorless camera and I was better prepared for the work load and found it much less of a struggle.  Year 2 once again ended with a big exhibition and having learned from the previous year’s mistakes, I roped in some help to help me hang my work which resulted in a million percent improvement in presentation!

I’m in a local camera club and continue to try and improve my photography skills.  I very much still consider myself a beginner although the photos I’m taking now are a vast improvement on the blurry, out of focus photos of my teens of random objects and family pets.

Learning composition techniques, and training my eyes to watch for opportunities for a nice photo has re-awoken in me the beauty of mother nature and the world around me.  I have once again begun to notice the miracles of nature and the complexities of plants and trees and landscapes that surround us but we take for granted every day.  This aspect of photography reminds me of my safe-place as a child, chilling out in my grannie’s garden on a blanket, with a bunch of books while she lovingly tended her plants, pulled up weeds and threw the odd stray earthworm in the direction of a cheeky robin, I remember for years there was always a robin hopping around a short distance away from her in her garden.  (I don’t know how long robins live, maybe it was the same one for a few years or a series of robins that learned the same trick.)

Photography brings me back to my childhood in this respect.  It makes me see and experience the world in a way I have not done in many, many years.  I consider it a great gift to have this ability back in my 40s after having it lie dormant for may decades.  I will continue with my efforts to improve my photography and broaden my knowledge, it has been a great pass time that forces me to get out and about and create a little bit of activity in my life.