Bite-Size Blog Post #88 - Haresceugh Fell
I make a very quick photography stop with an old friend before heading north for an exciting adventure.
On My Way to Something Exciting
My friend and long time photography collaborator, Chris Sale, has been photographing the Pennines ever since he moved there a few years ago. I try to pop in and see him and his lovely wife whenever I’m passing by on the M6. It’s always good to catch up, especially when it involves an overnight stay, as that gives us the opportunity to head out with the cameras.
Earlier this week, Chris kindly invited me to stay on my way up to Scotland. I’m visiting Scotland to catch a flight to a very special location, but more of that in a future blog post.
I arrived at his house after dark, so there wasn’t much time to do anything other than enjoy a glass of wine and have a chat. We did, however, promise ourselves that we’d get up early the following morning for some photography.
It turned out to be a challenging hour or so. The morning had brought heavy cloud, and Chris’s home territory in the Pennines is far from the easiest place to photograph. As Chris describes it, it’s like Dartmoor, but without any of the interesting stuff!
The image you see below was actually taken on the walk back to the car. I had found the morning very challenging and I don’t think I took more than five frames in total. Yet, somehow, this photograph caught my attention.
Perhaps it was the long path stretching into the distance. Maybe, subconsciously, it represented the long journey I had ahead of me. Or perhaps it’s just a picture of a path!
Either way, spending an hour with a friend doing the thing we both love is never a waste of time. In fact, I’ll be stopping off on my way back from this trip, so we’ll get the cameras out and do it all again.
Hopefully, with better weather this time.
Haresceugh Fell, The Pennines - Nikon Z8 with Nikkor Z 14-30mm /f4 S at 16mm, f/8, 1/60 sec at ISO 500, Kase Revolution CPL.
Bite-Size Blog Post #75 - Fiend's Fell
A short walk in the Pennines revealed a stark but beautiful landscape where light, shadow, and a solitary cairn became the perfect black and white subject.
Featureless and Challenging
In my last blog post, I talked about my day out exploring and photographing the north east of the Lake District with friend and collaborator Chris Sale. Though Chris knows the Lake District very well, he has also spent the last few years getting to know the Pennines. So, the day after we photographed the Lake District, he took me out on a short walk to a nearby hill in the Pennines.
The drive up to Hartside Pass was brilliant, full of twisty bends and sweeping views. I could immediately see why it had become so popular with drivers and motorcyclists alike. It was a lovely sunny day, so the road was busy, but we were soon parked up and walking out across the open moorland towards the cairn on Fiend’s Fell.
Chris had told me many times how featureless parts of the Pennines can feel, and he wasn’t wrong. In many ways, it reminded me of Dartmoor, just without the dramatic tors. The views were stunning though: rolling hills stretching as far as the eye could see. But beyond that, there was very little to catch the eye. I could suddenly understand why Chris gets excited about stone walls and ruined buildings. Finding an interesting foreground out here certainly isn’t easy. For me, the most obvious, and probably only, choice was the cairn itself.
Almost immediately, I began thinking in black and white. Removing the colour would help emphasise the texture and structure of the cairn, while also drawing attention to the moving patterns of light and shadow moving across the landscape and sky. I never thought I’d get excited about photographing a cairn!
While the Lake District is undoubtedly the more varied and dramatic landscape, there’s no doubt that the Pennines are an area deserving of much closer attention.