FatSig, as it is Known

About 10 years ago, one of my oldest friends died. He kindly left me a sum of money to play with. I’d just got back into photography, and was at that time using a Sony R1. I liked the interface, and the handling. Around the same time, Sony released the A850 as a cheaper alternative to the A900, and that, and a couple of lenses, were within my reach because of my friend’s kindness.

Cow Parsley in the Defensive Ditch at Ludgershall Castle

So, an A850 went on the shopping list… But what lenses? Well, I only needed a couple, I thought. And who needs a bagful of prime lenses? A nice wide angle zoom, and a long-ish telezoom would surely suffice. The Sony 70-300G had been well-reviewed, and who needs anything longer than 300mm, right? The wide angle presented a bit of a dilemma, but after reading a few reviews, I settled on the Sigma 24-70 f2.8 IF EX DG. It was a big, heavy lump of glass, with a big front element to let the light in. Due to its girth, it’s become known as FatSig.

Scabious and Cranesbill

I’ve always been impressed with it. Other lenses have been and gone over the years, but old FatSig remains with me.

Sunset Neat Compton Abbas , Dorset

The 70-300 gave way to a 70-400, then a 150-500, then a 150-600. And of course…only two lenses? What was I thinking? I discovered M42 adapters, and the fun of finding old lenses to use. 50mm M42 lenses made me realise I might need a 50mm AF lens as well… And, oh, look, there’s a second hand Minolta 50mm f1.7 on eBay!

Still, though, FatSig was always there. It has nice contrast and lovely colours.

Oil Seed Rape and a Blue and White Sky

Sometimes you feel the need to go a bit wider than 24mm, so yes, you might need a Cosina 19-35, or a Sigma 17-35, or a Tokina 20-35. So each of them was duly experimented with, and the last remains with me. The Tokina is a nice lens too, for the the price.

A Winterbourne Ford (Tokina 20-35)

And, of course, when I moved to the telephotos that started at 150mm, there was now a gap between them and the top of the Sigma’s range. Some experiments later, I ended up with the Minolta 100-200 which I still have – a sharp lens with lovely colours.

A Tiger Moth Takes Wing (Minolta 100-200)

As time goes by, the lens bag has filled with more lenses (mostly cheap and fun). But the Sigma 24-70, good old FatSig, remains in the bag.

Water Dean Bottom

Ten years of use, dropped once and fixed once, still a lovely thing.

Over the Black Heath

Salisbury Plain — 31/12/15

Today started bright, and as I hadn’t been the to Plain for a few days, I decided today’s trip – the last of the year – should head that way. When we arrived atop the Plain, I was disappointed to find that once again it was very windy, and clouds in the distance hinted at the showers to come. We trundled along the Wessex Ridgeway, looking for birds, but once again there were few to be seen. The clouds also began to roll in, and the day turned greyer. A heavy shower was soon rattling on the roof and gusts of wind rocked the car on the suspension.

However, when the shower had blown by, a rather splendid rainbow was left behind.

Double Rainbow Over the Plain

While I changed to a wider-angle lens, more sunshine burst through the breaks in the cloud and the landscape became more golden…

A Full Bow Over the Plain

We continued on our way, and then stopped to have a drink and look out over the heathland. There, I espied a female (ringtail) hen harrier, but it was too far away to take a photo. As we finished our drinks, we could see cloud building again to the west… More showers were on the way. We decided we might as well head home. The rain held off for a while though, so we pushed on a bit further around the east of the Plain, on the byway to Larkhill past Casterley Castle, Compton and Netheravon. Here we saw a hen harrier again. Whether or not it was the same one, we could not tell, of course. And just before we saw the hen harrier, coming down the hill to Water Dean Bottom, the last few moments of sun weakly illuminated the archeological features around Compton, and made the lines of the lynchets rather lovely.

Strip Lynchets at Compton

And then, finally, just before the turning off to the old road to Netheravon, this copse – a rather perfect, typical Wiltshire copse – caught my eye, and it was one I hadn’t photographed before.

A Typical Wiltshire Copse

After that, there was a bit more drifting around the tracks, and an exploration of a byway I hadn’t driven along before. We retraced our wheel tracks in an attempt to relocate the hen harrier, but to no avail. And then the clouds began to gather and gloom overtook us, so we returned home.

And that is the story of my day…

Except that… At home, while reviewing my photos and processing them, I realised the few photos I had taken today had the feel of David Inshaw landscape paintings of the mid-70s. If you don’t know Inshaw’s work, see:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Inshaw
http://www.davidinshaw.net/

Cutting into Trees and Surprise Egrets

Today’s trip took us east and north of Marlborough. Chores delayed our start, so we thought to drift around locally and see what we could see – a few miles to the east to Froxfield, then to Ramsbury, Aldbourne, and Baydon, then back to Aldbourne, up to Upper Upham, and then back to Marlborough.

First, to Froxfield to look at the little water meadow pond there. Sometimes it’s a pond, sometimes it’s simply a big puddle. At the moment, it’s half-way between a puddle and a pond. In the field next door, where the stream that feeds the pond exits, I was surprised – and pleased – to note the rather astounding total of 15 or so little egrets. Surprised, as I had noted only a few days ago that the egrets that visited the area had seemingly disappeared; and pleased, as there is still something slightly odd in seeing this so-recently-continental bird paddling in local streams.

Two of the Fifteen Little Egrets

Unfortunately no bird – green sandpiper, little egret, grey heron, carrion crow nor red kite – would come close enough to enable a lovely detailed photograph. So we carried on towards Ramsbury. Chugging up the slight incline to Rudge, I noticed that the bare trees were making lovely shapes against the sun, so I stopped to take some photos.

Trees on the Ridge at Rudge – 1

Trees on the Ridge at Rudge – 2

After this we continued our journey towards Ramsbury, making a small detour to the place we call Yellowhammer Yard, because it was once a favourite of yellowhammers feasting on the farmer’s discarded seed and husks. Unfortunately, Yellowhammer Yard has been filling up with discarded soil, trees, gravel and manure, and is no longer visited by the variety of birds it once was – although we did see a number of chaffinches bright in the sinking sun.

So back towards Ramsbury we headed, then onto Aldbourne,  where I made the choice “go up that road there, we hardly ever go that way”, a choice with which Lizzie agreed. Nothing much took my eye, however. At Aldbourne I decided for a change to head towards Baydon, which I have only toured through a couple of times. Happy circumstance! For along the road out of Aldbourne we had an excellent view of a barn owl, quartering the verges of the road. So close was it, I never had time to properly compose and focus; all I have is a rear view…

A Departing Barn Owl

And so we carried on, through Baydon, along Ermin Street, and then taking a left back towards Aldbourne. There was a momentary diversion along a byway that sadly went from gravel to slick mud with deep ruts, which I didn’t want to attempt (well, not with Lizzie looking on with terror!). So we reversed out of that muddy nightmare, and headed back towards Aldbourne; but only a couple a hundred yards/metres or so down the road, I noticed another lovely ridge-line of stark tree silhouettes…

I liked the wires appearing from out of the frame in this one:

Tree Lines

The other photos from this location involved cutting into the wide view to find pleasing arrangements of smaller groups of trees:

Space for a Sunset

The Dancing Sisters

By the time we’d finished photographing these trees, the sun had dropped behind the downs of Wiltshire, and the light began to quickly fail, so we headed home, via Aldbourne, a diversion to Upper Upham, then Aldbourne again to Whiteshard Bottom and the Roman road to Mildenhall.

And that is the story of my day…

Salisbury Plain — 23/12/15

Today was a bright day, the first after many days of dullness, and rain, and grey skies and rain. So I decided to head out and see what I could find to photograph. As is often the case I headed to Salisbury Plain hoping, as usual, to find hen harriers and short-eared owls.

For various reasons, I made my way to the Plain via the back-roads around Wootton Rivers and then through Netheravon. Just before Wootton Rivers, next to the road for Brimslade Farm, is a very small shed I’ve seen many times and thought to photograph. Today, with the weak, watery sun shining on it, seemed like a good day. I tried it from a couple of different angles, but from straight ahead, with Martinsell Hill in the background, worked best I felt.

The Tiny Shed Near Brimslade Farm

The day was, as so many seem to have been this year, blowy, which meant there were very few small birds sitting atop posts and branches. However, once I arrived at the Plain, there were small birds to be found at ground level. The problem would be photographing them among the grass. Pleasingly, this meadow pipit did what meadow pipits like to do — run along the road — and so gave me a fine photo op…

Meadow Pipit in the Road

I watched the starlings, pipits, buntings and linnets flit around and feed for a while, and then I headed on towards Casterley Castle. When I drove into the combe at Water Down Bottom I spied a hawk being mobbed by a crow. The hawk turned out to be a red kite; this was the third or fourth time I had seen a kite in this location, and would surmise that it is the same one. Kites are not yet that common on the Plain, nor in this part of Wiltshire, so it is interesting that one appears to be resident somewhere around this area. I didn’t manage to get a very good photo of it — it suddenly moved very fast towards me, and I wasn’t ready…

Red Kite at Compton

Having failed in this endeavour, I continued up the hill out of the combe and onto the Wessex Ridgeway, along by Casterley Castle and towards the Charlton Clumps. The Clumps are a small stands of trees that are spread around the top of Charlton Hill. I often photograph them. I tried to resist. But I saw some fieldfares, and stopped to check them out. And then my eyes were drawn to this Clump, and I just had to…

One of the Charlton Clumps

 

As to the fieldfares, there were hundreds, probably thousands of them around the Plain today, sitting in trees and grubbing in the grass. I managed to catch some sitting in the sun, high up in a tree in another of the Clumps:

Three Fieldfares in a Tree

I then continued on my way around the Plain, along the Ridgeway, past Red Horn vedette post to Market Lavington vedette post, where I took the byway into the centre of the Plain. I saw very little as I drove down this byway and others, just flocks of starlings flying past to their roost (there is a large starling murmuration on the Plain). No hen harriers, no short-eared owls. I think I might have seen a merlin, but can’t be sure. Chasing the uncertain merlin, I ended up near some trees — called Old Farm Clump on the Ordnance Survey map of the early 1900s. Next to this clump, on the other side of the byway, are three evergreen trees. One of them stands slightly apart, and often makes a good photographic subject depending on the time of day, year and sky. Today, the lone tree looked rather good in the weak light with broken cloud behind it.

I thought it might be worth trying a shot with the Lensbaby Composer and Sweet 35 lens… I rather liked it… I made the colours cool in this shot:

A Lone Tree with Lensbaby

Whereas in this shot, using the Sigma 24-70 wide angle, I went for a warmer tone, sunset colours. This made the shot starker, more of a silhouette. I also went for a lower angle, shooting upwards slightly:

The Lone Tree, Low and Wide

After that, darkness quickly began to fall. There were no owls or deer to entertain me, and shower clouds began to roll in from the west. So I headed back up through Candown Bottom towards the Market Lavington vedette, back to Red Horn Hill, and down to Devizes to get myself a spade.

And that is the story of my day…

 

 

 

 

 

Little Egret Haiku

in mirror water
an egret waits — then its bill
breaks this calm instant.

A Holloway On the Plain

I confess to liking old roads and old ways. I’m not much of a historian, nor much for history; however, perhaps because I spent a lot of time travelling in my Dad’s lorry when I was young, old roads and trackways intrigue me. If I catch sight of a linear hollow in the landscape, I always wonder if it is the remnant of a holloway.

The black and white photo at the head of this post shows various tracks and holloways leading up over a ridge on Salisbury Plain. The area of the Plain shown in the photo is under military control; a training area covers roughly half of the Plain and is the largest military training area in the United Kingdom. The photo shows various tracks cut by military vehicles over the years, but very obvious is the holloway curving across the hill, upward and to the left, and then straight up across the landscape to the horizon.

Here is a view from a slightly different angle, and in colour. I couldn’t resist photographing it again yesterday; the shadows and curves always catch my eye.

Holloway Leading into Candown Bottom

I have confirmed that, at least in the 1890s, this was the most obvious “way” to Market Lavington, as can be seen here, the 1889 Ordnance Survey six-inch map for the area — look for Candown Farm and Grove Down in the top right-hand quadrant of the map (and if you like maps, check out the treasure trove of maps at the National Library of Scotland).

If you check that map, and look at the Google Maps aerial views for the same area, you can trace the way across the Plain. The Plain is now crisscrossed with tracks — the older byways and tracks often head into areas littered with explosives, and the military have rerouted byways or added new ones.

If you were to follow this way across the Plain, however, you would end up at a junction with the old toll road that crosses the Plain and connects Devizes and Salisbury. At that junction is the old iron finger-post that would have given directions on the roads.

The Old Fingerpost on the Toll Road

Here, you can see on the left of the photo the trackway that leads from this junction and would, in a couple of miles, sweep you down the hill, around the bends, deep in the holloway, through Candown Bottom and then on to Market Lavington.

If the signpost still had its fingers,I’m sure the one on the left would indicate Market Lavington, the one on the right, Devizes (or possibly Urchfont), and the one facing us would say Salisbury.

When looking at the OS maps, and the Google Maps images, it becomes obvious what a web of small tracks and byways once crossed the countryside, joining together farms, villages and towns, and connected to the toll-roads and highways.

Expect further way-related musings in the future…

So, There’s a New Camera in the House

For weeks now, Lizzie and I have been wondering what to do about the cameras. Here’s the dilemma. A long time ago, just after it was released, I bought a Sony A850. With a full-frame sensor, and a big, bright, viewfinder, it has been a delight to use. I have, over the years, built up a small selection of useful lenses. Lizzie also enjoys photography, so I bought as a wedding present her first DSLR, a Sony A58.

The old A850

However, as time has gone on, Lizzie has come to envy my big, full-frame, viewfinder; the A58 has a 1.44 Mpixel OLED viewfinder – a very good one, but a mini-TV, nonetheless. At the same time, I’ve been envying some of the functions of that viewfinder: focus peaking; being able to view the shot as it will look after capture; and also envied other aspects of the camera, such as the flip-up-and-out rear LCD.

The tiny Sony A58

And therein lies a problem – Sony no longer sell cameras with glass viewfinders. All their cameras now have LED viewfinders of varying degrees of clarity – the more you pay, the more pixels you get, and the higher the refresh rate.

To provide Lizzie with a glass viewfinder would require shifting systems – to Nikon, or Canon. That would mean moving to another mount, and thus a whole new set of lenses. And the Sony Alpha cameras have other advantages, such as in-body image stabilisation and, as the A-mount was inherited from Minolta, access to many decent Minolta lenses produced over the last 25 years or so.

So – I had a moment of inspiration that was something like a light-bulb turning on but more akin to a flash going off. I would buy a second-hand Sony A99 and both Lizzie and I would use this and the A850 on alternate weekends. I could see if viewing a display would detract from advantages such as focus peaking. Lizzie could see whether the glass viewfinder is really much of an advantage over a 2.4 Mpixel OLED viewfinder, especially when it comes to checking exposure and depth of field.

The Trial Sony A99

 

By using both full-frame cameras, Lizzie could also judge whether she is comfortable handling a full-frame body for a few hours at a time; she is a tiny wee woman, and she might find the bodies uncomfortable; and that would indicate that perhaps even Nikon and Canon full-frame bodies would be too cumbersome. As you can see in the banner photo at the top of this post, the A58 is pretty small in comparison to the two full-frame cameras.

So – even more reason to take photographs this weekend!