Good morning everybody today I'm in mid Wales it's a bit of a miserable morning but I love
coming out after it's rained you get a nice sheen to everything and it really brings out
the colours that's the plan today and I'm hoping to get some autumnesque photographs
Wow every time I've come here in the past it's so much more water flowing
down this River and it hasn't been so overgrown now this waterfall isn't an
amazing shot but I'm going to get it anyway it's nice to have all
the greenery around it with a few of the leaves turning yellow and turning brown
Wow that rain keeps coming and going but there are some big drips coming off the
tree camera's a little bit wet but it's not too bad one thing I have noticed with these Tamron
lenses they're not that good when they get really wet what I've found is if you get rain in here
You Pull It in that pulls moisture into the lens then when you go out if it's a little bit sunny
and the sun gets on your lens especially if the temperature's a little bit cooler
you get a little bit of fog in the lens I've had that happen to me on the previous shoot
and it's not great you've got to wait around for that moisture to go from inside the lens
I think after today my lenses are going to be in a box of rice now whenever I've mentioned
Woodland Photography in the past I talk about the chaos this is just so chaotic but I'm sure
we can find something here that has some kind of order or that just stands out a little bit foreign
one shot now I've got these leaves coming off this tree they've turned
a little bit yellow and we've got the darkness of the gorge in the background
I'm kind of looking down at them a little bit so this is the tight shot
and that tree this is level but that tree is a bit wonky so I'd probably take it about here
to make sure that tree is parallel with the edge of the frame it kind of works as a wide shot as
well just a shame there's nothing in the bottom right hand corner as a bit of a dark corner with
nothing in it I do like the branch going across the top and that kind of frames it up I'm trying
to cut out as much of that boring sky as possible whenever I'm on Bridges like this I always use
them as a brace so I'll always lean against them to give me that extra bit of stability
I'm a stickler for something like this Leaf covered in water droplets
always a winner just getting a good angle on it
this bright area in the sky is actually working out quite well
because it's so bright over there it's offering almost directional light but directional soft
light not really hard light so we've got this row of trees here and some of them stand out quite
nicely with this hill in the background that's giving them a dark background so I'm going to
try and pick one of these trees off I'm going to pick out this old one here with a prominent trunk
there's actually a little bit of fog coming up the valley in the background
that's giving a bit of Separation not sure if it's going to work though
foreign I do have to admit I'm not much of a tripod shooter when the light drops and when
I need it I use it but if I can get away with not using it I don't get the tripod out and it
stays on my back and you've probably noticed this in some of my videos where I'll bump the
iso app and leave this on my bag instead of getting a nice clean shot sometimes I think
the shot just isn't worth it but I think these branches look really nice the iso is up around
about one thousand one thousand six hundred and I want to drop it down to 100 just in case I can get
a really good shot there so this is the shot gone super tight on this bit of Branch we've
got the leaves below it and we've got the leaves above it I like how these bits of branches just
stand out they almost framed by the leaves got an F 5.6 so the widest aperture for this lens
I'm going to drop the iso down to 100 which is giving me 1 13 of a second that Sunny is
coming out a little bit but it's not shining on this scene yet so it's still quite a soft light
and we've got it on the timer I'll take the shot
hmm
that way go that way that way all that way
that'll tell me which way and it's that way
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so my drone is in there somewhere probably see the red flashing light Maybe
how can that still be up there foreign
come on drop
oh seems to be all right
that wasn't the best thing to do I don't think many twos are pretty
sturdy though that took an absolute beating got stuck in the tree this arm felt it back
and it's still working yay so my drone has lost two of its nine lives foreign
look at this
we have a little rustic bridge now is there a shot here
it's got to be so we've got all these trees and rubbish down here that makes it really messy
but it is a really nice River there a nice framing with that bridge going across we've
also got this white little bit in the distance where the water is going underneath the road
bridge so without hunting around too much I think this will be the first composition
I've got the polarizer on to reduce those Reflections and to deepen the saturation in
the colors I'm going to shoot a few handheld and just have a look to see how they are
thank you now with that shot that I've just taken I know pretty much what the subject is but if I'd
taken a shot like this and I wasn't 100 sure just bring the camera up to your eye and look through
the viewfinder whatever your eye goes to first that's the most prominent thing in your prey
with this one it goes straight to the river goes to the bridge and then it kind of notices the
river in the distance as well so I know I've got a potentially good composition at this location
I was thinking I might shoot wider but I don't want to get any of the sky in I don't want to
get any of this rubbish in the foreground and I quite like where the bridge is in the frame
so I think I'm going to shoot from here and I'm going to shoot from a tripod now with this shot
I like this bit of rock and I like this Branch coming down here kind of leads your eye from
this bottom corner into the frame I didn't want to get the whole bridge in just wanted to get a
chunk of it I'm also going to focus that as well because I think this is too close and
that's too far away so I'm going to focus down here got my focus at the bottom take the shot
focus on the bridge this is kind of halfway into the shot
then focus on the waterfall in the distance take that shot
now this shot might not need to be focused at but I'm just getting them just in case
the worst thing is when you get a shot home and the foreground's a little bit blurry but the
background is a little bit blurry there's nothing worse than having an almost perfect shot now I'm
not saying this is perfect but you know what I mean now that rain's starting to come back in
so I'm going to head back up to another location
I'll find up here nice big leaves on the floor look at all those
so I'm focusing on this Leaf getting everything else in the background and
keeping the aperture wide open blurring out that background
now the hardest thing is finding a leaf that stands out when you're doing these
really close-up shots we've got the reflection on these leaves polarizer isn't cutting all of the
reflection out it's only cutting half of it out the one leaf that I found a sky in the background
so I think I'm going to keep walking until I find the leaf that I'm looking for
and I think I might have found one right let's see if we can get this to work so what I spotted was
this bit here this kind of Branch that's coming down I think it's like a half broken tree that's
not dead and it's covered in these Brown yellow and green leaves I just like how that's cutting
the opposite way to all the other trees still is a lot of Chaos in the background and if there
was some fog that would help with this shot I don't know fog today I don't have a fog maker
so I'm just gonna have to do with what I've got but I do really like how it stands out
let's go here so this is at 28 if we go in that's around about 90 it's about 85 something like that
so that's what I'm thinking this bit really stands out and you've got some of the trees
in the background with the verticals I just like it I like the colors and how different they are to
everything else around it I'm just thinking if I shot this with say an 85 prime it'd be
interesting to see what it looks like compared to the Tamron 28 to 200 at around about 85.
just so happens I've got the H5 in my bag I think one thing I find in the woods is
using an 85 mil prime a little bit tricky but you can get some quite unique shots with it
so let's see how that looks oh gonna get it right down to F 1.8
it's just a shame with the trees in the background some of them are falling over if every other tree
was straight then this was cutting through it that would look fantastic but I think on the
85 between the two the 85 blurs the foreground a bit and it blurs the background ever so slightly
and makes that subject stand out just a little bit more and also with the polarizer
taking a shot with no polarization and a shot with polarization just to show you the difference
is amazing when he put them side by side how different they really look
just all of that reflective light from the bright Sky just bounces off the leaves the
polarizer gets rid of all of that I just love using polarizer in Woodlands like this
now you can be looking for big things or big Landscapes or trees but you can also
be looking for little details as well just notice this Pine it's yellow it's
stood amongst this Greenery around it so I think this could take a shot
I just like how it depicts that start of autumn you've got the greenery around it
which is still alive then you've got this Pine which is dying which is showing that
Autumn is coming so next time you're out and you're struggling with your composition or
you're not quite sure why it's not working get the image in the viewfinder hold it up to your
eye and see where your eye goes to first if it's not subject you need to change it
foreign