I edited down to 21 photographs that show the harsh ruggedness and the versatility of this landscape. I shot most of the images with a telephoto lens, to compress the look of the photograph and to fit many aspects into each photograph.
The diagonal line of how the grass cures around the path leads the eye into the lake.
The breaks in the ground from tyres create strange leading lines that draw you to look at the trees in the background and the shrubs in the middle ground.
This time I used the way the ponds naturally form a line when viewed from this angle to create an interesting path to the lone tree.
I contrasted the white light of the sun with the light that had been cast on the grass and bushes that turned everything yellow gold.
I framed this to have a semi symmetrical light blue shape of the ice to create an point of reference until you notice the dog that suddenly appeared while I was framing this shot.
The bird stayed long enough for me to stalk closer and frame it in the centre of the image, towering over the other bushes and towering over the viewer to survey all the land immediately around it. I bestowed the bird with a power in the image while retaining its true nature of a small bird.
I liked the way the clouds are drawing over the scene adding drama to an already dramatic and diverse environment.
I composed this photograph to have many layers. It starts with the foreground having bright yellow flowers that lift up from the greens and brown, behind we can see the grouse covered hills, further still we see the tree covered cliffs that look over Farnborough.
This cut into the land is reminiscent of a moat around a castle. Long since lost its purpose as a defensive structure, now has brush and trees growing out of it. I felt the tree climbing up the right side of the photograph and lording over the trees in the background highlight the shape and degradation of the imagined moat. Again I used a telephoto lens to compress this image to fit the scene within the frame without being distorted and allowing the viewer to focus on the individual elements.
This has two concepts of the previous images combined in one, the bright yellow gold of the setting sun contrast against the movement of the clouds to cover the blue sky. Keeping the reference point of winter in the viewers mind.
The two blue-grey ponds point the viewer to the third blue grey object in the photograph, these give an anchor to study the sharp brush and the trees in the background.
The curve of the path brings you in to the 4 sections of the photograph, who said I had to stick to a rule of thirds? We start with the path lit by the sun and is bright in the image, the next section is more subdued, the greens and yellows are still bright and a a point to focus on. Behind these there are dark trees in the background that add an air of fear and gloom to the photograph, but directly above this is the God-like Sun illuminating the other sections of the photograph.
There is delicate balance between the brush and the grass and the torn up track.
This has a calm, hopeful, bright aesthetic that is put in turmoil with the knowledge that there is a dangerous drop where the dirt road ends.
This photograph shows the intricacy of aspects in the landscape working with the ghosts of people who change the area by repeatedly driving over it
These two photographs highlight the diversity and different aspects and themes within this landscape.
Here I shot with a wider lens to gather the full scene of the dirt road cutting through and creating a gap between open area on the right and the difficult brush on the left. I wanted the road to naturally lead the eye in rather than be too obvious if I had framed the road in the centre of the image. I also felt this framing worked better to show the two different areas. It lets you see both areas and cutting the brush so it has less surface on the photo than the open area highlights its difficult rough nature.
I had the camera in a low position to bring the grass in the foreground higher in the frame and to deepen the curves in the shoreline. I especially liked the way the sky was moving over the image flattening it out. I stuck to the rule of thirds and put the horizon and sky in the top third, with the foreground and lake cutting in half the other two thirds.
I wanted to highlight the idyllic nature of this lake and remove all the surrounding flora. The lake is recessed in the ground and going down into this small beach area makes one forget the harsh nature of the landscape, you become peaceful and time can happily roll by. This is symbolised by the movement in the clouds over the trees and reflected in the lake beneath. I particularly like the way the sky is reflected not just by the lake but by the left and right halfs of the scene. This was a 30 second exposure and luckily the clouds broke in the right way that revealed the beautiful symmetrical pattern. I used a wide angle lens to forces the streaks of cloud across the sky so they were moving way over the camera. The long exposure also smoothed out the water to express the idyllic feeling of the landscape.
Here the landscape is broken up by a large dell that has all manner of plant life; trees, bushes, grass, brush, heather, paths, inaccessible dense patches and, muddy marshes. I took some of the potency of the variety away b using a shallow aperture to allow the viewer to focus on the here and now. The bush right in front, blocking the path. One can worry about the other obstacles in due time.
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