It is embarrassing how long some pictures take to be realised. This one, for example, was conceived about 3 years ago and I even bought the white forensic/ interior decorator suits in Estonia at the time, only for them to lie untouched in a drawer unti last week. It was shot just 10 minutes from [...]
A fore-runner of the main work for Rewilding Childhood, I made this picture of my son’s hand bedecked with foxglove blooms before I knew that the Swedish name for this plant is in fact “finger flower”. The inspiration come from watching my children play with this and other toxic/ medicinal plants in my garden. [in [...]
I’m not one to encourage idle speculation but was interested enough in the thread Pete Cairns initiated on Nature Photographers recently to think about the future of nature photography in a professional context.
There are few things I am certain of, but it is possible to discern some trends then, well, speculate.
• For professional “nature” photographers, [...]
It’s only a week to go before the closing date. I have inside intelligence that the entry is of a high standard but there is somewhat less of it than in, for example, Wildlife Photographer of the Year. Seems to me that this is the one to put your work in to make a mark. In [...]
1st June
During a couple of previous visits to the fort that lies above Mont Dauphin Gare and Guillestre I had seen a few of the marmots that live on the slopes beneath it. This was at a much lower altitude than one would normally expect to meet these rodents and at dinner that evening, Michel [...]
Black and White Photography magazine, August, contains a six page feature (and cover!) I wrote for them on my ideas about the medium and what it offers. You can read the unedited version here which, in places, makes a little more sense than the published one. Buy the magazine if you want the photos! There [...]
30th May. I met Joël at 0515 and we headed south on the picturesque, if convoluted, D900 to Dignes les Baines, in the heart of France’s fossil country. He had arranged the previous day with the Director for us to access the Butterfly Gardens before they officially opened in the hope that we may surprise [...]
It is quite possible that I was the only person in Britain who spent last Saturday evening photographing dying dock leaves. If there is a community of hitherto unrecognised colour junkies out there craving their first fix of autumnal colour, I sympathise. Eastern Scotland is wearing its familiar summer colours of grey and cabbage green [...]
In the photographic community, mention of “vision” is everywhere. Dammit, I’ve used the word myself in books and articles without being altogether clear in my own mind what it means. But believe me, it matters: it is the difference between a bunch of great pictures and a body of work. It has little to do [...]
28th May
Just after breakfast, Robert (by this time I had been encouraged to use “Bob” and “tu”) showed me a site for henbane, a fantastically poisonous member of the nightshade family that grows on a roadside above Guillestre. Although I had seen the plant once before in Scotland, these “bushes” were far more impressive. My [...]