They say that if life gives you lemons then you should make lemonade. This January and February all my photographs were taken within walking distance of my house. That includes a walk by the river Wye but just to point out the lemons: the river path is bordered by a muddy turnip field, the river often floods depositing mud and debris, and on the other side of the river is the Sewage Works and the Recycling Centre. So the question is how to make lemonade from that lot?
It turns out that the key to creating interesting pictures by the river in Winter is to use the weather. Out of many forays I had three local walks by the river which resulted in pictures for my scrapbook. Let’s call the walks ‘Mist and Frost’, ‘Frost no Mist’ and lastly ‘Mist no Frost’. Each of these walks presented their own challenges and below I describe two pictures from each walk.
Mist and Frost
One morning in early January I woke up to see this unusual combination of conditions through the window. After my second cup of tea the situation was the same so I pondered where I could go to take pictures? I thought that the river might hold onto the mist so I put on coat, hat, gloves and camera bag and set off across the main road and behind the houses to the river.
What really struck me, apart from how cold it was, was how every branch and twig was encased in ice. The picture ‘Frosty Riverside’ is framed by these intricate details. The mist creates a complete white out beyond the far bank so it doesn’t matter what is there. This picture is more about the framing than the tree on the other side but the use of the river and reflection create depth in the picture. I took this hand held at ISO 200 because although there was no sun the white of the frost and mist gave me enough light.
I was worried that the mist would disappear but in fact it got thicker until I was in fog really. The picture ‘Silent Path’ shows the field on the left and the riverside on the right. I like the way that the frost on the tree branches smudges the silhouettes of the tree. The fog is hiding the back of the housing estate and our eye follows the path past the gate barely visible in the mist.
At first I struggled with the post processing of this picture. My initial inclination was to warm it up and increase contrast because that is what I generally do with my pictures. That gave a very odd picture and then I realised the obvious. I reduced the temperature (added more blues) and increased the exposure (because the fog was really white). This process enhanced the frostiness of the grass and brought the picture much closer to what I saw. I just added a slight vignette to 'contain' the picture. I also flipped it left to right because I prefer the weight of the tree to the left and the path two thirds across the picture.
Frost no Mist
After my initial success by the river - I printed eight pictures from the trip! - I kept my eye on the weather and one morning in January there was an orange sunrise with frost. Now my local photography spot was a bonus because I could get there in ten minutes. Despite this, cloud came over before I could get there but now that I was out I would see what I could find.
The effect was very different. I could see all the way to the hills behind the trees and the low sun put a line of orange light along the horizon. It encouraged a more expansive viewpoint because this time the light was more significant than in the mist.
The frost lightened the field and the bare trees created silhouettes against the light. The picture ‘Morning Glow’ is a view to the East with the river on the right. I like the fan of the riverside trees and the relative size of the oak tree in the field creates a sense of depth.
I used some experience from my previous trip to look for reflections in the river. ‘Frosty River’ combines the frosted detail of the vegetation with the orange glow in the sky. Without the mist I had lost the soft box feel of the light on my previous trip - when the light was even and muted all around. On this morning without the mist there was a very big difference in brightness between the highlights in the sky and the dark riverbank.
I exposed for the highlights but that made the picture very dark around the river. Fortunately I was able to recover a lot of detail in post processing. I found that the main trick was to reduce the contrast because that brought the lights and the darks together in the middle.
I think that the orange in the sky is important in these pictures because it adds an extra layer of interest and separates the very similar hues of the sky and the land.
Mist no Frost
After my two productive trips the weather turned wet and grey which didn’t inspire pictures. I did do a trip to the river with sun and blue sky but that mostly had the effect of accentuating the lemons on my walks.
Eventually in February I woke to another misty day but by now it was warmer and there was no frost. A big advantage of a frosty day is that the mud freezes solid. This means that with walking boots you have no problem with traction. Without frost I needed my wellington boots and it was much more perilous because there was mud everywhere! It didn’t help that there were now sheep in the field.
I quickly realised that I needed a different strategy because there were no frosty details and everything looked drab - particularly where the trees had caught debris from the recent flooding. I ended up walking further along the river to a stretch which offered reflections. I took lots of pictures but I particularly like ‘Riverside Walk’ because of the figure on the other side. I did wait for them to be in this spot between the trees and I like the fact that they have a reflection too.
An advantage of my third trip was that it happened to be a Sunday morning and so there were some people about. ‘Walking the Dog’ uses this fact to add a bit of storytelling to the picture. I like the layering in this picture. There are the branches on the right, the people on the path, the first tree in the mist and then another tree which has almost disappeared. The white on the brambles is sheep wool!
So my conclusion is that I cannot just go out locally and take interesting pictures on any day but if I keep an eye on the weather and use a bit of creativity then there are possibilities. Even in a field of lemons!