Reflecting on silhouettes

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One of my early blog posts had the title, The eponymous silhouette, and reflected on how the finance minister of Louis XV, Etienne de Silhouette (1709-1767) spent much of his retirement with paper and scissors making that to which others gave his name. The piece accompanied a photograph of my wife and some small trees in silhouette form in front of a view across a stretch of water in the Lake District. In those early years I posted quite a few photographs featuring silhouettes, often including my wife, but also of gulls, street lights, ducks and much else. Silhouettes in images are very strong forms with heightened impact. Shapes that are of little consequence when brightly lit assume much greater significance and become more attractive as a photographic subject when seen in silhouette, no matter how mundane the subject might usually appear to be.

Consequently, on a recent walk in the Yorkshire Dales near Langcliffe, the sight of the silhouettes of trees and a couple of gates with a distant valley and mountain beyond, immediately drew my eye. I took a shot of the subject and then, realising how much stronger the image would be with a person in silhouette too, I asked my wife to step into the shot.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Olympus E-M10
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 42mm (84mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/500 sec
ISO:200
Exposure Compensation: 0
Image Stabilisation: On

Mist on Giggleswick Scar

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The all-enfolding mists of autumn are viewed by many as an unwelcome intrusion after the brightness and warmth of summer. But, to poets such as Keats, and to many photographers they are a pleasing change that transforms familiar landscapes and offers a melancholy note that is rarely to be found in the warmer months.

We recently spent several days in the Yorkshire Dales, the area of my upbringing. Rain was quite frequent, as it often is in such parts, but not in quanitities or at times that prevented us having a long walk each day. One of our rambles took us on to the limestone upland known as Giggleswick Scar, an area of cliffs, scree, caves, short sheep-cropped grass, rowan trees, bracken - all the attributes of what geographers call a karst landscape. A thick mist accompanied our walk to the summit of the Scar but shortly afterwards it started to clear from the high ground leaving the grey blanket in the valleys below. Today's photograph shows rowans and hawthorns silhouetted against the mist in the Ribble valley with the summits and clouds beyond. When the mist started to dissipate it was quite difficult to distinguish between the hills and the clouds, but by the time of my photograph this was more easily done.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Nikon D5300
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 95mm (142mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f8
Shutter Speed: 1/400 sec
ISO:100
Exposure Compensation: -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Yorkshire Dales mist

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A few days in the Yorkshire Dales market town of Settle, the place where I was raised, held the prospect of not only seeing members of my family but also walking the hills and doing some photography. With that in mind I hoped for some calm weather with sun and cloud. However, I knew from long experience that Settle in October (or any other month!) frequently delivers rain. Being on the west side of England's main mountain range, receiving the full force of the moisture-laden prevailing south-westerlies how could it do otherwise? And, true to form, it rained. Often it was heavy and sustained; at other times heavy shower followed heavy shower with the briefest of interludes between. But, on one day it relented and a day of mainly sun and clouds was interrupted by only a single downpour. So we got a longish walk on "the tops" as the hills are known locally and I got some photographs.

In fact, the day we spent walking started with thick mist in the valley - a temperature inversion mist - and the summits above bathed in sunshine from a clear sky. The dramatic mist proved to be perfect for photography and produced some of my best shots, including today's. In fact, as we walked and snapped and talked and hauled ourselves up out of the Ribble valley onto the limestone and millstone grit heights it occurred to me that, as far as photography goes, the weather you get is often better than the weather you wish for. Perhaps that phrase will join my list of self-penned photographic aphorisms. It has so often been true for me that my best shots have been taken in weather that is "extreme" in one way or another, or is quite different from what is usually thought of as good photographic weather. I reflected further on this when we passed a bookshop in Settle. In the window were a few different volumes of photographs of the Yorkshire Dales. All had a cover that showed a well-known location photographed in sunshine with blue sky and white clouds. I took a few shots of that kind myself during our time in Settle, but the ones taken in the unanticipated and unwanted mist please me more.

The photograph above was taken near the start of our walk at a point when it looked like the mist would rapidly lift. In those circumstances an eye for any available images and rapid composition is needed. Here the two gates  in the drystone walls, the short lane, and the trees offered the best possibilities.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 28mm
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/800
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation:  -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

The upper Ribble valley

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The River Ribble is one of the major rivers of the United Kingdom, joint 19th in length at 75 miles (120km) long. It flows from its source at the confluence of the Gayle Beck and Cam Beck near Ribblehead, through North Yorkshire and Lancashire, to where it joins the Irish Sea between Lytham and Southport. The Ribble has interest and beauty all along its length. Growing up in the area shown in today's photographs I spent much of my time along its banks, and on my return visits I often photograph it, delighting in its varied moods and sights. When I lived on the Fylde Coast I frequently photographed the Ribble estuary at Lytham in a wider way and through its details.

Looking at today's photographs you may well say, "I see the valley, but where's the river?" In the upper reaches the Ribble is usually tucked away, bounded by trees on its often steep banks. That is the case in both shots: in the smaller it is below the line of trees in the middle-ground, and in the main image its course can be followed from near the bottom right of the frame, past the field with lines of drying hay in the centre, and off to the left below the wooded cliffs.

I took the first photograph fairly early on a sunny late September day. The light was modelling the undulating land well, showing off the drystone walls, and giving the trees a solidity that will disappear with their leaves. The highest point of land is the distant Fountain's Fell, land once owned by the monks of Fountain's Abbey. Below and to the right is a large cliff face, all that remains of Craven Quarry, the place where I photographed the Hoffmann Kiln earlier this year. The smaller photograph was taken on an equally sunny day, but in the afternoon and from the other side of the valley. I took this one for the contrast between the unimproved fields in the foreground and the distant background that contrast in character and colour with the greener improved fields closer to the road, river and farm. This shot also shows off well the drystone walls made of the local limestone that are characteristic of the Craven area of Yorkshire.

photographs and text (c) T. Boughen

Main Photo
Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 50mm
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/200
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation:  -0.67 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Sunset copse

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Driving through the upper Ribble Valley in North Yorkshire one evening, just as the sun was going down, I came upon this copse on top of a low, rounded hill. The symmetrical silhouette of the trees against the sky and the sun-tinged clouds caused me to stop and take my photograph. This area of Yorkshire is underlaid by limestone, and the area in question has drumlins, so I'm guessing from the outlines and the aforementioned facts that these are beech trees on one of these low hills that were formed during the last glaciation. The regular, parallel undulations emphasised by the low sun suggest that the land was once cultivated by medieval ridge and furrow methods.

Beech is planted in the Pennines as shelter belts for farms and fields, and always seems to do best on limestone. Sometimes, as here, groups are planted as landmark clumps, helping people to orientate themselves, adding beauty to the landscape, and providing a regular supply of firewood from the overcrowded branches that the wind brings down. Looking at this copse one can almost imagine the trees have made a pact with each other. "Let's all grow big branches on the outside", they might have said, "but smaller ones inside. And you lot in the middle don't bother with too many side branches, just grow up taller than the rest of us." Of course the overcrowding of trunks, and the availability of light are responsible for the shape of each tree and for the overall symmetry of the group. However, its nice to think that these stately trees are co-operating on their hill-top site to extend the life of each other, and in so doing prolonging the pleasure that they provide for passing motorists with cameras!

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 104mm (208mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f6.3
Shutter Speed: 1/200
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -1.0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On