Welland, Nene and Rolls Royce

click photo to enlarge
Long before I moved to Lincolnshire I was familiar with the names Welland and Nene. A teenage interest in aircraft taught me that the Rolls Royce aero engine company usually named its turboprop and jet engines after Britain's rivers. Consequently I came to know the Spey, Dart, Avon, Tyne, and many others, including the Welland and the Nene. I read that rivers were chosen for these engines' names because they emphasised the steady flow of power that is a requirement when powering an aircraft. If that's true it makes more sense than the naming conventions of house-builders when they come to name the streets that they create. Poets, castles, trees, birds, flowers, warships, aircraft, bishops, generals, towns, villages, and yes, rivers, are just some of the inspirations I've come across. I'm waiting for sponsored brand names to make an appearance - it can only be a matter of time.

I think I've mentioned before in this blog that river names are some of the oldest words to be found in our language. Because of the importance of rivers as sources of water, food, soil enrichment (through flooding), defence and as territorial boundaries, the original name, given who knows when, has often continued in use, unchanged, to the present day. Which is more than can be said for the River Welland itself. Today, for much of its course, it is embanked and flows in a channel that is above the level of the surrounding land. Sections of it have been straightened to speed its flow. It has always been one of the rivers that drained the hinterland of The Wash, and today it is carefully managed to do that as efficiently as possible.

None of this is evident in my photograph of the Welland that was taken near Crowland at the end of November towards the close of an afternoon. I deliberately under-exposed the shot to increase the contrast and make more of the sky's details, the shiny ribbon of water and the delicate branches of the leafless willows.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Sony RX100
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 10.4mm (28mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/250 sec
ISO: 2000
Exposure Compensation: -2.0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Two Spalding warehouse conversions

click photo to enlarge
In the UK finding new uses for old industrial or commercial buildings often results in them being converted into living accommodation. From power stations to old agricultural barns, fire stations to tea warehouses, apartments of varying sizes and prices are very often the first choice for a redundant building. It's not always the case; I've seen churches that became recording studios and cafes, a police station that became a restaurant, and more than one corn exchange transformed into a theatre. However, on a relatively small island with an ever growing population, housing of one form or another will often take precedence over any other use for a surplus building.

The other day we were walking around Spalding, Lincolnshire. The weather was sunny and the light clear and sharp. It was a good opportunity to photograph buildings. When I came to review my collection of shots I was prompted to reflect on the images of two Georgian warehouses that have been re-purposed (as modern parlance has it). One is barely recognisable as a structure from the eighteenth century, so complete have been its successive makeovers. Gone are the warm bricks to be replaced by painted render that is moulded to resemble ashlar blocks. The central hatches have been converted to windows and the hoist has gone too. In 1947 a main entrance with a hint of "Moderne" about it was created. It is now, I believe,either apartments or offices, with the name, White House Chambers.

The second example was formerly a warehouse belonging to the company of F. Long, but is now multiple apartments. It is a later conversion and has retained much more of its original character. Look at this building and you can immediately see its past. The original brickwork with its imperfections has not been too heavily modified. The rows of windows remain, as do the central hatches, but they are less integrated into the facade than in my other example. No attempt has been made to disguise the anchor plates of the tie rods that brace the building against lateral bowing; in fact they have been made into features. And, the pantiles of the roof, though probably not original, are characteristic of the period of the building unlike the concrete tiles of the other warehouse.

It seems to me that the way these warehouses have been converted exemplify two of the main approaches to such a task: treat the original building as a shell to be updated and made serviceable without any particular regard for its past, or retain the character of the original while doing sufficient to achieve its new purpose. Thankfully, today, the latter approach is more usual.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Nikon D5300
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 66mm (99mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f8
Shutter Speed: 1/125 sec
ISO:100
Exposure Compensation: 0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

River names

click photo to enlarge
The names given to rivers are some of the oldest words to be found in the British Isles. Many of them are pre-Celtic in origin, belonging to a time of which we have little knowledge concerning the languages that were used. The river in today's photograph - the River Welland - is one such name. All we know of the word "welland" is that it occurs in the earliest written documents: we know nothing of its meaning. The same is true of the Lincolnshire rivers Ancholme, Humber and Witham.

When we come to rivers with Celtic names we are often in a position to ascribe a meaning, though sometimes this is no more than an educated guess. In Lincolnshire the name of the River Glen is likely to be of Celtic origin and probably means "the clean one", echoing the derivation of the Northumbrian river of the same name. The River Lymn is also Celtic and derives from the Primitive Welsh "lemo" meaning an elm tree, hence the river's name is "the place where many elms are found". The names of the rivers Trent and Nene are also thought to have Celtic roots.

Why should river names be among our oldest words? The answer is that rivers are important and enduring features of the landscape, a source of food and water, useful for transport and an effective and immutable boundary or defensive line. Such a significant geographical feature would be named before settlements, hills or perhaps even people.

I've photographed Deeping St James church and the River Welland from this location before at different times of year. It makes a fine composition and is an archetypal English rural lowland scene.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Sony RX100
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 37.1mm (100mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/500
ISO: 125
Exposure Compensation:  -1.0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

River Welland and Deeping Gate Bridge

click photo to enlarge
I recently read Peter Ackroyd's fine book, "Thames: Sacred River", a work that examines the river that runs through our capital. I read of its early origins, its course from source to sea, its role in trade and commerce, how it was and is used for pleasure, the way artists and writers have depicted it, even how it was a conduit for the city's effluent and the steps taken to return it to life after being for so long, at least in London, little more than an open sewer, and much else. Through fifteen sections and forty five chapters, each of which almost stand alone, Ackroyd looks at the many facets of the Thames. At a number of places he discusses the sites where the river was bridged and the importance that early peoples assigned to such places. This is a subject that has long interested me, and one that I was thinking about when I took today's photograph.

In the British Isles a relatively high number of archaeological finds are associated with bridges. The weapons - swords, daggers, shields, spear etc - of early peoples have often been discovered in river beds near bridges or in the banks and land surrounding them. This is thought to indicate the high value, reverence even, that was placed on a crossing of of a river, the flow itself being seen as something akin to a life-force. The Romans shared this kind of esteem for flowing water and often placed altars by bridges. Medieval religious orders built bridges with chapels on them for similar reasons, but also as a means of raising funds for the maintenance of the crossing.

Deeping Gate bridge has the year 1651 carefully carved on one of the upstream cutwaters. There are no ribs on the underside of the arches, and these are rounded, not pointed. Both of these suggest that the date signifies when it was actually built rather than rebuilt or restored. Consequently it is very unlikely to be a crossing point that experienced the devotional offerings and activities described above. Today it continues to fulfil its original purpose as a crossing point, and now, as at the time it was built, the narrowness of the road means only one vehicle at a time can pass over it. On the day I photographed it the sky, the sun, the reflective surface of the river and the early autumn tints on the trees made a composition that, apart from the road signs and telegraph poles, could have been seen on and similar day over the past couple of hundred years.

For further information about this bridge and a couple more of my photographs of it see here and here.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Sony RX100
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 10.4mm (28mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/400
ISO: 125
Exposure Compensation:  -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Seasonal colour

click photo to enlarge
Recently, as I was looking through my 2012 collection of photographs, I got to thinking about basic natural, seasonal colours. It seems to me that in a country such as ours green, blue, grey and white are colours that are constants throughout the year. Grass, sky, clouds and snow provide those. To these three staples winter adds the black of wet trees and the brown of dead vegetation. Spring injects the yellow and yellow-green of new growth into the mix. Autumn adds the tints of yellow, brown, orange and red of turning leaves. But it is summer when nature deploys the fullest colour palette. To all of the colours of the other seasons are added every other colour that nature offers. But more than that, it offers them in deeper hues. Consequently when in September autumn makes its presence first felt in subdued tones, longer shadows and the first chill in the air, I look at the colours around me with a sense of what I'm about to lose.

On a walk in mid-September at Market Deeping I stopped on the bridge over the River Welland and looked downstream at the trees overhanging the shallow water. The sun was shining and the light was bright and clear revealing every detail.  The colours were deep and glowing with a touch of autumnal brown in some of the leaves. The view offered little in the way of a main subject but the mix of colours was beautiful and evocative of the summer that was beginning to pass out of reach. So I tried to hang on to it through the photograph I took.

A week earlier we'd been in Grantham and I took another photograph. It offered a nice contrast between the sharp angularity of the building and the irregularity of the planting. But it too offered that memory of summer. Here the flowers were starting to turn and the first fallen leaves of a silver birch were littering the grass. In a few short weeks the leaves would be gone and the flowers too. But the scene retained the essence of summer whilst at the same time prefiguring the autumn to come.

photographs and text © Tony Boughen

Photo 1
Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 24mm
F No: f8
Shutter Speed: 1/60
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation:  -0.67 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Saturated greenery

click photo to enlarge

A run of days with blue skies, temperatures in the upper 20s Celsius, and a high sun during the main part of the day, all characteristic of July in eastern England, almost made me wish for the uncharacteristic, overcast, wet and changeable weather that marked much of spring and the first part of summer this year. Almost, but not quite. Family duties and other activities have forced me to draw upon a photograph from a couple of weeks ago for today's post. Such has been the very limited amount of time I've been able to devote to photography recently.

My shot shows a view of the River Welland in Stamford, Lincolnshire. I took it from the Town Bridge looking west (upstream). The area of grass beyond the piece of exposed shore and the weeping willow is the start of the Town Meadows, an area of park-like open space in the middle of Stamford. On the left is the rear elevation of Lord Burghley's Hospital, almshouses founded in 1597 on the site of the medieval hospital of St John the Baptist and St Thomas the Martyr (founded 1170-80), by the lord of that name. Some twelfth century work remains visible here but most of what can be seen is of the seventeenth and nineteenth centuries.

I took this photograph because it seemed to sum up the weather of early July - cloudy skies, churned up rivers with heavy flows of water, and saturation. Not, in this case, we Britons, dripping under our damp clouds; rather the saturated greens of the grass and trees which at this time of year are usually showing a great deal more of summer's parched yellows and browns.

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 24mm
F No: f8
Shutter Speed: 1/40 sec
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation:  -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Autumn at Deeping St James

click photo to enlarge

The other evening, with a friend, I gave a talk to a group in the village about photography. We divided the alphabet up between us and we each spoke about 13 of our own images (a couple with secondary images to support the main one). At one point I mentioned a quotation by Aaron Rose that I have always liked and which I first used very early in the life of this blog: "In the right light, at the right time, everything is extraordinary". This observation makes the important point that light has the power to change things, even the most mundane, into objects of beauty and visual interest. I think the author and most people, me included, assume the quote is about the value of strongly directional light, and a lot of my photography - in fact quite a bit of every photographer's output - makes use of this kind of illumination.

However, as I've got older I've come to realise that every sort of light has qualities that can be used in photography, even the uninspiring flat light that is produced by a blanket of stratus cloud. Whereas hard, directional light makes for contrast, drama and in-your-face eye-catching qualities, diffuse, almost directionless light softens the scene, mutes everything and confers a quiet quality that can be very appealing in its own way. I blogged about this in connection with a photograph I took last year of some boats drawn up on the shingle beach at Aldeburgh, Suffolk. A couple of days ago similar light prevailed when I took this photograph of the River Welland at Deeping St James in Lincolnshire. I think it's not only the subject but also the light that gives the photograph some of the qualities that I admire in English landscape painting of the first half of the nineteenth century. Who knows, it may be a liking for the work of artists such as Crome, Cotman, Constable, Stark, Stannard and Colkett (mainly members of the "Norwich School") that accounts for me every now and then producing images like the one above.

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 65mm
F No: f6.3
Shutter Speed: 1/160
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation:  -0.67 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

River Welland scene

click photo to enlarge

I sub-title this blog, "Photographs and reflections from Lincolnshire, England", so it's perhaps about time that I featured a photograph from the county where I live. The trouble is, I haven't got too many photographs that were taken locally in the past month. Here's one, however, that I took it on a shopping trip to Stamford. The River Welland runs through the town and this section often has a small boat or two moored under the trees. It's enough to give a point of interest around which to build a composition. I posted a shot a while ago of the same area of river, though with a wider perspective.

As I walked over the bridge I noticed a few mallards and mute swans in front of the pair of rowing boats. After something of a wait as the birds swam here and there, never quite getting into a compositionally "right" location relative to the boats, this solitary bird obliged me by positioning itself in the area of dark water on the right of the frame and I pressed the shutter.

In one of my early posts on this blog I reflected on photographing swans, and in particular the slightly apologetic note with which enthusiast photographers often accompany such an image. There is the feeling that swans are "corny" subjects, photographed to death. I've always been of the view that if we excluded subjects that have been heavily photographed there'd be precious little left to photograph, and that the approach you adopt is more imprtant than the subject itself. Evidence for my belief in that assertion can be found in the number of photographs of swans on this blog and my different treatments of the subject! See here, here, here, here and not least, here.

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 140mm
F No: f8
Shutter Speed: 1/125
ISO: 160
Exposure Compensation:  -1.0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

A river runs through it

click photo to enlarge

Spalding in Lincolnshire, that is, and the river is the Welland. In fact this short river, only 35 miles long, that rises in the Hothorpe Hills of Northamptonshire and flows into The Wash near Fosdyke Bridge, runs through a number of other towns and villages including Market Harborough, Stamford, and Market Deeping.

The derivation of the word "Welland" is unknown, and like many rivers, it is likely to be one of the oldest names associated with its locality, probably being of pre-Celtic origin. It was, for many years, one of the rivers whose flooding was controlled by "washes", areas of pasture enclosed by raised banks that run parallel with the river and over which flood water was allowed to spread during times of high water. In 1953 the Coronation Channel was built to divert excess water from the Welland, around Spalding, as a means of alleviating flooding.

The town of Spalding grew up along the banks of the River Welland, and today roads on each side provide pleasant, scenic routes through the town. Much of the waterside is lined by fine, brick-built Georgian terraces and individual houses, as well as the remains of warehouses which have been converted into flats. The presence of this water-course with its attendant landscaping and old buildings gives the town a Dutch feel, and in fact there have long been connections between this part of Eastern England and that country, both in terms of agriculture as well as land drainage.

My photograph shows the tree-lined, grassy banks of the River Welland and a couple of the large old houses. It was taken on a December afternoon in the yellow-tinted light of a low sun, with the remains of snow and ice still visible by the water's edge.

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 32mm
F No: f8
Shutter Speed: 1/125
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.6 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

The challenge of mid-day photography

click photo to enlarge

In a recent post I talked about the difficulties and disatisfaction that can come from photography during the middle of the day in high summer. High contrast, short shadows, very bright light and desaturated colours resulting from reflections on leaves and grass were some of the issues I reflected on.

Yesterday I was in Market Deeping for lunch. We ate at a Georgian hotel, a former coaching inn, that backs on to the River Welland. After we'd eaten we went to have a look at the river which at that time of day was cloaked in deep areas of shade from the bankside trees. As we stood there looking at the ducks and fish in the clear water a rowing boat came into view and my friend and I raised our pocket cameras to take a photograph. It may have been the prospect of being snapped by strangers, or perhaps it was an unwillingness to run the gamut of the hotel's eaters and drinkers along the riverside terrace, but whatever the reason, the rower immediately turned the small craft and headed back downstream. But not before I'd managed to frame a shot that included an off-centre boat against shadow, a foreground of delicate grasses, and an over-hanging frame of trees.

Looking at the image on the computer later that day I was disappointed by the glossy reflections off the leaves above the boat. The foreground leaves also had a brightness that made for good shapes against the darker water, but they were a touch "blown". What to do? Well, I subdued the overhead leaves and did the same with the leaves at the bottom (though with less success). Then I thought I'd try a black and white conversion. It has qualities that appeal.  Both shots still reveal the time of day when they were taken, but perhaps less than they would have done before my "tinkering". An image taken at that time with an overcast sky, or earlier or later in the day would definitely have been easier to work with.

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Lumix LX3
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 12.8mm (60mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f2.8
Shutter Speed: 1/200
ISO: 80
Exposure Compensation: -0.66 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Autumn reflections at Deeping St James

click photo to enlarge
The earliest stone bridges in Britain - the clapper bridges - are simply large pieces of stone that span streams: sometimes just one, and on wider waters two or more with intervening supports. The technology of those early days didn't stretch to anything more elaborate and fashion wasn't a consideration; it was purely function that drove the design.

When arched bridges made of stone examples with semi-circular arches and pointed arches were often built during the medieval period. The Romans introduced the former, and the Gothic builders the latter, so it was these stone bridges were constructed from the C12 to the C15. In theory the pointed arch can span a wider waterway but the disadvantage is that it has to be built quite high to do so. Often a series of rounded arches with intervening piers was chosen instead, though many medieval bridges followed the fashion and have pointed arches. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, with the influence of the Rennaisance, fashion turned to semi-circular, rounded arches, and also to segmental arches which involve a segment of a circle smaller than 180 degrees on vertical piers. However, the technology had not developed to the extent that earlier features could be jettisoned.

Today's photograph shows the Deeping Gate Bridge over the River Welland at Deeping St James. It connects Cambridgeshire (the left bank) with Lincolnshire (the right). This structure was built in 1651, a date that is carved into the stonework on the upstream side, and is typical of its period. Gone are the pointed arches and ribs underneath that allowed stone bridges to be lighter, but the short spans, heavy piers, triangular cutwaters and simple chamfered decoration of the arches remains. Not until the next century would balustrades, niches, panelling, statuary, urns and segmental arches wide enough to span a small river appear.

I have photographed this bridge before, but stopping at it the other day I was tempted into another shot by the reflections, autumnal tints and saturated colours produced by the largely overcast sky. On this occasion I positioned myself downstream on a footbridge.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 40mm (80mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f6.3
Shutter Speed: 1/250
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -1.0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

River Welland landscape

click photo to enlarge
On a recent walk at Deeping St James I passed the point on the bank of the River Welland where I'd taken a photograph on the last day of February. So, in the interests of comparison I took another shot, though this time in portrait format, from what I thought was the same point. When I came to compare the images it proved to be near the place where I'd stood before, but not precisely the same spot.

Anyone with an interest in English landscape painting will understand the appeal of a composition such as this and the earlier one. It has most of the component parts that Constable, Girtin, Cotman, Turner, Cozens and the rest arranged in countless drawings, sketches and finished works. There is the nominal subject of an old church, its spire piercing the sky. Then there is the river wending its way towards it, offering a line to take our eye through the composition. This line is echoed by the river banks, one side light, the other darker, depending on how the sun falls. A reflection of the church in the river is not something that always appears in such paintings, but here it adds to the mid-ground interest. And finally there is the trees - clumps of leaves and arching branches, their softness contrasting with the sharpness of the stone building.

There are, however, two things my image doesn't have in order to properly conform to this artistic genre. The first is a dramatic sky laden with billowing clouds of the kind so beloved by this group of painters. But, as I'm not one for pasting in skies from other photographs, here I've happily taken what nature offered, knowing that my photograph can be seen as both a record and a picture. The second thing that's missing is the animals or people that give scale and another area of focus to so many of these paintings. Often a few cows at the water's edge provide this, though sometimes it's a peasant leaning on a gate, or perhaps accompanying a horse and cart. Unfortunately, in Lincolnshire in 2009, cows have given way to cabbages, and bucolic peasants are difficult to find, so for my next photograph at this location I'll have to see about persuading my wife to fulfill this role. If I take along a few suitably rustic props, say a pitchfork, a smock, and a straw hat, who knows what could be achieved...

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 64mm (128mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f10
Shutter Speed: 1/200
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Deeping Gate Bridge

click photo to enlarge
In my working past I sometimes used to talk to groups of children about the importance of good manners. To illustrate my point I would often use the analogy of bicycle maintenance, observing that the purpose of oiling a bike chain is to lubricate it such that the links engage with the sprockets smoothly, with minimal friction. So, I would continue, good manners are like that oil, and enable people to get along better by reducing the friction between them. I think those who were keen cyclists might have understood my point, but probably the rest reflected that it was their father who maintained their bicycle and wondered what the old duffer at the front was on about.

The subject of today's photograph, the Deeping Gate Bridge at Deeping St James, Lincolnshire, would not work without good manners. A stone-built, three-arched structure, it was constructed in 1651 to cross the River Welland in both directions, a function it carries out to this day. However, when it was erected the traffic that used it would have been pedestrians, horses, farm animals, carts and carriages. Today's traffic is mainly a regular flow of any motor vehicles that will fit on its single track roadway, but also a regular sprinkling of walkers and cyclists. Passage over the bridge is not regulated by lights, so courtesy is required of the drivers to ensure that traffic keeps flowing. And flow it does, not with the calm serenity of the river below, but in spurts and gushes, first from one side, then the other, as drivers reciprocally give way to each other. Pedestrians crossing the bridge have triangular refuges at the top of each of the cut-waters, which accounts for these being not only on the upstream side, where they are necessary to divide the flow around the piers, but also on the downstream side (shown above).

During a recent longish walk by the River Welland, the bridge, its clear reflection, and the general setting with the C19 pub, thatched houses, trees and waterside plants all suggested a photograph. Had the ducks and swans further upstream been in the water nearby I could have composed using the full frame, but in their absence I took the shot knowing I was going to crop the bottom of the image.*

* Sometimes the first posting of my blog entries contains mangled prose, as the last paragraph of this one did today. However, my proof reader (aka my wife) invariably spots my lapses into gibberish, draws it to my attention, and a quick edit soon puts things right (or at least better).

photographs & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 14mm (28mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f6.3
Shutter Speed: 1/500
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.7 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Landscape at Deeping St James

click photo to enlarge
Last weekend I followed the course of the River Welland from the outskirts of Deeping St James to the centre of Market Deeping. The end of February is a time of year when the first real flush of spring flowers is appearing, the light is noticably brighter, I'm willing spring to get a move on, but the trees still wear their winter dress, and there's an edge to the wind cold enough to keep my hat on my head. All around the landscape has a grey/brown look, except where winter wheat is providing rectangles of fresh green.

That particular walk is an interesting one because the back gardens of houses line the river all the way. It's fun to see how some households embrace the river, setting up summer houses, paved areas with tables and seating, jetties and small boats, whilst others turn their backs on it, erecting fences and hedges to keep it out of sight and mind. Many of the buildings are a couple of hundred years old, and show the accretions of successive generations of owners, whilst others are quite new, sometimes featuring an upstairs balcony to take advantage of the view. A couple of weirs and a three-arched stone packhorse-bridge built in 1651 are also passed on the walk, as is the medieval church of St James at Deeping St James, a former Benedictine priory founded in 1139, with a west tower of 1717.

As I turned a bend on the walk the tower of this church came into view, with its reflection in the river, and a couple of well-placed trees. I took this photograph, meaning to present it in the colours characteristic of the time of year - all greys, whites, greens and browns. However, it looked like it had a composition and subject that would respond to a black and white treatment. I think it does, and even (dare I say) gives the landscape a Dutch/Flemish character - possibly "a touch of the Breughels" - as the punch line of an old joke has it!

photograph & txt (c) T.Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 43mm (86mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/160 seconds
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Reflecting on the River Welland

click photo to enlarge
You're walking through the countryside and your path leads to a bridge over a river or a stream. You walk forward onto the bridge, and then what? Well, if you're like me, and just about everyone I've ever observed doing this, you stop in the middle and turn to look either upstream or downstream. It feels like the natural thing to do. We don't seem to be able to help ourselves. So what is it about bridges over water that make us stop and look, when discretion might be urging us to keep going until we're back with our feet fixed firmly on terra firma?

I suppose it's the pleasure that comes from surveying a stretch of moving water, no matter how small. And the curiosity about what it might contain - the fish, frogs, rocks, weed and the other things that we can see: and the lurking things we can't see, but wonder about, in the dark, still pools. Could it be a relic of our primitive past when a stretch of water offered the chance of fresh food? Or maybe it's an aesthetic urge to trace a river's course with our eye, following the banks, the depths and shallows, the brooding shadows and dancing highlights, the never still ripples and eddies, as they move towards us, under our feet, and away. Then there's the smell of the air above water, fresh clean and sharp from streams that flow quickly over rocky beds, slightly musty and dank from slow flowing waterways as they meander through the lowlands. And finally, there's the sound that varies from the crashing roar of a rocky river in spate, to the gentle swish and occasional plop of a slow moving stream.

The other day I stood on a small footbridge that spans part of the River Welland at Deeping St James. This is a fairly slow moving, quiet river, but at this particular point it was noisy because there was a man-made weir below me. I'd heard it from a distance as I approached the river, and found it, fast-moving, with spray, swirling ripples, and shooting water. I stopped half way across to take a few photographs, closing down the aperture to f22 to slow the shutter speed and blur the moving water. I've taken shots of this kind before, but here I concentrated on where the water tipped over the edge of the small weir and slid down an incline before hitting the pool below. The differing speeds of the water in each part of its journey gave differing effects, and I reflected that making images like this is yet another reason for pausing when your path leads across a bridge over water.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 106mm (212mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f22
Shutter Speed: 1/13 seconds
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -2.0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Thinking about fishing

click photo to enlarge

The other day, as I stood on a footbridge over the River Welland in Stamford, Lincolnshire, I thought about fishing - the sort that you do with a rod and line. Judging by all the newly created "fishing ponds" that I've passed in recent years, the number of people wanting to pursue this sport must exceed the water available. And, each time I see a group of fishermen sat around one of these ponds I wonder just what is the attraction?

Several years ago, when I was in France I watched, open-mouthed, as fishermen sat round a pond pulling massive carp after massive carp out of the water. They stored them in their keep-nets, then at the end of their session, put them back in the pond. Maybe they weighed them; maybe they kept one or two for eating, I don't recall. However, it looked like "shooting fish in a barrel". It seemed to require no skill on their part, and they always caught a "big un". The only time I've pursued this sport was for a year or so in my youth when I fished the rocky River Ribble in the Yorkshire Dales and had a few goes on the River Lune near Kirkby Lonsdale. Here the skill was to find the location that held some fish (brown trout, grayling and salmon were the main quarry) then decide whether to use a lure, float or fly to catch them. The best areas to fish would change with the season and the height of the water. So, local knowledge and skill was necessary. I remain to be convinced that much of either is necessary when fishing a small pond that is stocked by man rather than nature. The incidentals that I enjoyed all those years ago - walking the bank, dodging the trees, wading into the shallows, standing on rocks, and watching the plentiful wildlife as I waited for a "bite" - also seem to be absent. However, there is clearly some pleasure to be had from casting from the edge of a pond or this pastime woudn't be proliferating. Perhaps the reason I can't see it is linked to the reason that caused me to cast aside my rod after such a short time. Truly, freshwater fishing can be a puzzling sport!

So why was I thinking about fishing as I surveyed this verdant river view. Well, try as I might, I couldn't see a single fish in the water. They must have been there, but hiding! I've pointed my camera at this particular view before but never taken the shot. However, this time the boats, the water, the trees, and particularly the light, made it work better as a photograph. So I pressed the shutter.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 48mm (96mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f8
Shutter Speed: 1/125
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.7 EV
Image Stabilisation: On