CAPTURE NEW HORIZONS

One of my favourite spots to visit in and around Dunbar is Doon Hill with its sweeping views of the East Lothian countryside and coastline. We made the trip up to the hill earlier today, dodging the bands of heavy rain sweeping across the coast from the west.  The fields at the top of the hill are filled with barley, which is nearly time for harvesting. As we walked up the sunlight hitting the golden crop contrasted nicely with the dark skies as the next rain front moved in. I captured a nice set of images before the rain came down using the X-T2 fitted with the 100-400mm and 50-140mm zooms plus the 90mm f2 prime. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- PLEASE SUPPORT THIS BLOG BY VISITING THE ADVERTISERS ON THIS PAGE By clicking on the adverts you are helping support this blog - thank you. --------------------------------...

Living in Dunbar on the East Lothian coast in Scotland we get to see all types of weather.   I love watching and hearing the waves crashing on the rocky shoreline between Dunbar and Belhaven and the sea is the main reason we moved here nearly four years ago from landlocked Grantham in Lincolnshire. Yesterday evening was a great combination of strong winds whipping up big waves and a low sun creating fantastic side lighting.  I took the Fujifilm X-T2 and the XF100-400mm lens onto the cliff top walk to take some shots of the waves as the broke over the rocks at low tide.  It is also a powerful reminder that the sea is beautiful but also very deadly and I had no intention of getting down on the beach to a closer shot. The result was some spectacular waves hitting the rocks with the low sun providing the perfect lighting conditions.  I set a fast shutter speed of 1/2000 to freeze the waves as they burst over the rocks. ------...

Landscape photography is mostly about planning to be in the right location and waiting for the right light.  However sometimes you just 'luck in' and this happened to me yesterday on the shore of Loch Fyne in the Highlands of Scotland. We were traveling back up the A82 to Inveraray when it started to rain.  The village has a small harbour so we decided to stop and wait for the rain to clear through.  As I was parking the car the light suddenly changed and a full rainbow appeared above the anchorage, highlighted by the dark rain clouds further up the loch. I grabbed the X-Pro2 with the Samyang 8mm fisheye to get the full arch rainbow.  I then had time to switch to the 50-140mm to get a closer shot of the rainbow hitting the sailing vessel moored up and then the 18mm f2 to get a different viewpoint before the rain stopped and the rainbow disappeared. It was a beautiful sight and one that I was in the right place at the right time to capture - pure luck!! ...

The beauty of living in East Lothian is being able to photograph the scenery in all weathers.  While I love a beautiful sunrise as much as the next landscape photographer, you can't beat a good stormy day with lots of drama to get the creative juices flowing. Take this image for example.  This shot was taken on the Fujifilm X-Pro2 and the XF100-400mm telephoto to compress the perspective, making Bass Rock appear to be a lot closer to my position in Belhaven than it actually is, which is about 7 miles away.  All I had to do was wait for someone to walk into the frame to give the image a focal point. The picture was converted to monochrome from the RAW file in NIK Silver EFEX Pro2 software using a customised preset that I have set up.   ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- PLEASE SUPPORT THIS BLOG BY VISITING THE ADVERTISERS ON THIS PAGE By clicking on the adverts yo...

This is a picture from Tyningham beach on the western side of Belhaven Bay looking eastwards towards Dunbar.  The rain was falling on the horizon while dark, foreboding clouds scooted over Dunbar Castle in the distance. The image was taken on the Fujifilm X-T2 with the XF100-400mm f4.5/5.6 fitted with the zoom set to 100mm.  The camera was set to Aperture Priority and the exposure was 1/500s @ f4.5 ISO200.

Most of the time as a landscape photographer I have to plan my trips carefully, always keeping one eye on the weather forecast to try and optimise my chances of coming back with a few 'keepers'.  Other times I can just get lucky and these images are one of those occasions. The shots were actually taken last September when I was testing the 1.4x converter for Fujifilm along with fellow X Photographer Dirk Bogaerts from Belgium, who was doing a round Scotland trip in his MGB for his new magazine Carburettor .   I had taken a series of shots for the test and these were taken just as the clouds parted to produce this stunning light display over Edinburgh Castle.  I filed the images for processing later and completely forgot about them until yesterday due to other work commitments.  As I said the images were shot on the XF50-140mm f2.8 fitted with the 1.4x converter fitted to the X-T1.  We were standing on Calton Hill looking west towards the castle when t...

Last Saturday in Estoril Portugal the sun came up over the town bathing the Portuguese coast in a warm glow.  However on the horizon storm clouds were gathering and by mid morning the winds were howling and the rain was lashing down, which brought a halt to first Free Practice session of the 4 Hours of Estoril (see blog HERE ).  The weather was so bad that a container ship was driven onto the rocks not far from our hotel and had to be towed off by tugs. All landscape photographers know that the light just ahead of a storm front can be quite dramatic as the sun can light objects against a very dark sky. These images were taken at sunrise from the hotel balcony in Estoril using the Fujifilm X-T1 and the 50-140mm fitted with the 1.4x converter. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- PLEASE SUPPORT THIS BLOG BY VISITING THE ADVERTISERS ON THIS PAGE By clicking on the adverts y...

For me landscape photography is so much more than capturing a chocolate box images of beautiful sunsets and sweeping sun kissed beaches.   Living next to the Scottish coast we get to experience many types of weather, usually all in the space of a few hours.  I have a healthy respect for the sea and tides and I am in awe of the power of the water crashing on the shoreline when the weather does turn stormy. This shot is one of my favourites showing the waves crashing against the rocks with the dark clouds forming on the horizon ahead of a heavy rain storm.

I missed posting an image yesterday and I apologise for this but I have been working on updating the MacLean Photographic website for a new project that I will be launching this weekend (all will be revealed soon). This was the scene this morning from the beach at Belhaven Bay where the sun broke through the low cloud cover for a little while but out to sea the black clouds were gathering.  This time of year is excellent for landscape photography when the sun is low in the sky for most of the day (when it appears of course). The image was taken looking east along the beach back towards Dunbar and Winterfield golf course using the Fujifilm X-T1 and Fujinon XF18mm f2 lens.

With autumn in full swing the seas off the East Lothian coast have been a little 'choppy' for the past few days, with high winds helping things along. The two shots used in this post demonstrate two techniques using fast and slow shutter speeds to record the wave movement.   The image at the top of the page was taken on the Fujiflm X-Pro1 and XF18mm f2 lens.  Using a slow shutter speed of 1/6th second, the crashing waves are blurred just enough to give the sense of movement. A longer shutter speed would've blurred the entire sea, turning it 'milky' but this isn't the effect I wanted. The shot below was taken using the X-T1 and the XF56mm f1.2, with the focus locked on the rock as the waves crashed over it.  Using the motor drive at 8 frames per second and a high shutter speed of 1/1000th second, the wave is frozen, with the water droplets clearly visible.   ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------...

This morning I begin a five day trip to France to work on Round 4 of the 2014 European Le Mans Series and then fly direct to Texas for seven days in Austin to work on Round 4 of the FIA World Endurance Championship.   As I sit in the lounge at Edinburgh airport waiting for my plane to London on the first leg to Marseilles I decided to post two of the images I have been working on from the visit to Seacliff at the weekend. This is a three shot panoramic of Bass Rock taken on the Fujifilm X-T1 and 35mm f1.4. The three images were stitched together in Photoshop Elements and then converted to black and white using Silver Efex Pro2. The second image is of the outer marker on the headland on the east side of Seacliff beach.  Once again it was taken on the Fuji X-T1 and 35mm and converted to mono in Silver Efex Pro2. The next scheduled update of this blog is on Saturday 13 September which will be a review of the Peak Design leash system I am using. ------------...

March saw more snow in Lincolnshire so there was plenty of opportunities to get some interesting snowy landscapes.  This shot was taken from Somerby Hill just after a snow storm had passed over Grantham.  The sun started to peep from behind the snow clouds giving this surreal scene that last about 30 seconds. Also in March we had three trips to London to organise the launch of the FIA World Endurance Championship's first event at Silverstone.  This involved a display of cars at Potters Field next to Tower Bridge and a press conference at the Royal Automobile Club in Pall Mall. There was also the first overseas trip of the FIA WEC season with the official test at Le Castellet in the South of France. CLICK HERE  to see the March 2013 archive   ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- PLEASE SUPPORT THIS BLOG BY CLICKING THE GOOGLE ADVERTS It doesn't cost you anything to...

Today's forecast of heavy rain here in East Lothian proved to be correct this evening when black clouds rolled in from the east at around 8:30pm.  The setting sun in the west proved some beautiful, golden light and a magnificent rainbow that became a full arch as the storm clouds came closer.  These shots were taken from Doon Hill just above Dunbar on the Nikon D800 with the Nikon 17-35mm f2.8 wide angle zoom or the Nikon 80-200mm f2.8 telephoto zoom.  Images taken on Nikon D800, Nikon 17-35mm f2.8 AF-S and Nikon 80-200mm f2.8 AF-D ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- PLEASE SUPPORT THIS BLOG BY CLICKING THE GOOGLE ADVERTS It doesn't cost you anything to click on an advert but we get a small fee for every click thru from Google and this helps support this blog - thank you for helping -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------...