CAPTURE NEW HORIZONS

This week has been a busy one for us with two visits to Edinburgh for meetings and a new computer system installed in the office (more on this tomorrow!).  We are also working on a new website design, which will be unveiled next month. This has left little time this week to update the blog, but we are back online now.  I did manage to grab this shot of the floodlit Edinburgh Castle while I waited to catch my train at Waverley Station.  Edinburgh Castle still impresses me and is one of the most instantly recognisable sights anywhere in the world.   The image was taken on the Fujifilm X100 and held steady by putting the camera on the fence surrounding Princes Street Gardens.

Today was a beautiful sunny winters day in East Lothian so we wrapped up warm and headed down to Belhaven Bay for a walk on the sand.  The long 3km beach attracts a lot of surfers and with some good waves on offer Belhaven was busy with people bedecked in wetsuits and carrying surf or body boards. I decided to take the Fujifilm X-T1 fitted with the Fujinon 56mm f1.2 lens on the walk, with the 18mm f2 in my coat pocket if I needed a wide angle lens.  As it happened I decided to keep the 56mm fitted to the camera and set about capturing some of the scenes on the beach as the surfers braved the very cold North Sea. With the tide on the turn the wet sand shimmered in the bright Scottish sun, so I decided to try and use this reflective surface as the surfers walked towards the water. The colour of the water, the bright blue sky and the yellow sand provided a very colourful subject, which I duly captured using the camera's RAW and JPEG mode, with the later set to 'Ve...

The Eiffel Tower is the iconic symbol of the French capital city. On my last few trips to Paris I have shot the Eiffel Tower at night in colour, including the images I posted on this blog on Wednesday HERE .   However I also decided while walking around the massive structure that the dramatic contrast created by the lighting on the 126 year old tower would be perfect for some dramatic black and white images, especially with the low clouds that were rolling across Paris bouncing the light and creating some extra drama in the night sky.   The 1063' / 324m high tower was erected in 1889 as the entrance arch to that year's World's Fair, it was initially criticised by some of France's leading artists and intellectuals for its design, but has become both a global cultural icon of France and one of the most recognizable structures in the world. The tower is the tallest structure in Paris and the most-visited paid monument in the world.   CLICK HERE for more i...

The reason for my business trips to Paris is for my job as the Media Delegate for the FIA World Endurance Championship and European Le Mans Series and my client, Le Mans Endurance Management, manages all aspects of these two sportscar championships.  The company recently moved offices in Paris and on this first trip of 2015 I had the opportunity to see the new working environment that my colleagues have to endure.  The offices are on the 5th and 6th floor of a building in Rue Gallee near to the Arc de Triomphe.  The views from the top floor are breathtaking with a fantastic view of the Eiffel Tower to the south west and Montmartre and the Sacre Cour to the east. Both these images were taken in late afternoon as the sun was setting, providing a beautiful soft glow over the 'city of light'.  My next trip will be at the beginning of March and I am looking forward to seeing this view again at the start of Spring . ---------------------------------------...

This was the scene this afternoon in Paris for the unveiling of the entry lists for the 2015 FIA World Endurance Championship, the European Le Mans Series and the 24 Hours of Le Mans.  With 35 cars announced for the WEC, 34 for the ELMS and 56 for the 2015 24 Heures du Mans, endurance racing is looking very strong. The venue in Paris was packed with VIPs and members of the media to hear the announcements, which were also broadcast live around the world online through various channels including YouTube and the FIA WEC official website. After 90-minutes all three entry lists were known and the media had the opportunity to talk to some of the drivers and team members about the coming season which starts at Silverstone on the 10-12 April for both WEC and ELMS.  Hopefully we'll see some of you there. Here is the official pre season video from the FIA WEC ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------...

One of the many pleasures of visiting Paris on business is the opportunity to walk down to the Trocadero and the Eiffel Tower during the evening.  This evening I had the opportunity to join fellow photographer John Rourke to capture the Eiffel Tower with the lights playing off the low clouds that were skudding across the Paris sky. There was also the opportunity to stand directly under the centre line of the tower.  For the past few years there has been some building work going on and the area under the tower has been fenced off.  Today was the first opportunity to be able to stand directly under the tower and look up. All the images were taken on the Fujifilm X-T1 and either the 10-24mm Fujinon or the 56mm f1.2. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- PLEASE SUPPORT THIS BLOG BY VISITING THE ADVERTISERS ON THIS PAGE By clicking on the adverts you are helping support this bl...

This was the wintry scene on a recent trip into Edinburgh looking west along Princes Street Gardens with Edinburgh Castle in the distance on the hill with the Scottish National Gallery in the middle distance. While Dunbar in East Lothian has had very little snow, Edinburgh and Mid Lothian have had a fair dusting and walking around with the X100 while I was waiting for my train back to Dunbar I captured this image from the Waverley Bridge. I will be in the centre of Edinburgh again tomorrow when I head out to the airport to catch a plane to Paris. This will be the first trip to Europe of 2015 and it is for the Press Conference on Thursday to unveil the entry list for this year's FIA World Endurance Championship, the 24 Hours of Le Mans and the European Le Mans Series. More on this later this week. Image taken on a Fujifilm Finepix X100 with a Fujinon 23mm f2 lens.  Image converted to mono using Silver Efex Pro2. -------------------------------------------------------...