Jazz Festival: Snap Snap

July 22 saw the beginning of the Edinburgh Jazz festival and Mark and I went out for the day with some others from the Edinburgh Digital Photography Meetup Group. It was the first day of the festival and opened with a mardi gras (the smallest I have ever seen) procession from the Mile down to Grassmarket, the music was good and there was a chance of a few good photos. 

It was packed, 100s of people were in the square, the sky was blue and the sun was out and it held a promise that his years August festivals might just have good weather...ha! lol, but the day was lovely.  

 

I have discovered a love of taking pictures of people. Trying to capture moments and expressions without pose. I used black n white for the day, there was lots of colour to be had but I just felt like Black n White. Nearly everyone else was shooting in colour anyway. I could have gotten some beautiful colour shots but something just made me want to go black and white.  I got very burnt – it was a stunningly beautiful day weather wise, good music, good mood, good day. 

I'm really enjoying my time out with Mark and the Camera. If I pace myself and don't over do it my health doesn't rebel that much, well not enough that I don't deem the time of recovery worth it. It's nice to get out of the flat once a fortnight - it's good for me to get some exercise for my body as well as for my spirit. Camera and Husband in hand I can face the world with a smile. 

Holidays: Husband, Camera, Country 'n Rain

Black Iris

 It's been a long time since I've been blogging and have a few things to catch up on. The first is my holidays in June. We had hoped that summer would be caught but alas Scotland's weather has been a tad bizarre this year so we had temps from 4cel to 15cel for the majority with a couple of weeks of rain and a few lovely 22cel days just before we left. Always the way lol. But still we managed to get out with our cameras and snap a few things. On one of the better days we drove up to Crathies Castle and took a walk with the cameras through the magnificent gardens. We've been quite a few times now but it's always worth the money to take a walk round the gardens. I ended up with only a few images I'm happy with, but then I'm really happy with them. This Black Iris in particular - I adore the contrast between the deep purples and lime greens.

Rainy Day at Loch

Tillyduke is always a pleasure that we look forward to every year regardless of the weather. The isolation and solitude in the country helps me get through the year of being trapped in the flat. It's become a photographic journey for us.  We met up with the Inlaws for a day and they took us for a long drive around the Lochs (I'll have to find out the names as I have a memory like a sieve. This photo was taken that day. It was raining and I was huddled under my somewhat scant rain coat trying to protect the camera and still have the lens point at what i wanted lol all the while eaten alive by midges. I made a lot of mistakes in my rush - didn't adjust my ISO or give my aperture settings the attention they needed but still I'm somewhat happy with the image - it has mood.

Every year (well now that Mark also has a camera anyway) we go to the Animal Park giving us the opportunities to take pictures of animals we normally wouldn't be able too. We also became somewhat addicted to bird watching and identifying them in the front yard drawn to the feeders. We both enjoy taking pictures of anything Nature and Wildlife – we are yet to discover something we don't like to snap yet.

Isn't he beautiful, and only still a cub really 2 years old. Man I love animals, I could photograph them for the rest of my life and be content.