Andy Gawthrope Photography

SHARE THE VISION

Tag: Dartmoor

  • Saddle Tor (Northern quarries)

    Saddle Tor (Northern quarries)

    By the last day of my recent trip to Dartmoor, the endless blue skies were starting to get tiresome.  O’ for a few wisps of cloud and some drama!  Spring was definitely announcing its imminent arrival tho.  By day it was tee-shirt weather but once the sun set it was full-on winter duvet weather 🙂  It felt somewhat silly leaving the truck in warm sunshine but packing boots and winter clothing!

    Although the sky was clear there was always a thickish layer of cloud hugging the ground like a duvet.  Perhaps mother nature knew winter wasn’t quite over.  Like heavy mist it significantly reduced visibility and looked like smog.  Not very attractive.  Big landscape shots just didn’t work.  Come the last rays of a day, it reliably gave a nice orange band across the horizon but not much more.  That low cloud can just be seen in the photograph above towards the left-hand side.

    I’ve photographed and posted regarding these rocks previously.  Their discovery was a genuine organic first for me, but since then I’ve come to realise they are quite famous, why I don’t know, and I usually spot someone with a tripod in the area.  One of these days I will enquire of others what drew them to the rocks.  On this occasion I wanted a different perspective and something that captured the soft orange glow from the setting sun.   The square format is the result of three images stitched with Affinity Photo – my favourite bitmap editor now I’ve escaped the clutches of Adobe.

    I will just plug the Affinity suite of applications as they are truly fantastic and I’m very, very happy to support the company.  I’ve used Photo for over a year now and I’ve not missed or regretted the absence of Photoshop.  It is a superb application and I’m really looking forward to the forthcoming next release.  The application is feature rich and, importantly, stable on Mac.  Previously I’ve used Illustrator for logo’s and artwork needing vector graphics; Affinity Designer has all the capabilities of Illustrator I need and is easy to use.  The third application I used, all be it, infrequently was InDesign, so I’m really looking forward to the forthcoming release of Publisher which is currently in public Beta.  Moving to Capture One and the Affinity suite has saved me hundreds of Pounds per year.  If you haven’t tried the Affinity apps, then I recommend you download and try the trial versions.

    Andy

  • Hart Tor

    Hart Tor

    At the end of February a large high pressure system parked itself over the UK for a few days giving some stable, sunny weather.  Hopefully it was the first of many yet to come but since then its been wet and very, very windy – but it is winter.  Hopefully, the weather will break soon as I found one of my bins flying down the road the other day and tonight, I note, its gone completely – not a sign of it anywhere…  Perhaps a kind neighbour has rescued it, it’s been abducted by aliens or its just gone to that place where all the missing bins go. 🙂

    With the arrival of stable, sunny weather I popped down to Dartmoor for a few days, staying at the Plume of Feathers in Princetown.  Whilst Princetown is notorious for its jail – which, by the way, no longer holds the UK’s most dangerous since the local council refused upgrades – it is also well placed on the Western side of the Dartmoor National Park with good access to most places and surrounded by stunningly beautiful tor’s to its South and West.  Once upon a time Princetown had a railway station that linked it to Yelverton on the Plymouth to Tavistock line.  That would have been a great sight and it’s such a shame it closed in 1956.  Although the railway tracks are now gone its path remains and it now makes a popular walking/cycling route.  Perhaps one day it can be reopened.

    The area just South of Princetown is one of my favourite area’s on the moor and there was one particular Tor I’d been meaning to visit for some time as it looked promising based on mapping and Google Images.  Now, it’s always better to be familiar with a location and its potential before arriving at a shoot, so it was with some trepidation that I drove down the B3212 in near absolute darkness with just stars in the sky.  Would I find the tor in the dark?  Would I get there before the sun rose?  Would the light be good and would the tor be photogenic?  The usual questions that haunt a landscape photographer!  I knew from reviewing the map the previous evening – over a pint of Jail Ale – that a straight line walk-in would likely put me in a boggy stream bed – something I definitely wanted to avoid.  It would be necessary to walk South-East for 500m then South-West for 500 metres.  The plan proved good, although my estimation of the first 500m was off somewhat! But, in my defence, it was completely dark :-).  Still, I used to be better at that sort of thing.  After a while and no sign of a tor I decide I couldn’t afford to waste time and checked the GPS.  Sure enough I had walked too far on the first leg so was to the North and East of the tor.  With the new bearing established off I trotted across the moor trying not to trip on the tussock grass.

    Even with the navigation mishap I got to Hart Tor well before sunrise.  After all, I had deliberately left plenty of time having not been before….  As dawn approached I relaxed as I’d found the tor, I’d got there in time and it was definitely photogenic 🙂  The only problem was going to be the lack of cloud and thus no colour towards the sun.  However, as it got lighter low cloud hugging the land like a fog became visible. Much better!  I just had to wait for the sun and hope.  Fingers crossed 🙂

    With slightly higher ground on the Eastern horizon the sun rose a little later.  This higher angle and the clear sky resulted in little colour towards the sun but some lovely low angle light on the grasses and, thanks to that low cloud, the most gorgeous soft colours towards Leather Tor and Sharpitor.  The result was the photograph at the top of this post;  it is one of my favourites from Dartmoor.

    Andy

  • Leedon Tor

    Leedon Tor

    As readers will know from the preceding post I’ve been exploring the Dartmoor National Park again 😉 There is an area to the South and West of Princetown bounded by Leedon Tor, Ingra Tor and King’s Tor that contains the old railway and some quarries.  This area looked interesting on the map but I was hesitant as its higher than most of the surrounding moor and the tor’s didn’t, on the map, look especially interesting.  A particular objective was to understand what opportunities the quarries might offer as I’ve got this Dwarf kingdom, Lord of the Rings type image lodged in my brain!

    Starting at the Southern end, I climbed Leedon Tor and noted it had potential especially for a nice colourful sunset.  Moving North I explored the railway and the odd lonesome tree before stopping for lunch at Swelltor quarries.  Swelltor faces West and given the right lighting there should be nice black and white photographs, but being midday with high contrast and clear skies the atmosphere was all wrong.  A return visit is needed. 😉  Continuing North, after lunch I arrived at King’s Tor – a large and complex group of stones  – but I didn’t see any simple arrangement that caught my interest.  A small tree on the South-East side does warrant future investigation though 😉

    I was back at Leedon Tor for the golden hour and watched the sun gradually sink to the horizon, but with a sinking feeling I knew nothing was going to happen.  The sky was almost cloudless and although there was a nice orange band at the horizon it just went dark. 🙁  So, back to the pub and another pint of Jail Ale!  The next morning I tried again.  This time the lighting was better and as the first rays of sunlight caught the higher rocks and grasses it painted them in a nice warm soft orange colour.  The photograph at the top of this post captured the moment 🙂

    Looking at the photograph now I see a stack of rock half lit by the sun and it reminds me of another similar stack.  The Bownerman’s Nose which featured in an earlier post here.

    Andy

  • Light Fantastic!

    Light Fantastic!

    On my first visit to Dartmoor I recall thinking it was boring open moorland with nothing to make a good photograph apart from the odd rocky Tor!  Well, that was quite some time ago and since then I’ve grown to really appreciate its shapes, subtle colours and rugged looks.  Dartmoor is, I guess, one of those places that grows on you. 🙂  Nowadays its one of my favourite places in England.  Its like a wild animal – for days it will be warm, friendly and accepting then for no apparent reason it’ll have your arm off if you’re not careful. 🙂  Its wild, its rugged, its just the sort of place I like. 🙂

    Early last week, the weather forecast looked promising for a visit but from afar you can never be sure.  Dartmoor weather does what it will and pays little heed to the pronouncements of weather forecasters.  My plan was to be on the very Western side of the moor for evening and spend an hour investigating opportunities somewhere I’d not been before – Hayne Down.  But I arrived later than planned, just after midday and four hours before sunset so there wasn’t really sufficient time to investigate the area and to head further West so I chose to stay.

    The weather was lovely; better than forecast and I could see high and thin cloud which I thought would catch the evening light, there was no wind, it was sunny – but not overly so – and warm.  One of the first photographs of the afternoon was North past a pinnacle of rocks known as the Bowerman’s Nose.

    Bowermans Nose
    Bowermans Nose

    The light was still strong and perhaps not in the best position for the above photograph but the low angle of sunlight nicely emphasised the trees and hedges on the distant landscape.

    In my rush to park and commence photography I’d somehow missed the obvious parking near the top of the hill and parked at its base.  Not good.  The hill was much bigger than I had thought and the approach I chose, following sheep tracks, led through some horrible bracken and grass covered rocks that just wanted to twist or break your ankles.  It was an uphill slog with the sun in my eyes.  Note to self – think about your approach more…  Realising the light was harsh I returned to the truck and moved it nearer to the top of the hill so as to make a dark descent through hidden rocks unnecessary and thus a lot safer.

    On returning to the rocks an hour or so later the light was starting to turn and paint the landscape in a wonderful golden light.  Compare the colours in the photographs above and below.  The foreground is different but the distant hills are the same.  The harshness of the light had gone and things were now getting beautifully soft. 🙂

    Hayne Down
    Hayne Down

    That light continued to improve for another hour before the sun finally dipped below the Western horizon at which point all those thin high-level clouds that I thought might catch the light, did so and turned wonderfully pink to the East and yellow and orange to the West.  Even after sunset I was shooting for a further hour. 

    Days like that are what makes landscape photography so rewarding.  Forgotten are thoughts of the lacklustre days when the weather just didn’t cooperate.  It was one of those days when there was no wrong.  It was magic. 🙂

    If you have enjoyed this article please remember to share it with your friends.

    Andy

    All images are Copyright Andy Gawthrope Photography.

    Bowermans Nose
    Bowermans Nose
    Hayne Down
    Hayne Down
    Hayne Down
    Hayne Down
  • Rocks near Haytor, Dartmoor

    Rocks near Haytor, Dartmoor

    Continuing with the previous thread about panoramic format photographs here is another. Perhaps not so large, this was only 3 x 50M pixel un-cropped!

    Looking at this image you could be forgiven for thinking it was a warm summers evening. How wrong that would be! I took this only recently (November 2017). There was a 20 to 25MPH wind blowing, the air temperature was about 3 degrees Celsius and the afternoon had been pretty much dominated by very heavy dark clouds and rain showers. Basically it felt like a couple of degrees below 0 Celsius. Chilly when you are stood pretty still for over an hour! 🙂

    Haytor is one of the famous Dartmoor tors. I’ve spent time in its vicinity before but never been happy with the results. This time I walked away from the tor to the West just exploring the landscape looking for nice compositions. On one occasion I had to shelter out of the wind as a heavy rain shower passed through. That rain must have been almost frozen as it really hit hard and stung the face. Most unpleasant! After some distance I spotted this tree which I felt contrasted nicely against the rocky tor. I stayed at this location until after sunset shooting images of the surrounding area but this turned out best due to a the rookie mistake of not ensuring the camera was absolutely still in the buffeting wind. Lesson re-learnt 🙁

    I must admit to being surprised when another photographer arrived and then another just before sunset. Having three photographers converge at a random location on Dartmoor must be pretty unusual. But maybe I stumbled on something more well known…

    Andy

  • Moorland photography

    Moorland photography

    Black Tor on Dartmoor lies just South of Princetown on the B3212.  It’s not a large Tor, in fact, it’s a rather small, non-descript Tor easily missed as its set back off the road just over the brow of a hill.  It’s on a rise and stands just a little higher than the surrounding landscape so offers some nice views.

    Moorland usually consists of large expanses of similar looking terrain which, without, something to draw the eye results in photographs that are just plain boring 🙂 Dartmoor is nice in this respect as its peppered with little hills topped with rocky Tors and the occasional forest or large group of trees.

    Moors are often associated with being windy places where the weather changes from sunshine and blue skies to cloud, rain, fog, hail and snow all within a couple of hours.  They are thought of as intimidating and often scary places.  So, people strongly connect to photographs communicating one or more of these characteristics.

    The photograph above is a more subtle, a softer, interpretation of those characteristics.  In it I’ve tried to convey vast open space whilst using the tall grasses and boulders to provide the sense of an exposed, desolate hill top.  Sub-consciously the viewer knows it’s likely to be a windy and cold location. 😉

    Andy