Dunwich Heath

I last visited Dunwich Heath (National Trust) in July/August 1974 when Adam (our oldest son) was -1month old. Jane was heavily pregnant and we thought that a break for a week in the pub in Walberswick, being waited on hand and foot, would be just the ticket.  The rain didn't stop for four days and we gave up and went home!!  But during those four days we drove down to Dunwich Heath and then drove back again - soggy heathland in driving rain didn't do it for us.

Today we returned and had a spell on the beach with grandchildren, the grand-dog and Tom & Emily, then we had our picnic before taking a walk around the heathland.  The heath is spectacular at the moment with acres of heather in flower.  If you don't take grandchildren and the dog, you may also be lucky enough to see the Dartford Warbler, grass-snakes, lizards and lots of other flora & fauna.

Whether you are a Scot looking for a heather-fix, or and East Anglian searching for a new walk, Dunwich Heath could be the place to go.

Focus stacking garden flowers

I have been experimenting with the automatic focus stacking facilities afforded by the Olympus OMD E-M1.  For the uninitiated this allows the photographer to capture a series of images each of which has a very shallow depth of field and then to combine the infocus parts of the images to drive at an image in which the required part of the image is sharp, while the background remains a pleasing soft blur.  Usually this means setting up the camera on a special rack on a tripod with allows a series images to be taken, moving the camera forwards a very small amount between exposures.  However, the Olympus system automatically takes a series of shots with different focal points and then (optionally) stacks them for you.  The images below have all been stacked in the camera with the exception of the shot with two roses which gave me too much depth of field, so I selected a subset of the images and stacked them using Photoshop.  The final image shows how too many shots results in too much focus!

Salisbury - mostly cathedral

Staying with my brother in Winchester, we visited Salisbury on Monday. the first thing to catch our eye in the cathedral precincts was an extraordinary sculptured bottom.  We discovered that this was part of an exhibition by Sophie Ryder who seems to specialise in creatures with hare's heads and human bodies…

Inside the cathedral I was surprised to find that it was not a cathedral with masses of natural light as I had imagined.  Visiting with non-photographers anticipating their lunch inhibited my use of tripod, so I used the built-in HDR facilities on my Olympus OMD E-M1 all hand-held.  The first shots are from the garden of Ted Heath's house. The last pair are my attempt at showing the magnificent scissor arches which were introduced to support the spire when it was added 100 years after the main body of the cathedral.