Rufford Abbey

July 27, 2023 fishyfisharcadeLeave a comment

I visited Rufford Abbey back at the end of May. It’s the ruin of a cistercian abbey dating back to the 11th century and then later incorporated into a mansion house in the 17th century.

The monastery was closed by Henry VIII when England broke away from the catholic church in 1530. Henry appointed commissioners to find evidence that would allow him to close the abbey. Apparently, one of the “disgraceful offences” that permitted this to happen was an allegation that the abbot, Thomas of Doncaster, had broken his vows of chastity with several single and married women. Following this, the abbey and lands were granted to George Talbot, one of the wealthiest people in the land at that time, and construction of the new house began.

In the 15th century, the estate passed to Sir George Savile. Savile supported the Royalists during the English Civil War, and his support for the royal family allowed for prosperity in the years following the restoration of the monarchy.

During World War II, the estate was requisitioned and used by the Leicestershire Yeomanry, 6th Cavalry Brigade. By the end of the war the estate was in poor state and Nottinghamshire County Council bought the estate to preserve it. This included demolition of some parts of the structure.

In 1969, the estate was officially designated a Country Park.

It’s not possible to enter the ruin itself, but the whole thing is surrounded by Rufford Abbey Country Park, incorporating gardens, woodland, a reservoir and various cafes and other entertainments. The park itself is free to enter, but there is a parking charge if you arrive by car.

It was a pretty hot day when I visited and there were a lot of visitors (although I’ve almost completely managed to keep them out of these pictures!). There is a large adventure playground making it ideal for familes, plus acres of open grassland, formal gardens, and woodland trails that are nice to experence and explore.

Fujica GW690 & Ilford HP5+. Ilfotec DD-X 1+9 15mins 45secs @ 20°

Taken 27 May 2023.

Film photography · Medium Format · Photography

Village scenes

July 26, 2023 fishyfisharcadeLeave a comment

A couple of images taken within a stone’s throw of one another, both in the village of Whitwell in Derbyshire. Whitwell appears to be quite a nice place, but it’s somewhere I rarely pass through – mostly because you have to leave the main road deliberately to get there, and it’s otherwise easily bypassed. One day I think I’ll park the car and go for a proper wander around the place as I’m sure there are plenty of interesting things to photograph.

Fujica GW690 & Ilford HP5+. Ilfotec DD-X 1+9 15mins 45secs @ 20°

Taken 27 May 2023.

Film photography · Medium Format · Photography

Abandoned bungalow

July 24, 2023 fishyfisharcade2 Comments

I drove past this place on my way home aftert a day out and turned the car around to stop and get a picture. It would have been good to get closer, but there was a sign warning about trespassing which I didn’t feel like disobeying.

Fujica GW690 & Ilford HP5+. Ilfotec DD-X 1+9 15mins 45secs @ 20°

Taken 27 May 2023.

Film photography · Medium Format · Photography

Winter chill

February 10, 2023 fishyfisharcade4 Comments

The photo published here today is the only decent photo from the roll of Kodak Gold I shot recently that still looks good in colour. All the others had colour casts and I had to convert them to black and white. This one managed to avoid the weird colours. The colour here is quite subtle but I think it still adds something to the image.

Fujica GW690 & Kodak Gold . Lab developed. Home scanned and and converted using Negative Lab Pro.

Taken on 21 January 2023.

Film photography · Medium Format · Photography

Cow Parsley

February 9, 2023 fishyfisharcadeLeave a comment

One of the common nicknames for cow parsley is Mother-die. I learnt this from my grandma when I was pretty young and I remember spending quite a few years as a child being especially careful around the stuff, just in case. The name mother-die is thought to originate from rural villages and said that if a child picked the plant and brought it home then their mother would die. The rationale behind this is likely that, while cow parsley is edible, there are a number of very similar looking plants that are harmful, including hemlock.

Fujica GW690 & Kodak Gold (converted to B&W in Lightroom).

Taken on 21 January 2023.

Film photography · Medium Format · Photography

On a misty morning

February 8, 2023 fishyfisharcade2 Comments

Another of my converted Kodak Gold shots. I almost left this one as colour, but I think the black and white version is better. The colours were pretty muted in any case.

Today was the thing at work that I mentioned a couple of days back – the thing that was causing me stress even though I suspected I was worrying for nothing. And I was right. Everything went absolutely fine. So I’ve spent a few days spending way too much time being concerned about something I needn’t have. Now I need to catch up on the other stuff I didn’t do because I was focused on this. Oh to be me…

Fujica GW690 & Kodak Gold (converted to B&W in Lightroom).

Taken on 21 January 2023.

Film photography · Medium Format · Photography

Across the Moss once more

February 7, 2023 fishyfisharcadeLeave a comment

Here’s another photo of a bridge crossing the River Moss (as I mentioned the other day). I took this photo just after my wallaby / kangaroo encounter (see here if you want to find out about that) and regaled a couple of other people with the tale of my unexpected encounter.

I had pretty high hopes for this photograph. I’d switched from black and white film to some Kodak Gold by this time and, while the light was dim due to the fog and the tree cover, the camera was tripod mounted and the composition was nice.

Sadly this roll of film is one that Negative Lab Pro (or perhaps me, as the user) struggled with – usually Negative Lab Pro works a treat, and I’ve had no issue with it converting Gold in the past. It could be the fact that I’m scanning on a V700 rather than a V550, but I’m not really sure. A couple of the colour images look ok, but many of them had a nasty green and purple cast to them that I was unable to remove. In the end I decided to cut my losses and convert them to black and white using Lightroom. Happily all the shots I converted suit the monochrome treatment pretty well.

I still have the un-converted RAW DNG scans so I may yet re-visit them to see if I have more luck with a further attempt but, for now at least, some of this roll will be sans colour.

Fujica GW690 & Kodak Gold (converted to B&W in Lightroom).

Taken on 21 January 2023.

Film photography · Medium Format · Photography

Stuff on my mind

February 6, 2023February 6, 2023 fishyfisharcade3 Comments

It’s one of those days today where I don’t know what to write on the blog (although here I am, writing stuff about not knowing what to write…). Today I think it’s because I’ve got something preying on my mind at work. Nothing terrible, just something I need to do this week that I’m not sure I’m fully prepared for. Usually, it comes to pass that I’m stressing out about nothing and everything will go just fine, but that doesn’t stop my brain flipping into anxiety mode. The fact that I’m focusing on this one thing also means I’m not spending time on a bunch of other things I need to be doing, leading to a cumulative worry about, well, more stuff.

It also doesn’t help that I tend to procrastinate. And while I always pull things together in the end, there’s always the worry that one day I might not be able to. I seem find myself increasingly easily distracted from things I ought to be concentrating on in recent years, to the extent that I wouldn’t be at all surprised to find out I have ADD (but that’s another story). I guess that tomorrow I need to just pull myself together, give myself a virtual slap across the cheeks to wake myself up, and just get on with what I need to do. In a couple of days the thing will have passed and I can get back to normal (i.e. worrying about the next thing…).

So, look at that – I’ve written more than I do on many other days. Good ol’ productive stress, eh?

Here’s a picture of a foggy scene. This is probably not disimillar to what it looks like inside my head right now. 🙂

Fujica GW690 & Ilford HP5+ (@1600asa) . Ilfotec DD-X 1+4 13mins @ 20°

Taken on 21 January 2023.

Film photography · Medium Format · Photography

Across the Moss

February 5, 2023 fishyfisharcadeLeave a comment

This is the first of two photographs of bridges crossing the River Moss That I’ll publish – the second will be here in a couple of days.

I managed to get out and shoot a few rolls of film today, 36 exposures on some Superia Xtra 400, and a couple of rolls of 120 through my Bronica ETRSi (one HP5+, one Fuji Pro 400H). It’s the first time in ages I’ve shot so prolifically, and should mean that the wolves can be kept from the door for a while in terms of me having new photos for the blog. I’ll get the two rolls of C41 sent off for developing tomorrow and will maybe dev the HP5+ one lunchtime this week if I get the chance. I’ve got about a half-dozen more pictures from the GW690 to keep things ticking over until then though.

Fujica GW690 & Ilford HP5+ (@1600asa) . Ilfotec DD-X 1+4 13mins @ 20°

Taken on 21 January 2023.

Film photography · Medium Format · Photography

Rushes

February 4, 2023 fishyfisharcadeLeave a comment

I think the left side of this picture is a little messy, but there was unfortunately no way to get around it short of cropping. The GW690 has a fixed focal length and, while using my legs to zoom is often a viable technique, in this case I was hemmed in by trees at either side, and in front of my feet the ground dropped into marshy wetness where the rushes are growing and I didn’t fancy a boot full of freezing mud.

Nonetheless, the foggy morning does a lot of lifting and makes the shot quite pleasing, I think, particularly the contrast of the heads of the rushes against the faded backdrop.