This Morning in Brinscall Woods
I wasn't really in the mood to go out for a walk this morning as I'd been on a relatively long hike in the Lake District yesterday and everything was still hurting. I should add that it was a very enjoyable walk in the Dunnerdale fells, a mere six miles and 1,600ft of ascent, but it seems my body classes that as a long walk these days.
Anyway, despite the strong urge to remain in bed this morning, I'd received a used copy of the GF45-100 f/4.0 a couple of days ago and was eager to test it properly, plus mist had been forecast first thing, so somewhat wearily I forced myself out of the house and off to the local woods, thinking I'd just potter around for 30 minutes taking some test shots.
Three hours later I was still there and, if I hadn't had other commitments and my joints weren't still aching, I would have stayed much longer as the conditions were great and seemingly improving as the day wore on, although the promised mist was a complete no show as usual!
All images taken on a tripod with the Fujifilm GFX100S and 45-100 f/4.0, except for the first image which was shot at nearly 45mm with the 32-64 for some reason. All were taken with a CPL and edited from individual raw files in Capture One Pro 23.
1. Wonky Trees
This is actually the right hand half of a wider shot and although I liked many of the features on the left hand side, they weren't really adding much to the overall composition, in fact I felt they imbalanced it.
2. Hanging Out With A Fun Guy
I seem to be spotting fungi all over the place at the moment, there were loads of tiny ones mixed in with the turf on the fells yesterday, but this little cluster on the side of a rotting tree seemed kind of cool. The 45-100 only focuses down to 65cm, so there's been a bit of cropping to get this so large in the frame. Having said that, the full res edit is still about 40MP.
3. The Eerie Woods By Hatch Brook
This is close to unedited by my standard. I've switched up the film sim to Film High Contrast, boosted the contrast a bit in the lower left and lifted the overall exposure ever so slightly, plus I've cropped it to 3:2 to get rid of some bits of sky that were creeping into the frame. Looking at this, I wish I'd included a bit more of the tree on the right hand edge of the frame, but if I recall correctly, the main trunk continues up and out to the right and what looks to be the trunk curving back into the frame is actually just a branch, so it's probably better as it is.
4. Fifty Shades of Green (and a bit of yellow and orange)
5. A Gateway
This was as wide an image as I could get with the 45-100 and there was already a downright hostile holly tree attacking me from behind just for standing on this spot, so zooming with my feet wasn't an option. I did take a slightly wider shot by moving a little to the left which allowed me to move further back without getting impaled on the holly, but in the end I actually preferred this shot out of the two.
6. Don't Forget To Look Up
This was taken around 9:30. The woods sits on the steep, West facing slope leading up to Withnell Moor, so it doesn't get any direct sunlight first thing in the morning, but by this time the tops of the trees were just beginning to rise above the shadow cast by the hillside and the canopy was taking on a rather impressive golden glow. I nearly missed this spectacle and it was only by chance that I looked up to the top of the steep slope in front of me and spotted it.
7. Over The Wall
This is on the other side of the wall to a one time favourite photography spot of mine. That spot has lost its lustre now that the fallen tree that sat across the wall has decayed and collapsed, destroying one of the best features in that scene. Fortunately the view from this side is not too shabby at the moment.
8. Colourful Chaos
This a very busy image, but I think it works. I've actually cut about 1/4 of the left of the frame to draw the focus more along the line of the receding wall, which I think removes a few distractions and helps to guide the eye.