Woodland photography is hard.
This morning I took Una to Stanmer Park with a few things deliberately in mind: using trees to frame the view, looking for light and colour, and simplifying the scene. Sometimes that meant moving sideways until one trunk disappeared behind another. I also tried taking several versions of each composition, to see what a small change of position might achieve.
It all sounds quite straightforward until you’re standing in a wood. There is always another branch. Usually crossing something you’d rather it didn’t.
I came home with 109 frames, including exposure brackets, and eventually arrived at these five. The path beneath the yellow canopy is my favourite, and today’s photo of the day. It comes closest to bringing the framing, colour and sense of depth together.
Beneath the Canopy
In the two other autumn studies, it was the yellow itself that interested me: foliage hanging between the dark uprights.
Held Between the Trees
A Window into Autumn
The fallen tree was more about shape and texture, and gave me an opportunity to practise merging exposures.
After the Fall
Una, meanwhile, supplied a foreground subject without being asked. She had her own investigations to conduct.
A Closer Investigation
Looking through the results, I could usually remember what had caught my eye. Getting that across in a photograph was another matter. Bright backgrounds competed with shaded subjects, and branches that seemed promising on location led the eye somewhere entirely unhelpful.
Editing helped some of them. Others needed different light, a different viewpoint, or simply to remain an interesting thing I’d seen on a walk.
I’m increasingly in awe of people who make woodland photographs look effortless. I’m also increasingly aware that I may need to get out of bed earlier on foggy mornings. A little mist between the layers would have helped several of today’s compositions considerably.
For once, I’m keeping the rejects so I can compare them with the versions that worked better. There’s plenty to learn from this lot.
Including, possibly, how to set an alarm clock after checking the forecast…
