Cycle Ride to Zouch

First of all, sorry for not posting in a while!

Anyway, a couple of weeks ago we had a really nice spell of good weather, so I hopped on my bike and went for a little ride to a place called Zouch. Funny name but I had never been and it turned out it was really pretty. I got quite into the bike ride so I decided I would cycle along and pic places that I thought would make a good picture, then on the way back I could snap them! This seemed like a good idea at the time, however as I got to the where I was about to turn around, I noticed a quiet little road that would lead me back home, and would have been nice and peaceful to cycle down. This however meant I missed all the photo opportunities on the way here! Doh! So I cycle back to where I had seen some opportunities I definitely wanted to get, then had to leave the rest as I carried on home.

In the end, I only got a few good photos from the trip, but it was really good exercise so that is a bonus!

Here are the photos from the ride:

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Fun in the dark

Unfortunately, this post is not as seedy as the title makes out!!!

Have nothing to do at 11 O'Clock at night? go out and take photos! At least that is what me and my buddies did. We cycled over to the multi-storey car park in Loughborough and started to shoot photos of things about! Having never really shot before in the dark, it was a huge learning curve, but playing with exposures, shutter speeds and apertures it started to come together. It was especially good because I got to use my new tripod and remote shutter!

After we had taken photos of the only good thing we could actually see (the tower below), we decided to ride the bikes with the lights on whilst using a fairly long shutter speed. As you can see from the photos we played around with different colours and flashing lights and different patterns to try and produce loads of different effects.

Eventually we moved onto the basketball court near to home which was so dark I had to use a torch to set up my equipment, however in the photos you would have no idea as the street lights in the distance bring everything to life.

Shooting at night is now going to be a new challenge of mine, as I love the way things can be seen in photos when in reality things were very dark or pitch black!

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Five Locks

After going to Kirkstall Abbey, Hana, her parents and I went to Five Locks. For those of you who don't know it, it is 5 locks in a row on a canal, pretty simple. And for those of you who don't know what a lock is..... well, for boats to go up and down hill on the canal, they have to enter a lock, close the door, let it fill up/empty out, then open the second door and they can carry on going as they will be level. It's really quite clever!

Anyway, enough of that engineering/canal lesson, here are the photos! Don't forget to check out the other photos from the day here - Kirkstall Abbey, Flower Power.

Flower Power

Whilst at Kirkstall Abbey, there were plenty of flowers to take snaps of, and with it being a sunny day, it was a photographer's dream! So I got out my zoom lens, set up my tripod and snapped away at this colourful lot!

As you can see from the photos, there were a load of crocuses all over the place, but also were some daffodils, and a couple other kinds I didn't recognise.

The first load of these are all the different angles of the crocuses, but I couldn't pick my favourite so I put a few up!

Also if you want to read my other blog about where these were taken then just click here - Kirkstall Abbey.

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Kirkstall Abbey

Recently, I went to Kirkstall Abbey in Leeds with Hana and her parents. We went on a beautifully sunny Sunday, which is quite odd considering that it has only just turned into spring, and it is England! We never get sun!

Kirkstall Abbey is an old abbey that is now open to the public to look around the remains of it. It has some real character and some huge windows, plus it is placed in some beautiful gardens filled with flowers - three guesses as to what my next post will be?? There is also a little river running by the side and a courtyard in the middle with some brilliantly green grass.

Here are some of the photos taken on the day:

1. The abbey roof

2. The river

3. An entrance in the building

4. Rocks lining the wall

5. In the courtyard

Don't forget to check out the next TWO posts arriving in the near future, taken on the same trip! I'll post the links to them here when they're up!

Here is the first: Flower Power