Torridon and Applecross: A Photographer's Guide

"Torridon and Applecross: A Photographer's Guide" is a distillation of as much knowledge and experience as I could squeeze into 84 pages, gained during my months living and photographing in this quite wonderful part of the Scottish highlands. Included in the guide are dozens of location suggestions, "behind the scenes", practical tips on visiting the area, as well as listings for accommodation, eating and shops.

"Just flicked through - looks ' the business'. Well prepared, great info and not too tripod holes which is great. The ideal barometer is 'does it make me want to go there?'. My answer "Yes it does" right now, actually. And you can quote me :)"

Doug Chinnery, Professional Photographer and Workshop Leader for Light & Land

Free Sample

To give you a flavour of what to expect, you can download a short sample of the eBook free of charge.

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Standard Edition - £4.99

Just the 84-page ebook. Comes with free updates for life.

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"With a Print" Edition - £44.99

As well as the eBook and lifetime updates, you will receive a signed print of one of four photographs from the book. The print will be "A4-ish". "Ish" means that it will be printed as close to A4 as the photograph's aspect ratio allows. This print offer includes international delivery from my home in Australia.

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Making the Image: Bruce's Tree

In this Making the Image post I’m going to take you to Torridon in the Scottish Highlands. The wee road to Diabaig weaves its way along the north shore of Loch Torridon before climbing up the lower slopes of the Torridon hills. The view of the mountains to the south across the loch is quite beautiful.

Two Trees

Just above Inveralligin the road passes across a large sandstone plateau. There’s little on this plateau that immediately captures your attention as a photographer. It’s mostly grass and heather with few rocks or other features and so it’s easy to drive by. However on the edge of this plateau are two little rowan trees. And like most photographers I’m a sucker for a lone tree.

Coming from the east the first tree is the larger and more shapely of the two. However it sits below the edge, and with a telegraph pole and some houses below the edge it’s quite difficult to arrange the tree’s best side (where it’s shape is most pronounced) with the distant mountains.

The second tree is smaller and scrawnier, and I actually drove past it several times before deciding to stop for a closer look. I’m glad I did. Again from a distance it looks fairly nondescript. Yet it sits right on the edge, with an exposed slab of sandstone channeling a burn into a mini waterfall over the edge. Beyond it the mountains on the south shore of Loch Torridon are rather shapely, providing the perfect backdrop.

Variations

I spent some time looking at the tree and rock from different angles, quickly dismissing most of the compositions. Often the rock wasn’t strong enough as a foreground. Other times the tree would overlap the distant mountains, which causes confusion within the image.

Having looked at it from all angles, it became clear that the strongest composition placed the tree in the gap between Beinn Damh (left) and Beinn Shieldaig (right). Loch Damph sits between the two mountains, partly visible in some of the images. Putting the tree in this gap helps to accentuate and frame the tree. If it overlapped another element, the tree would lose its prominence and would lead to visual clutter. I think careful placement of objects like this is essential in a good photograph; it shows an attention to detail that moves an image beyond a hasty snapshot.

The small puddles on top of the rock helped to better define shapes in the rock that stood proud of the water, in the final composition creating a diagonal from bottom right up to the tree and Beinn Damh in the top left. I think without the water on top of the rock this composition would look too rock and bottom heavy. The luminance and reflections on the water help to break up the large mass of the rock.

Polariser

It’s interesting to consider the role of a polariser here. I’m a big fan of polarisers, mostly for their ability to render otherwise wet and shiny rocks as much darker and graphic shapes which helps to strengthen the flow through an image. Invariably when faced with wet rocks I will check the effect of a polariser on them.

In this case the polariser cuts out all of the blue light reflected on the foreground sandstone. This has two major effects. The first is that it massively increases the contrast of the image. The very bottom of the polarised image is close to black, whilst the sky behind the tree is very light. The histogram is stretched across its full width. The unpolarised image has much lower contrast, with more tones bunched together in the middle of the histogram, and less deep shadow. It’s important when using a polariser to consider this impact on contrast.

The other effect is an aesthetic rather than technical one. The unpolarised version is more luminous with an even blue tone to it. The blue reflections help to define the rocks and puddles. To me there’s an overall sense of tranquility and otherworldliness to this image. There’s even a slight sense that the blue on the rocks is a continuation of the loch below.

By contrast - pun intended! - the polarised version has a much wider colour range and looks more like you would expect (somewhat ironic given the need of a polariser to render it so). It’s still a nice image and the dark towards the bottom could be pulled up in post processing, but there’s a lack of magic and mystery to this image. It lays the scene out before you and leaves fewer questions.

Either version of the image works, but being a big fan of blue and something a little different I much prefer the unpolarised version.

It's All About Position

In the set-up shot you can see here how low and close my camera is to the rock and the tree. It doesn't matter how small and scrawny the tree is if you get in close to it.

Even moving just a few inches back greatly diminished (using a 24mm focal length) the tree and also the shape in the rocks. I always find it's really important to push in low and close with a wide angle lens to give the foreground real prominence.

Bruce's Tree

Finally in the name of honesty, I've seen a shot from here before. This is strange given how nondescript this spot seems! I read this post by Bruce Percy last year. At the time I didn't recall the image as being from Torridon. Yet subsequent research whilst I was staying in Torridon earlier this year turned up Bruce's version of this Torridon tree.

Hopefully the other shots I've shown here add weight to my argument that I have made my own image. I think if you were to visit the location yourself, the tree fitting into the gap between the mountains is quite natural, and for reasons above I didn't feel happy with other compositions from here.

It's interesting how different conditions (the light and the water on the rock), different visual interpretations and what must only be small differences in position lead to what I think are quite different images. Even though I talked about getting low and close, it looks like Bruce has gone lower and closer and with a longer focal length than I did (noting that my distant mountains are more expansive).

Nonetheless knowing the similarity to Bruce's image I'm hesitant to include it in my portfolio but think it presents an interesting talking point. I always try to approach my photography with the view to find and do my own thing, and I'm uncomfortable with even a passing similarity. Plus, I think I prefer Bruce's image!

Thoughts on Shutter Speed from Glen Sligachan

One of the things I've been developing over the last 6 or more months is a more creative approach to the use of shutter speed. Rather than a 'short' or 'long' binary switch, I like to consider shutter speed as an analog dial allowing us to dial up or down the degree of detail in the water to taste and to suit a particular shot. I particularly love the streaking that gives the water a sense of personality when using a mid-length shutter speed of 1 second plus or minus 2/3 second.

Though it suits some shots, I think full detail in the water often provides a confusing and distracting element in a frame. Conversely a very long shutter speed pushing the water exposure towards white for the 'silky water effect' removes any sense of character in the water, it just becomes white blobs in the frame. In between the two though there's the possibility of retaining some of that detail, that real sense of flow and undulation.

I often wonder why, when presented with raging torrents and stormy seas, we want to tame them into placid milky foam. In these elemental environments it is precisely the raw power and personality of the water that I want to capture. If it's a raging torrent, let it be so!

I thought I'd share an image from Glen Sligachan to show you what I mean.

Here's the first shot, looking towards Marsco down Glen Sligachan and the raging torrent that is Allt Dearg Mor (the one the footbridge crosses). Not a unique shot, indeed quite popular though most tend to shoot towards Sgurr nan Gillean and the Cuillin Ridge rather than Marsco, which I think is a particularly photogenic mountain. Still, I find it impossible to drive past Sligachan without stopping such is its beauty.

Already aware that I prefer to avoid very long shutter speeds these days, this shot was made at 1.6" at f/16 and ISO100. I had a polariser and a 3-stop neutral density filter on, the combination of which will block out between 4 and 5 stops of light. It's quite a nice shot I think, but when I look at the water it feels too placid. In particular, the white of the plunge pool holds very little detail and as a result interest. It's quite a large expanse of an image to be close to white and unsettles me.

Note that with other more gentle cascades you may find that 1.6" would retain reasonable detail in the plunge pool. Conversely with a large crashing waterfall, even 0.5" may record too much foamy movement in the plunge pool to keep any detail. The point here is that each time you encounter water you need to use some judgement and spend some time getting to know it to choose the perfect shutter speed. Each shot has a perfect shutter speed, but it's not fixed it's something you have to discover.

For the next image I've pulled out the 3-stop ND filter and I'm now using a 1/5th shutter speed. Note that in so doing I've nudged my polariser and there's a lot more glare on the rocks - oops! This is the main reason I often use a polariser around waterfalls.

Looking at the water itself there's a lot more detail in there and so to me sense of motion through the frame. Let's inspect more closely side-by-side.

The overall feel of the water in the shorter exposure is much more like what I would associate with a turbulent pool and a raging river. Observe that the exposure is still long enough that the detail has been 'smeared', so we don't have the full detail but rather the implication of detail.

Unfortunately the shorter exposure was just a tad under exposed, and the glare on the rocks from that nudge on the polariser means I'm not fully happy with this frame as is. Instead I take both exposures into Photoshop as separate layers (in Lightroom, select both, right click, "Edit In", "Open as Layers In Photoshop") and I use a layer mask to 'paint in' the more detailed water. You may also note that I've dialed down the opacity of the layer with the water exposure to 53% to reduce the extent of the detail in the final frame. Actually having a separate exposure like this allows me to dial the detail up and down as suits my taste back in the studio.

There's a few more tweaks I've made elsewhere in the image to result in the final image below. Some may prefer the original, smoother version but I much prefer this more turbulent rendition of Allt Dearg Mor and Glen Sligachan; for me it better suits its wild feeling location.

Success! Scottish Nature Photography Awards 2014

It's with great pleasure that I can announce that I have come 3rd in the 'Scottish Landscape Sea and Coast' Category of the Scottish Nature Photography Awards 2014. My selected image, "Incoming Tide, Loch Sunart", was chosen in what I'm assured was a very fiercely competitive category and the one from which the eventual winner - "The Boy" by Donald Cameron which is a lovely image - came from. It's always a great feeling to have one of your images recognised in this way and, as a Scot, having success in my 'home' awards means even more. I also had an image shortlisted in the 'Land' category.

My image will be included in the national exhibition which will be touring the country as well as the book of awards. I'll post more details about those when I have them.

You can see all of the winners and their images on the Scottish Nature Photography Awards website.

I'll write a 'Making the Image' post sharing the backstory and my approach to the image shortly. In the meantime I'll leave you with the 2 images that were recognised.

New Year in Knoydart: Some Thoughts and Images

Happy New Year! I hope you find 2014 to be an enjoyable and creative year for you.

For my first post of the year I thought I’d share some thoughts and images from the Knoydart Peninsula where I spent New Year. Though on the mainland Knoydart is only accessible by boat from Mallaig. The sea lochs and mountains, including 3 munros, that surround it mean the only other way to reach the small village of Inverie is by foot, and quite a few miles of walking it is too! Hence Knoydart is described as Britain’s Last Wilderness and the excellent village pub, the Old Forge, calls itself the Remotest Pub on Mainland Britain.

I certainly felt remote being there. Or a better way of putting it was that my day to day worries felt remote whilst there. It was a lovely time spent with my little family and friends in a warm and welcoming community surrounded by incredibly beautiful scenery.

As our 3 nights away were predominantly family time my time out with the camera was limited. I managed to sneak out for 60-90 minutes at sunrise on a couple of mornings whilst our youngest daughter napped, and then had about 2 ½ hours on Hogmanay afternoon while everyone grabbed a wee nap ahead of the ceilidh and festivities later.

On the Beach

Both mornings were spent on Inverie beach. I had hoped to continue a series of images I started making in Northumberland a week earlier where rough seas crashed against the rocks.

However the narrow opening to Loch Nevis (map) means that the sea loch is fairly sheltered, and so the waves gently lap at the shallow beach rather than pound it. More research ahead of time would’ve changed my expectations if not the reality.

As a quick aside (and perhaps obvious to many) where you see a large beach marked on an Ordnance Survey map it is usually depicting a flattish and calmer stretch of beach. Even better on 1:25k Explorer maps you will see two blue lines on each side of the beach – one showing the mean low water mark and the other the high water mark – which helps give you an idea of how far the tide has to rise (and so also how quickly the tide will be moving. As an extreme example if you look at Morecambe Bay, notorious for its fast moving tides, you’ll see a huge expanse of sand, indicating a flat sand plain across which the tide moves very quickly).

To describe the landscape further, although surrounded on three sides by large mountains their proximity makes it difficult to make photographs of them. It’s hard to make a compelling image of a mountain whilst stood at its base. It seems to me that to make strong images of Knoydart’s mountains you need to either climb them or walk down the glens between them which takes several hours or more, time I didn’t have. So as strange as it seemed with them towering over me mountains weren’t my main subject.

I worked along the stones on the beach, shooting towards the westerly neck of Loch Nevis, with Rum’s Cuillins visible through the gap. Even then I found it quite tough to find interesting rocks to work with and when I did it was only a matter of minutes before the tide had moved out beyond them. I got a couple of images that I’m happy enough with, but felt a bit too hurried for me to be completely satisfied.

In the Hills

On the occasion where I did get out for some more time I decided to climb a hill. My friend Jim (@knoydartjim; a pretty appropriate Twitter handle!) had recommended climbing part way up Sgurr Coire Choninnichen behind Inverie. The mountain has a flat plateau below the main peak that the locals refer to as ‘The Flats’, with views across Loch Nevis to Eigg and Rum to the southwest and also along the glen (Gleann na Guiserein) towards the Black Cuillins of Skye to the northwest.

My route started along some lovely woodland tracks in Inverie Woods before arriving by the deer fence on the on the lower western slopes of the hill. From here I worked my way up rough and boggy ground that wasn’t too steep but slowish going at times. It was one of those walks where the summit seems to recede as I got closer. An hour and a half into my walk I decided I couldn’t give myself much longer, so pressed on to the next rise and decided I’d make images from there, come what may.

Several large boulders gave me something to focus on for some foreground interest. To be honest I find it difficult to put my heart into making images that so often amount to no more than ‘distant view with a rock on a lower third’. At times I think we can get a bit too desperate for foreground interest that we’ll use just about anything to anchor the image.

My view is that unless it’s in some way worthy of inclusion then I don’t see much point in including it – illusion of depth, or no. I remember Bruce Percy telling me “Find a rock that you love”. If you don’t love it, leave it.

Again short on time (spot the trend) I just had to make something – anything – for a few minutes before starting the trudge back down the hill. Having done this so many times I don’t think this is a lesson I will ever learn. The pattern goes thus: I’ve only got a couple of spare hours. I want to climb a hill. I expect that once said hill is climbed that the most unique and sublime view will reveal itself. 2 hours later it doesn’t. I quickly take a photo of "a rock on a third" and start back down the hill bemused that it all went wrong (again).

Not only is the walk ruined – by racing to position and not enjoying it for itself – the photography is ruined by having too little time to fully explore the landscape and my response to it, returning with little more than a snapshot.

So I’m making this note to myself to either focus on the walk, take longer, or walk a shorter distance if I want to prioritise the photographs.

On this occasion I probably would have been better exploring the woods at Inverie, but a large part of me felt the story of Knoydart is untold without some mountain scenery. Better yet, perhaps I should’ve just enjoyed the walk in a beautiful part of the country without worrying about making images.

F-Stop Guru

The longer walk gave me the opportunity to try out a new big of kit that my wife gave me for Christmas - an F-Stop Guru backpack. I’m a huge fan of F-Stop gear. I’ve used the larger Tilopa BC for 3 years now and have always thought it’s as close to perfect as I can imagine any one bag getting. Sometimes though it’s just a bit too big and unwieldy, and gets pretty heavy at full load.

The small daypack that I used for commuting or to carry a small load  had just fallen to bits and needed replacing so I looked at the Guru. With my previous bags I had the challenge of fitting my Fuji XE1 in with lunch boxes, laptops, books, etc. Well the Guru also uses the removable Internal Camera Unit (ICU) system of the larger bags so that I can have a dedicated and protected space for camera gear, and carry all of the other stuff I need.

I love the modularity of the F-Stop system. I can put a Medium ICU (same as I use in my Tilopa) with my Canon 5D3 and 4 lenses, or a Small ICU with the 5D3 and 2 larger lenses, or I can put in a Small Micro ICU which accommodates the smaller XE1 with room for a few more lenses. With the Medium ICU I have little room left for non-camera gear in the main compartment but with the Micro ICU I have lots of space, so I can tailor the pack to my needs - from carting loads of camera gear to carting loads of non-camera gear but still having a camera with me. Such a simple, no brainer system but it’s amazing (if pricey!).

The Guru also has a number of good sized pockets and pouches, takes my 15” MacBook Pro and feels really comfortable and well balanced on the back. It’s probably my new ‘if I could only have one' bag rather than the Tilopa, the size of which encourages me to carry more gear than I need most of the time. I’m very happy with it.

The only major downside of the Guru is that it doesn’t have dedicated tripod attachments. My extra large Gitzo tripod already dwarfs the Tilopa when strapped on and so attaching it to the side isn’t really feasible. This is only really an issue for longer excursions where the Tilopa will remain my main bag, I don’t mind carrying my tripod in my hand for a couple of miles.

I’ll write a proper review of the Guru - and the Tilopa for that matter - in the near future.

Magic Gear?

This was also a chance to take my Canon 24-70 lens for a good workout. Initial reaction is that it is super sharp especially in the corners - a noticeable step-up from my 24-105mm workhorse - but also that 70mm is quite limiting as the longest focal length for how I work. I found myself twisting instinctively for more reach to find I had none, and that extra 35mm makes a big difference. Better sharpness or better reach?

I’ll get used to changing lenses more often for more reach of course but, as I already knew, the choice between these two lenses isn’t clear cut. More time with the 24-70 will clarify my thoughts.

In the meantime I’ll reiterate my view that it’s quite rare that a single piece of equipment will magically improve our images. Often people rave about gear and I can't help but feel they are justifying their choices and the expense (see Guru comments above! :)). In most cases there are better ways we could improve our images than by buying new gear.

In Closing

Anyway there’s a few thoughts on my trip to Knoydart. It’s a beautiful part of Scotland, with a lovely feeling about it and a very welcoming community. It was great joining in with their Hogmanay celebrations. It was a cracking night and they definitely know how to party up there! It wasn't a hugely productive photography trip and I include the images here to show my failings rather than my awesomeness. But it was a time for my family and I don't mind coming home with little to show.

I think to make the most of Knoydart photographically you need more time than I had and a bit of legwork. There was a beautiful painting in our room at the Knoydart Lodge (which I can highly recommend; website) of a view from Sgurr Coire Choninnichen across several small lochans (on the Flats) looking towards the Inner Hebrides. I would love to go up and see it myself. I may even leave the camera behind. Maybe.