Ye Olde England with castles too..

SnapHappy

Left the house at 6am (sunday, must be barking!) and off out for the day in search of some colourful fly agaric mushrooms for the current challenge. No such luck :rolleyes instead taking in:
Bodium Castle : probably the nicest one in England....


Just caught it right as the sun started to rise but could of done with wider glass...one more..


We were the first there this morning shortly followed by these guy's, sure know how to travel...


Followed by some refreshments in here....:slurp


Then off to the famous site of the Battle of Hastings :duel for a short walk taking in the grounds and the monastery.....


Finally after taking in some roast beef inside a giant yorkshire pudding we headed of to Beachy Head, Jenny finds a zoom all of her own...


Beachy Head is well known, sadly too for suicide, there are flowers and little makeshift headstones scattered along the cliff edges.. very sad..


Amazing views and the famous chalky white cliffs.....


Great day:D but alas no 'shrooms. :huh

gubbs

Looks like you had a great day, Bodiam Castle is special, andy, luben & myself had a 3:30am start to make it there for sunrise a few months back... I'm keen to have a look at Leeds Castle in Kent too....

Stan

Great shots of the pub and the cliffs esp. Great travelogue. Thanks for sharing


Cheers
Stan

Dee

My favorite is...
The white cliffs against that dramatic sky and the lighthouse! Enjoyed all of them, but that's my favorite!

SnapHappy

Gubbs, thanks. I thought I was early but 3.30 am (ouch!) Bodium is a great site and one which I'll be going back to a later date. I haven't been to Leeds Castle yet but agree it does look like a good place to visit. Thanks for your comments

Dee & Stan thanks for your kind comments Glad you enjoyed. I too like the cliff shot, it had just rained heavily and the dark clouds had just passed over when I got this shot. Shame that the horizon is a little skew though.

gubbs

Darren, looking at the shots of the castle they look a little soft, were you using a tripod and what was the exif??

SnapHappy

gubbs wrote:

Darren, looking at the shots of the castle they look a little soft, were you using a tripod and what was the exif??

Gubbs, the first one was shot with aperture priority @ f6.3 1/100.
The second was normal program mode and f7.1 1/100 all hand held.
Shot in JPEG (low) and tweaked a touch in graphic converter. Not yet up to speed with RAW.

Complete novice and have only been shooting since Jan, no tripod owned as yet but next on the list is a manfrotto 190 prob.

Greatly appreciate any further comments on what I could/should have done.

gubbs

Darren, as a guide, for handheld (without IS) the minimum shutterspeed should be around 1/focal length ie 200mm 1/200 sec, 100mm 1/100 sec, and so on, down to a minimum of around 1/60-1/30 for me.
What lens were you using?

I'm on a pretty small screen at the moment, so its difficult to see but it looks like the focus point is in front of the castle on the first shot, the ripples look sharper than the castle

in the 2nd shot: depending on your focal length, I'm not sure if the DOF would be big enough at F/7.1 to cover the foreground and the castle & without a tripod you would have struggled to use a smaller aperture beacuse of the shutter speeds

The fact that you got up at 6:00 on a Sunday morning tells me your pretty keen so if you're interested in landscapes, a good tripod and head is a must.

SnapHappy

Gubbs, I used my Sigma 24-70mm EX/DG macro/350D which is literately only weeks old in my hands.
The focal length on the shots is 30mm & 24mm respectively. I assume you mean focal length set on the lens at time of capture I'm going to have to get a smugmug account so I can get my exif data up on the site.
You're right the ripples do seem to be focused and the castle not, I'm not sure why as I have the centre spot set for focusing on the camera.

Thanks for your guide, I must read up more (on everything really!):D

I was hoping to buy a tripod & head this week but just been hit with a fine from Kent's constabulary for speeding :pissed so with a spare cash flow problem I'll buy the 190 pro-b for now and a head next month. I will return to Bodium at some point, it just takes a good hour to get there from south croydon!

Andy

love bodiam castle i really enjoyed my trip there. thanks for sharing these

Phil U.

Ah nice series. I love old buildings including castles. Very dramatic look to that cliff shot.

erich6

Nice shots Darren. I like the castle views.

Erich

SnapHappy

Thanks for the kind comments