Wadsley Common

I recently decided to practice my use of the full manual controls of my camera, rather than sticking it in aperture priority mode with full evaluative metering. Spot metering, an old 28mm M42 mount lens with aperture ring and manual focus, and full manual control of ISO and shutter was the order of the day. As part of this practice, I also decided to try and improve my use of the zone system, pioneered by the great Ansel Adams. Of course, I remembered to invert the process for digital and expose for the highlights, process for the shadows.

One of the first things I came across was a very rude horse. It seemed nice enough, until it repeatedly turned its back to me, farted, then turned back to resume staring at me. Charming.

Fortunately there was also a much friendlier horse.

This chap wouldn't leave me alone! So intent on gaining my attention was he that every time I raised my camera to my eye, he tried to push it out of the way with his nose. I got quite a few shots like this:

I'll post some more of him later. He seemed to quite like being in the centre of the picture so I took a few more. Moving on, I found that I was on a very pretty little lane with the city of Sheffield in the background.

Leaving the path and heading further up the common I decided to leave the beaten track and headed up a rather rocky and unstable path.

Thankfully it was worth it. I got some splendid views over Sheffield, both the city and the countryside.

Moving on, there was obviously plenty of foliage. Some of it was very green.

Some of it was burned or missing.

But much of what was there was very brightly coloured indeed, and very nice to look at.

All in all a very pleasant stroll indeed. I think my control of exposure is improving, making sure that I manage to include the maximum amount of detail so that processing is easier. No blown out skies for me! I also created a new Aperture preset that boosts the contrast without stretching the mid-tones too thinly. I think it works pretty well.