GCSE Art Coursework

Hi all,

Sorry for the lack of posts its been a bit hectic at the moment with exams and coursework. I hope everyone had a good Easter although it was ages ago. I had very eventful two weeks or so meeting Simon King and just bought a new camera but haven't had a chance to use it yet. Anyway I thought I might upload some of my art coursework for a change.

I expect I will see you all out and about,

Greg.

Top Goshawk

Middle Gyr Falcon

Bottom Snow Leopard

My Best Animals so Far....

I haven't posted any thing for a while so I thought that I would post some of best animals that I have seen so far, however that doesn't mean best pictures as most of these are record shots and are terrible! There are many other things that I've seen but have no pictorial evidence for but at least I know I've seen them, such as Hoopoe, Gyr Falcon, Short-eared Owl, Little Crake, Waxwing and much more that I can't remember!

There is also those occasions when you get a unique experience that you didn't expect to happen. Two winters ago (or something like that) there was a Minke Whale that was swimming only 10 metres or so of shore from Swanpool and the day of the 2007 Rugby world cup final me and a couple mates had a day trip to the Ilse of Scilly and saw big rarities like Blackpoll warbler and on the way home on the Scillonian we were accompanied by 60+ Common Dolphin! It would have been even better if England had won!

But as always there are a few that you miss and you kick yourself for not seeing them like the Alder Flycatcher and Red-Flanked Bluetail. Anyway back to some photographs sorry for the long post but I don't expect to upload anything for a while as exams start soon and I'm absolutely dreading it!

Might see you all out and about sometime,

Greg.

Snow Stops Play

Like everywhere Falmouth has received its fair share of snow and as a result there was no way out this morning. However also like the rest of the county there are hundreds of Thrushes flying around, mostly Redwing along with the odd Song Thrush and Feildfare. The Feildfare is now bird 99 on my local list of birds seen in walking distance from my house. Birding in Falmouth can be quite productive at times. This time last year I saw my first and so far only Waxing eating berries when walking back from school. Other birds that I've seen in Falmouth over the years also include Surf Scoter, Laughing Gull, Black Guillemot, Red Kite, Iceland Gull, Black Redstart and Merlin. Today wasn't that good but there was still 10+ med gull on Swanpool and lots of Blackcap in the garden. Feildfare were seen and heard throughout the day and around 50 Redwing feeding next door before being chased off by the local male Sparrowhawk.

Purple Portfolio

I like the colours in the image above and the lighting. All these images were taken in my last photography session of the Christmas holidays on Monday at Penzance. My favourite shots are the portrait (above) and the the first action shot (below).

These are very hit and miss action shots, but the 400d did alright but a nice new 7d would be even better! However its bit out my price range. The 400d's 3fps is just not quick enough for most action shots. When a birds flying it always photographs its wings in the same position or a wing obscuring the rest of the bird, so you really need 6fps+ to capture different posses.

A large selection of portrait shots of purple sandpipers in different lighting and different ranges. These birds winter every year at Jubilee Pool and show very well on the rocks at high tide. At low tide the birds disperse and feed at different beaches around Penzance.

Kingfisher

I was looking through some old files and found this digiscoped image. Despite probable being my favourite bird this is my only picture of a kingfisher that I've taken (and it isn't great), but I hope to improve on this in the next few months. This was taken back in March 2007 at Copperhouse Creek.

Long-tailed Duck

The female Long-tailed Duck was showing well today from the hide at Loe Pool. Despite the constant rain there was still plenty of birds on and around the pool like this Goldeneye, which the Long-tailed duck would feed with. There was also Shoveler, Pochard, Reed Bunting and plenty of fieldfare and Redwing in the hedgerows.

Star Trail Test Shot

Saturday night the weather was perfect for a long exposure of the stars. My camera normally uses shutter speeds between 30 secs and 1/4000 secs, but for this picture I used the bulb function for the first time and exposed it for just over 7 minutes. This blurred the stars as the Earth rotates. Next time I've got to find something more interesting for the foreground rather than houses!