Photography under all conditions and small wildlife

We have managed to take a few thousand photos over the last two weeks, although the weather has presented us with some challenges. We didn't get the 2 multi day trips in we had intended but instead made the most of different days in different locations. The weather did therefore affect what we took, but didn't stop us from getting out and getting a  large number of photos covering a very wide range of topics, from views and historic buildings to plants and wildlife. One of the advantages of photographing in changeable weather is the variable skies, soft light one day, blue skies with white floating clouds anther and dramatic skies another.

In the article Wet weather photography we have looked at how you can get out and get more photos in more challenging weather, the types of locations that are ideal in different types of weather from occasional showers to rain, and the planning that you can do so allowing you to make the most of all opportunities and the time you have available.

One of the limitations we always find is that we live in a country which is only partly open, the sun may rise early in the summer months but many places don't open until 10 or 11am and are shutting again by 5pm, when there are so many more hours of sunlight. Just think if they were to open from 7am to 7pm, nearly twice as long we could all get around to visit twice as many places or perhaps visit a few more but take it at a more leisurely rate either way tourists sites would do more trade, in shops, cafes and entry charges. In addition we would be able to work around the weather better.

We have a second major article, looking at photographing Small wildlife, and some of this can be done inside so is not weather dependent. At the end of this article we suggest a project that you could have a go at, photographing several garden snails, and this can be done indoors so is also not weather dependent. We had a go ourselves at this project and have produced another article on the way we undertook this and showing some of the results we obtained. We also have a wildlife page on the common garden snail so you can see a little more of the creature we are giving you the challenge to photograph.

One of the areas we visited a week ago was Chester, we wanted to photograph the town walls and the roman amphitheatre, but also found quite a lot more to photograph, as well as a range of other opportunities including several bridges and the interesting River Dee. We discovered more we could go back to another day to photograph. On this day we had a number of objectives mostly within Cheshire, and have a list we have produced of attractions in Cheshire with location guides produced for some of them. Cheshire is a pleasant county, similar in many ways to many of the west country counties, and would be the ideal place to take a photographic break. Amongst the places we visited that day was the Chester Roman Amphitheatre, Chester Castle & City Walls, Chester Roman Garden, the Anderton Boatlift. We wanted to photograph some ancient crosses that stand in a cobbled market square in Sandbach. We had expected to find some stones amongst cars and was pleasantly surprised to find it in a large traffic free area surrounded by ancient buildings, and that the crosses were far larger then we expected. Sandbach itself was a very pleasant and interesting place, flowers everywhere, loads of things to photograph, buildings, flowers, an old water pump, a most unusual church where a path goes though and under the bell tower. By one of the free car parks there were two modern carved crosses surrounded by flowers that were interesting to photograph. Driving out we spotted more that we could have taken as well. I had better not explain the giant cakes sold in a cake shop near to the ancient crosses, that were so fresh and tasty that they justified the days expedition. There are quite a lot of canals nearby, so when I go back to photograph some more of these, perhaps I will be tempted to visit the cake shop again. We have produced feature location guides on the places mentioned above plus some other locations guides, you will find a complete list below.

Not all of our trips were large distances, one day we paid another visit to Cotswold Wildlife Park only half an hour from Cheltenham. The animals are nice and close here so you don't need long lenses, and between the two of us we took about a thousand photos over 6 hours. This is one of those locations we could go back to many times and always come away with a range of different photos. Often our trips here are with clients who having had several days training want to put it all into practice and its a great location for those who have the knowledge, to put it into practice and get a very large number of quality images, while reinforcing and trying out different skills. This is a wildlife park you walk around, many of the animals are in natural settings, it has a very wide range of animals, but with many of the larger ones, a small number of each. The day we visited they had a birds of prey demonstration and we got some interesting in flight shots of three different species.

Another visit was a multi stop day, in the Portsmouth and Winchester area visiting castles, abbeys and a variety of other places. We didn't get around quite as many places as we had intended that day, as we spent far longer at Porchester Castle. This was built by the Romans and has full height roman walls still. It was later modified and a larger keep developed over several periods. The main tower is still intact, and you can climb all the way up to stand on the roof getting great views all around. We will be producing a detailed feature guide on this interesting castle. We photographed all around the outside, the inside and many shots with the ruined and substantially complete parts of the castle, as well as from the roof, and the castle from a high viewpoint not far away.  Far too many to use.

Over the coming weeks we will be producing feature guides on many of the places we visited, and over the next week we just might manage to get out and visit a few more places. Some of the places we are visiting we have discovered before and some we have come across while writing up location guides or visiting as research for future ones. We are enjoying the photographic challenges, discovering new topics and locations and should be loosing some weight with all this walking, but then there are the giant cakes, the fish and chips.......

What about the places you have discovered, have you thought about sharing them and making use of your photos and putting together some location guides. You can find information on how to do this by selecting the Locations Button and then Submit a Location, from the menu on the left.

Wet weather photography

Photographing Small Wildlife

Garden Snails - wildlife facts

Photographing Snails (Project)

Cheshire's Top Attractions

Adlington Hall, Macclesfield, Cheshire

Anderton Boat Lift, nr Northwich, Cheshire

Arley Hall Gardens, Northwich, Cheshire

Bluebell Cottage Gardens, Dutton, Cheshire

Bridgemere Garden World, Nantwich, Cheshire

Capesthorne Hall, Macclesfield, Cheshire

Chester Castle, Chester, Cheshire

Chester City Walls, Chester, Cheshire

Chester Roman Amphitheatre, Chester, Cheshire

Chester Zoo Gardens, Upton on Chester, Cheshire

Cholmondeley Castle Gardens, Malpas, Cheshire

Lakemore Country Park, Crewe, Cheshire

Roman Gardens, Chester, Cheshire

Sandbach Crosses, Sandbach, Cehshire

Weeping Ash Gardens, Glazebury, Cheshire