Vision on Gabbro Photography Blog

Being in the wilds

Sun, 15 Feb 2026 00:00:00 +0000

I love watching old black and white films. The other day we watched Whistle Down the Wind, with its simplicity of landscape and freedom to run around in open fields under big skies. The farm is on Pendle Hill, adding an essential mystery to the experience of travelling back in time to when technology, if it existed, was largely hidden. The fields and hills were free of chattering signals and the warm and cosy farmhouses free of distracting devices. When the wind moaned in the lum, you looked at the window to see the moon disappear into black storm clouds and you were glad you tethered the old gate, as the rain began to spatter the glass. Of course, the Pendle women were persecuted for being different. That landscape was never really like that as long as there were people in it. Those who could see it for what it was, a wild and beautiful place to wander, experience the weather and find cures in nature were disposed of in the name of religion.

Mountain meditations on nature and photography

Tue, 30 Mar 2021 00:00:00 +0000

A cold west wind scratches cats’ claws across the dark grey of Loch Slapin as I walk away from the car and onto the wet, soggy, eroded hillside. Black peat runnels tell a tale of torrential rain over the winter while across the loch Blaven sleeps under a grey blanket of cloud. Ragged tendrils run along the jagged crest of the Clach Glas ridge and the light is meditative, calming, muse-light.

Learning to edit : A review of Bruce Percy's Advanced Photoshop Curves

Sat, 01 Sep 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Being primarily a mountaineer with a camera, it’s only been in the last two or three years I’ve begun to explore ‘photography’ in a serious way. Up until then I relied on my wee Sony Cybershot and although its noise reduction is draconian its best feature was exposure lock, allowing me to compose for both the scene and my mood. A tiny wee camera that went everywhere with me and allowed me to gain a commendation a couple of years ago.

On focus

Wed, 28 Feb 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Memories are precious things. They transport us back to a time that seems to belong to another person. Someone like us but not quite. Our younger self, with different ambitions, philosophies, outlook and interests but they ground us, remind us who we were, why we now are who we are. They allow us to see how far we’ve drifted in life’s storms and in the words of Pope Gregory the Great in the seventh century, without them,

Landscape vision

Fri, 04 Aug 2017 00:00:00 +0000

It’s important to be technically competent, the reasons for which I discussed in my previous post about workflow as it frees you up to concentrate on what you really love to do. Create emotionally stirring photographs based on what you see.

What you see is based on who you are, how you interact with life and the environment. What you see is based on your experiences up until the moment you find yourself sitting on top of a mountain and just looking. You don’t always need to have a plan. Sometimes it’s enough to just climb and see what happens.

My Creative Workflow

Fri, 28 Jul 2017 00:00:00 +0000

They say artists don’t make good business types. They’re just too creative with wild imagination and for me this rings true to a certain extent. When I’m wandering the mountains with my camera and notebook, contemplating a sublime view and thinking about how to turn it into a photograph, the last thing on my mind is the actual technical process of getting it from my head to a finished print. I’d much rather concentrate on the fun parts. Working the composition, waiting for the light to be right, examining my reaction to the scene and perhaps creating some poetry in the form of a gaiku to match up the atmosphere of the place and my mood. I envision the finished print but contemplation of long hours at the computer to get there has no place in my “creation space”.

Foundations of Style

Fri, 21 Jul 2017 00:00:00 +0000

It’s been a year and a bit since I moved from a small compact camera to a DSLR and it’s taken a while to get even remotely comfortable with the new technology. In the film years I’d gone from teenage angst with a Zenit E, to a Minolta XG-M, working with Fuji Velvia slide film and eventually doing my own B&W processing and printing using a college darkroom on night classes. The cameras had solid clicking aperture rings, infinity stop and depth of field preview, all of which I loved and formed part of my workflow. When I finally went digital it was with the 2.1MP Canon Digital Ixus V and then the 16.2MP Sony Cybershot DSC-HX9V.