Getting back into the swing of early starts after my 6-week work hiatus. It’s good to be back in the land of the employed again but I’ve found it hard to make time for photography as a result.

While I was off, I did take advantage of my freedom and spent some time visiting local places that I’d not been to before – notably Newlands Corner, Silent Pool and Box Hill. The shot below is from the top of Box Hill with some different post-processing to my normal style – let me know what you think.

Reflections are sometimes what you want on water as this next shot demonstrates – this is a reflection of trees overhanging the Mole River at the bottom of Box Hill, near to the famous stepping stones. There’s just enough movement in the water to give quite a painterly feel;

Other times, you want to minimise reflection. I included a shot of Silent Pool in my last post where the water was really clear which helped to see under the surface. But I also used a circular polarising filter to help eliminate reflection. It’s not something I use often but it worked well here. I mentioned these in Part 8 of my Gifts For Photographers series.

Next to Silent Pool there was a Vineyard (and a gin distillery), neither of which I visited. Here’s a shot of the vines taken with the InfraRed camera and processed in black and white.

Finally, back to the top of Box Hill. Here’s a snap I took with my phone.

Oh, nearly forgot, you remember me mentioning the new flash modifier I had invented recently using a milk bottle;

Well I posted this and the selfie I took with it on the Facebook page of the So You Want To Be A Photographer podcast that I listen to and they mentioned me in the next show and included my shots in the show notes for the episode – how cool is that!