Tuesday I ventured out and met a friend in the Peak District for a little photography.
The idea was to photograph the photograph the Heather on a hill called Carl Wark. Neither of us had been before but we knew how to get there because you can see and walk to it from Higger Tor. The weather forecast had been for thunderstorms but then at the last minute cleared. The conditions were looking good.
Shortly after arrival, I realised that I had a problem. The air was thick with midges and as soon as you stopped walking, they were biting. Hard.
After around 5 minutes of intense irritation I put my fleece on, ignoring the fact that the temperature was 34C. This only diverted the little blighters to my face. Fortunately I remembered having one of these midge nets at the bottom of my backpack and put it on. It made using the camera a little tricky, but it was a relief from the biting.
The evening went well, and I managed a few different shots that I like. I still need to get the processing right but the one above isn’t too bad. It was the final shot of the evening, around 20 minutes after sunset. I thought that the colour had vanished from the sky apart from a pink sliver – how wrong I was. It was only when I came to process the shot that I realised how much colour there still was. I really need to learn this lesson and not stop shooting too soon. I can imagine the blue hour would have been good also.
Fuji XT3 with Fuji 10-24 lens at 12mm. Tripod exposure of 6” at f/13 and ISO160. Kase 3 stop soft ND Grad filter on the sky.
Friday Nik Collection Processing Video
If you like photo processing, my latest video is now live on YouTube. It covers three techniques you can use with the Nik Collection for processing colour landscape photos. Here’s the link https://youtu.be/sWhvwSwKDoA
I hope you like the image and video and have a great weekend.
The Lightweight Photographer 
It looks to have been very worth the hike and the ordeal. Don’t you carry insect repellent for situations like this?
I do have insect repellant but I don’t leave it in my backpack because it has a habit of leaking and then rots the pack. I also don’t leave it in the car in case it explodes. Basically, I forgot it. That said the other photographer who was with me was wearing insect repellant and said it wasn’t working. There’s nothing like a physical barrier.
Thank you for sharing your Higger Tor image of the Heather. The image gave me a feeling of the place you visited. At least I didn’t have to endure the midges that you did. Your story of how they affected your time there almost topped the image itself!
Ha ha. Thank you.