What a difference a day (well 2 days!) makes! You’ll remember from my last blog Elaine, Kevin, Keith and I were out and about in the Dorset coast on a landscape photography workshop and I had spent most of the time thinking in Black and White mode due to the overcast days and dusks we had. Last night I had a call from a friend asking if I wanted to go out and shoot sunset, with a million and one things on the to do list I should have immediately dismissed the idea but looking out my window I could see lots of high whispy cloud in the sky… So off I went down to one of my most favourite locations, Hengistbury Head.

I have shot at Hengistbury many, many times, so on my way down there I started planning what I could do differently and decided to shoot with Panoramic format photographs in mind.

Here are the shots as the evening progressed…

Well, what a course! I was pleased to welcome Elaine, Kevin and Keith down to the “sunny” south coast for a group landscape photography workshop where they would learn how to capture stunning images in camera, well it should have been stunning “Black and White” images in camera as for the first time ever on a course we didn’t see the sun peep through at any point during the 2 days apart from about 30 minutes before the end of the last shoot! Still, at least it made it’s appearance at some point!

Elaine is a keen underwater photographer, Kevin a keen wildlife photographer and Keith was looking to learn all the basics of using filters so between them they had loads of experience and camera tales. All three of them wanted to learn more about composition, getting an image right in camera through using filters, how to use slow shutter speeds to get great results and more on landscape photography photo processing so I planned 6 shoots, 2 dawn, 2 day and 2 dusk shoots with some editing time in between.

As I said the weather wasn’t great unfortunately but I am a firm believer in showing emotion through your images and I think this really shows in the black and white image choices I made over the couple of days.

Black and White Photography works so well when you have flat grey skies or when the light isn’t as you had hoped, they can be dramatic and emotional and definitely worth braving the elements for!

I look forward to seeing some of Elaine’s, Kevin’s and Keith’s images over the coming days once they’ve finished editing them, hopfeully they will let me share some with you!

The next Ancient Headlands Group Workshop is on the 25th/26th June, click here for more information.

Pygmy seahorses are notoriously hard to find, measuring around 15mm in length their camoflague within sea fans is fantastic and I was keen to photograph the 3 species you can find in Raja Ampat, one of which is on their house reef, the Hippocampus Bargibanti! Guides Djamal and Bram were both excellent spotters as was my buddy Kath! I knew where the sea fan was with this particular Pygmy on it but I couldn’t find it for love nor money, after 5 minutes of looking I went to find kath and tell her I couldn’t find him, she came down to the fan and found him within seconds!!

After a couple of minutes another Bargibanti came onto the seafan and started headbutting the first pygmy, apparently this is normal behavious for 2 males fighting over territory! Fantastic to watch, incredibly difficult to photograph!!

I’d heard there was also a Hippocampus Denise on the house reef and enlisted Djamal to help me find it – this one is even more difficult to find, as you will see they look so similar to the seafan they live in!

The third species you can find is the Hippocampus Raja Ampat this one is unfortunately not found on Misool’s house reef but Bram knew of one on a nearby dive site so on the last day off we went to find him.

Now I feel I have to put this into a little context, the ocean is a pretty big place I think you’ll agree? Some of the dive sites we visisted were a good 500 m long and maybe as deep as 30m and we’re looking for something 15mm long with excellent camoflage abilities… It’s a pretty big ask for the dive guides to be able to find them but sure enough Bram went straight to the right seafan (out of 100s that looked the same to me!) and found the pygmy – impressive!

Fantastic little critters these pygmies, they are really sensitive to our flashguns and it’s important to wait for the right moment and only take a couple of shots before moving on so they don’t become distressed. Whilst out in Misool we were lucky enough to meet Sacha, one of the dive guides who had been studying the pygmies of their house reef for some time, htier mating habits and the birth cycle. The male is the one who gives birth and they do so every 17 days! I’m hoping that they will post up the fantastic video footage taken of one of their pygmies giving birth, it was absolutely fantastic! 

I hope you enjoy the photos of these great little pygmies as much as I did taking them!

Diving doesn’t come any better than at Misool Eco Resort on Batbitim Island near Misool, an amazing location in Indonesia.

The resort opened in October 2008 after 2 years in the building using reclaimed materials and local building techniques. Prior to the Eco resort being built the island had previously been home to a shark finning operation and along with setting up an amazing resort for divers the investors of the project also negotiated a 400km square No Take zone around the island which has recently been increased to 1220 km square.

The first indication of how rich a diving location this was going to be was counting 19 juvenile sharks in the lagoon in one spot in the house lagoon, what a treat we were going to be in for!

On the first day with camera at the ready, we headed out to Whale rock and Kalick sites and sure enough I was amazed at the quality of the reefs, so many pristine hard and soft corals, definitely worth every minute of the long journey out there! The House reef was absolutely amazing too, so many different corals and fish in such a small area.

With over 3500 images to go through and edit I’ll get some others up as soon as possible