August has been a very successful month in regards to photography as I have finally replaced my extremely waterlogged sony alpha 200! I now have a canon 1300d, I managed to find a really good offer on that camera thanks to the help of a few friends! In a way I am now better off after accidentally breaking my other camera as the new one came with multiple lenses including a zoom lens and a telephoto lens (something which I was looking at for my sony camera the day it broke!) so I have already noticed a difference in my photography!
I had heard both good and bad things about canon cameras as a brand, but I must admit I am really happy with the camera I have! It's been simpler to get to grips with that my sony - a lot of the time with that camera if I hadn't used it for a week or two I'd make some really rookie mistakes to begin with such as aperture, and as a whole I'd struggle a lot to properly frame or align my photographs through the lens. Whereas, with the canon camera I have found it quite easy to use which means that I pick it up and it's now an autopilot to check all the settings before or during photographs and the viewfinder is much clearer that when I'm looking through my photographs later there is limited dead space or objects are aligned exactly how I hoped they would be in the final piece.
Over the last month I have noticed significant improvements to my macro capabilities with the new camera! When I first got it I had a practise in my mums garden whilst it was in bloom and I was really happy with the depth and detail captured in these images! Me and mum visited Sizergh Castle again so that I could get some macro shots of their beautiful gardens, my small 'point and shoot' lumix camera was unfortunately not up to the task last time we visited! I am really happy with the photos I got, especially those with the natural blur to add depth! I think having a higher quality of image in the first place is really making me think about how I edit these photos, and if any anything, they actually require less editing now! (Not that I did loads in the first place!)
We also finally visited Furness Abbey - somewhere I'd seen many pictures of and longed to go. The images I had seen had definitely not done this place justice - it is a stunning ruin which I definitely suggest that people visit whilst in the area! We spoke to a lovely woman at the front desk who told us lots of history about the place, and visited the small museum whilst we waited for the rain to pass! They have recently found more artifacts whilst digging around the abbey area which I thought was really cool that history here was continuing to develop! There was also some scaffolding placed on the abbey, a large complaint on review websites, yet this is due to English Heritage wanting to ensure that the walls and the fantastic arches actually stay upright rather than crumbling so I believe this is the perfect reason to have modernity cross with history!
After our trip to Furness Abbey, we decided to have a walk up the Hoad in Ulverston, as we were never aware that you could walk up and visit it! It was quite a steep walk at points because we couldn't always find a path but there was stunning views along the way. We even managed to see Blackpool tower from the top! It was also nice to place other landmarks such as the Buddhist temple we regularly visit, Humphrey's Head which we visited last month and Greenodd where my Grandad works! This is an area of the county which I have not explored much with a camera, and rather only been when I was a child so it's definitely a place I want to explore more. Visiting the Hoad gave me a change to truly check out the capabilities of my new 70mm-300mm lens as there were stunning views of the Coniston fells and beyond from the top!
A visit to Penrith to have some dinner and a stroll around the Castle and town involved our major hiccup of the month. As we were cruising down the motorway my mum's car decided to break and we frog-hopped the majority of our way to Penrith. We decided to continue with our plans before calling the tow truck and I really enjoyed capturing the brick red castle against the beautiful blue skies. Because of the incident with mum's car however, it was put us slightly off travelling too far for days out in case it happens again! This is not all in vein as it is lovely to continue to visit our regular places such as Scout Scar or walks around the village after a year away from the Lake District!
I have made sure to make the most of August to the best of my ability as next month is the final countdown to finishing my dissertation and completing my Masters degree! Once that is out of the way however, I cannot wait to get lost in all the autumnal vibes coming our way!
Can't wait to share more new photographs with you guys!
