Anyway, both of today's offerings are from just before Christmas, at the end of what's quaintly known as Michelmas Term in Oxford circles. This first one is from Port Meadow, a large flood plain to the northwest of the city. I went for a wander with some friends of mine one crisp Sunday afternoon just before I went home for Christmas, and managed this effort of one of the friendly Port Meadow horses.
This also gave me the chance to practice using my shiny new graduated filter to bring out a bit more of the sunset - the attempts without it just caused a lovely silhouette, which didn't exactly do justice to Dobbin. He's still a bit shady for my liking, but beggars can't be choosers. Good model though, knew exactly how to pose.
Keeping with the theme (which I've literally just decided can be summed up as Sunsets at Christmas, for reasons that will become apparent) is another sunset taken over Christmas. (Told you it'd be obvious.) I decided to be a bit touristy and take the opportunity of Oxford being empty of students to have a look round Christchurch College, home of some Harry Potter fellow. As I made my way out past the beautifully decorated Christmas tree in Peckwater Quad, I decided that a panorama of the gorgeous sunset was definitely needed.
The trick with stitching photos together to make a panorama is to take portrait photos rather than landscape ones. It takes a couple more pictures to get the whole width of the scene in, but you maximise the amount of height that the final picture can get - which enables you to get the quad and the sunset in the same final merged product. I'm quite pleased with this one.
Anyway, hope yo had a great Christmas. I'm working again from Monday, but with any luck more photos will emerge. I got a lovely new set of ND filters and a camera bag for Christmas, so I definitely want to get out there and capture Oxford in the snow!
Now all I need is the snow...
