November 2021 Viewfinder
Autumn is here and so is the first Opposite View Wildlife Photography newsletter
Well, autumn has arrived.
As I type this, the rain is hammering down outside my window. My local burn is flowing at breakneck speed and the White Cart river, which it flows into, is surging and swelling to the point at which it looks like it will erupt like a geyser. As the flooding hits the Scottish news headlines, I doubt the irony of COP26 arriving in our city last weekend is lost on many locals.
All of this water has turned the crunch of fallen leaves on my daily walks into a squelching slip hazard, but it doesn't deter me. I adore this season, soggy socks and all. I have spent the past few weeks noticing the return of small birds to the trees. Long-tailed tits, bullfinches, treecreepers and goldcrests have become a feature of my strolls around the park. I have heard skeins of geese honking overhead while adult gulls show off their winter plumage on the playing fields. I am excited by these seasonal changes.
That said, summer wasn’t without interest. Traditionally a time for scouting for seabirds at the coast, I spent much of my time shuffling up and down my road to monitor the fortunes of our breeding lesser black-backed gulls. I also finally got to spend some time with my local kingfishers. There were a couple of occasions where we spotted some rare sights. We saw northern gannets hunting in the Firth of Clyde and black guillemots next to a busy path - but this has been another summer where we have stayed close to home, and sightings have therefore been of the local variety. That didn’t stop me from being busy, and I hope you will check out a couple of videos that I made through the summer months on my new YouTube channel.
I guess being busy does sum it up. I meant to send this first newsletter last month, but the days got away from me. Time is a precious gift and hopefully something I can help you save if you are an amateur wildlife photographer. With each monthly newsletter, I want to give you the advice I wish I'd had when I started my nature photography journey ten years ago. Don’t get me wrong; I got plenty of advice from fantastic professional and semi-pro wildlife photographers when I started, but what I needed was advice from other people like me. From people that get as much out of their wildlife photography passion as possible while juggling commitments at home, a day job, and all manner of other “life stuff” that can prevent you from picking up the camera from one week to the next.
So, I hope this finds you and yours well, and I hope the content below is of interest and use. Please send me your comments and let me know.
Rhiannon
Opposite View Wildlife Photography
Through my lens
The chase, two kids and a kingfisher
The chase is on in this image. It was supposed to be a hunting kingfisher. As you can see, these are roe deer, and they aren’t in a river. Allow me to explain.
Species spotlight
Eider - the destrier duck that is anything but soft
You won’t find the common eider under “seabirds” in your field guide but, in my opinion, any duck that can live in a rugged coastal habitat and gulp down mussels whole is just as badass as any gull.
Video series: Top tips for amateur wildlife photographers
Starting a local patch project
In this video, I share my top tips for kicking off a nature photography project on your local patch. SPOILER ALERT: it may be a lot easier than you think!
You may have heard other wildlife photographers explaining the benefits of starting a project. Channeling your energies in this way can indeed develop your skills, but it can also be a daunting prospect for an amateur - particularly if you're short on spare time for your photography.
If you're keen to start a wildlife photography project, my suggestions - based on my own experiences with my local urban gulls - will hopefully give you some ideas.
And finally…
It was a quiet Wednesday morning when the email appeared. I spotted the truncated subject line that announced its arrival in my inbox: “BBC Countryfile Magazine nature writing competition”. I knew it was related to the New Nature Writer of the Year competition that I entered back in June. I wasn’t in any rush to open the message as I knew it would say that the standard was very high, and I’d been unsuccessful this time. I was just about to ignore it when I spotted the “HIGHLY COMMENDED” at the end of the subject line. My shaking hand clicked to open the email and I read, slightly disbelievingly, that I had indeed been highly commended in the competition. My first thought was that there must have been some mistake. After the tenth read of the email from the Features Editor at BBC Countryfile Magazine, it finally hit home.
So, I’m delighted to tell you that my writing is appearing on the Countryfile Magazine website. Huge congratulations to the well-deserved winner Caro Fentiman and all the shortlisted writers and massive thanks to the judges for their kind words. I have copied my piece Winter on an urban burn and the judges feedback on my website, in the hope that this will help this achievement to sink in.
Keep in touch
Thanks for reading this! If you have any comments or questions, opportunities for photography or if you would like to use any of my images, please leave a comment. I’d love to hear from you.
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