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Wide Open Spaces- Lake District Life
Like many landscape photographers, for me the Lake District is the pinnacle of the British landscape. It’s the most breathtaking place and ideal from a photographic point of view, as it has practically every key element that makes a good landscape photograph. It’s not difficult to take a good picture of the lakes, but it takes a bit of effort and keen eye to take a wonderful picture. In many ways it’s actually harder to take this perfect picture than it is in say, a more sedate area of the UK, because it’s hard to know just where to point the camera, with practically 360 degree views all around you. A kind of ‘can’t see the wood for the trees’ scenario!
I have been coming to the Lakes as a kind of pilgrimage, annually for the last 7 years. Most trips are timed with the peak autumn season in late October and early November, when the area is transformed into a place of intense beauty and rich colour. I have, over the years, visited in spring and summer and over the next couple of trips I plan to visit in mid winter, but autumn certainly takes some beating for the sheer spectacle of the place at this extra colourful time of the year.
My travel and landscape photography takes me all over the UK and Europe and there are some fantastic locations I have visited on my travels, but coming back to Cumbria is always a joy and feels like all my other trips are just practise sessions leading up to my two weeks of heaven spent in the Lakes. The weather here of course is mostly dreadful. Plenty of rain and cloud (well it wouldn’t be the Lake District if it didn’t get this weather would it), but when the sun does appear, the light can be truly magical.
Unlike most photographers around today, I have yet to go digital. I feel a bit like a traitor to the new technology, but I can’t pull myself away from traditional film, which I feel still has the edge on quality. My main camera in use shoots 6x7 medium format, but my most treasured possession is a 6x17 panoramic camera. I bought this camera when I found that a lot of my images on the medium format camera were looking better cropped to a panoramic format and although the quality of the pictures was good enough to crop, I felt I wanted a dedicated camera to take full advantage of this type of photograph.
Now I shoot a lot of my landscapes with this camera and the quality is nothing short of stunning and way beyond what digital can achieve. For me it is the perfect landscape camera and when a scene suits it, there is nothing else that can create an image that sums up a place so easily.
The downside is that it only takes 4 frames per roll of film. It is also quite heavy and needs to be firmly fixed to a tripod for each shot. This of course slows me down and I can’t just rattle frame after frame off like I could with a small digital compact, especially when I think how much the film its costing me. This slow approach has its advantages however, as it makes me think about the picture I am taking. It means arriving at a location in good time before the light is right and then waiting for ideal conditions, so that I am ready and prepared when that perfect moment arrives.
It’s a joy to use my favourite format in such an amazing place and the two compliment each other so well. Some photographers find the panoramic view a difficult format to compose with, but to me it feels so natural and I have developed a keen eye to seeing the world in this letterbox view. It can be difficult to sell pictures of the Lake District, as it’s such a popular place that the market is over saturated with similar images. However, with the panoramic, I can now present images of familiar places that are seen from a new perspective. I hope the results speak for themselves.
© Craig Roberts
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