I am just back from running a weekend workshop in The Trossachs, a collaboration with the wonderful Fodder + Farm based at Gartur.
We started off on Friday evening with a meal and introductions (venison curry for those interested, and exceptionally tasty it was too) and then turned in for an early start on Saturday.
Saturday morning started with a 7am meet at the kitchen, a quick sausage sandwich and coffee to keep everyone going and then off to Loch Rusky for that classic dawn vista… unfortunately dawn was not aware of our plans and didn’t really show up! However we were treated to an slightly eerie, misty and monotone lochside landscape with a perfectly still surface to provide some interesting reflections. The rowing boats floating out on the loch added to the scene and gave us enough to work with as we discussed compositional theory, and how to completely ignore it!
Next stop was back to very familiar territory for me, the Falls of Leny in Kilmahog. This is a place I know well from many, many years of visiting as we had family just over the road and used to visit regularly - long before I found myself living in Stirling!
The old railway track runs through some lovely woodland before reaching the dramatic falls which were running in full spate due to the recent weather giving us plenty of opportunity to explore leading lines, ICM and using a variety of shutter speeds to try and convey different characteristics of flowing (or raging) water!
The final stop of the morning was at Loch Lubnaig to shoot some more lochside photographs, but of a larger body of water and with some mountainous backdrops courtesy of Ben Ledi. This was all about learning how to expose for a dramatic skyline and using short telephoto lenses to compress the perspective to make the mountains look more “mountainy”.
Lunch was provided by Mhor 84 who did a stellar job of pushing their burger right into my Top 5 of all time - I just wish I had the time and stomach capacity for a direct comparison of theirs and the Laide Inn just down the road, because it came very, very close to my memory of that finest ever burger!
After lunch we set off for the nearby Balqhuidder Church to shoot grave stones, ruins and textures for a short time, along with the iconic site of Rob Roy’s grave.
Having seen where the man was buried it seemed fitting to head in to the place that he lived. This was designed (in my plan) to introduce my photographers to mountain photography as Inverlochlarig sits deep into the glen from Balquhidder and is surrounded by some suitably majestic mountains, principally Ben More.
Here we were able to work on foregrounds that draw the viewer into the photograph and inform of the environment.
We finished the day on Loch Voil between Balquhidder and Inverlochlairg catching the last of the light, but alas no sunset. The firey hues of the autumnal trees combinged with a dramatic sky did make up for it though to some extent!
Then it was back to Gartur for another fine feast from Fodder + Farm!