Meanygate meanderings (and beyond) - a farmed landscape

[Ed Sutton]

I hadn't intended wandering today, having driven round the moss this morning and seen nothing that looked different - although it's not easy to look around while driving the narrow roads if you don't want to end up in the ditch at the side! But the rain stopped and the sun came out in mid afternoon so off I went. Quite a few more fields have been ploughed, the morning's rain making the soil look dark.



This is a spot where a tanker driver might have taken his eye off the road last summer. The cones have been there, or in the ditch, since the tanker was dragged out. The ditch had got blocked in the accident and has just been dug back out again. Hence the neatly positioned cones. For now.



A change of pump.



The only work in [progress this afternoon was some ditch clearing in the distance. This drain cleaner was parked up ready for action. Note the additional wheels for working on soft land.





Not great pictures, but they'll do as visual notes.

The greenhouses keep on providing abstracts though. The set grows!

 

[Harlequin565]

Frame 4 is right up my street. Quirky and yet purposeful.

 

[Boots]

The first and last float my boat.

 

[Ed Sutton]

There's a couple of dry weeks forecast so I'm expecting activity to pick up soon. I had a drive through the mere area today, which is sandier soil and things are under way there. On the far edge of the moss there had been some work started recently too. The grass at top left annoys me but I couldn't get a better position in either case. Step back and I'd have been in a hedge, step forward and I'd have been in the road, which was quite busy. The bags will soon be weighting down fleece or other crop protection.

 

[Boots]

I agree about the the grass. Do you have a policy of never cropping? If not, you may have been able to compose to crop out the grass.

Both very strong, but I think #2 has the edge for me.

 

[Ed Sutton]

I agree about the the grass. Do you have a policy of never cropping? If not, you may have been able to compose to crop out the grass.

Both very strong, but I think #2 has the edge for me.

No 2 for me too. I tried to crop the grass out when framing the shot (I prefer not to crop in post other than when levelling wonky horizons - although I'm more relaxed about it than I used to be) but I wanted to keep that line of bags along he top of the frame and all three bags at the bottom.

 

[Ed Sutton]

Yesterday's wander was a complete blank, so this morning I ventured to the edge of the old mere. So these pictures are not strictly part of this project. However, I did once sort of start a project which I called 'Mere, moss and marsh' covering the three drained areas of land around where I live. The stumbling block is that there's no public access to most of the mere. So it got ditched. Anyway...

The soil is sandier here, and dries out quickly.



This part of the mere is close to what was the original lake's eastern shore. The landscape has a different feel to open spaces of both the moss and the rest of the mere. This is actually a meanygate and the fields around it are hedged with trees here and there.





Some jobs have yet to be fully mechanised.











It was good to have a chance to get some fresh pictures, even though I have photographed the area in the past I was looking in a different way this time. It was refreshing too as I felt I'd got in a rut covering the same gorund, actually and metaphorically.

 

[Boots]

The first one is very striking, and I rather like the penultimate one in a funny way.

 

[Ed Sutton]

A rare for me B&W conversion. Proper pics to follow!

 

[Ed Sutton]

Here's the same implement in colour. Detail then 'record' shot.





For a short walk back on my usual ground it was quite productive. No work taking place where I was but signs of what had been done. It would be nice to include workers in the pictures but I take what I can get.

A scene-setter to start. Then I whittled it down. I keep finding myself torn between making pictures which explain a lot and abstracted details which don't. As I don't have any plan for how to present this project I guess it's best to keep taking both sort of shot.









I got quite a few variations of pictures of the trays on the trailer and the sacks on the ground, wide and tight. It's that shooting with no planned use in mind thing again.

This final one for today is to show how the land has been manipulated over the centuries. Quite a few fields have bits of what I take to be broken clay drainage pipes ploughed up over the years and the shards scattered each season.

 

[ancient_mariner]

You're really working the scene well still Dave - pretty good considering how long you've been shooting essentially the same place for so long.

The fourth shot (trays in trailer, bags in lines OOF) is one of the few times I wish you had a lens capable of shallower depth of field - for me, it would give a greater sense of distance if the softness increased as the lines went away from the trailer.

 

[Ed Sutton]

Thanks Toni. It is getting harder to keep fresh, but there's always something seems to turn up. Particualrly if I stay aaway for a few days. And especially now that planting and sowing season is here there'll be more frequent changes. I hope.

The fourth shot (trays in trailer, bags in lines OOF) is one of the few times I wish you had a lens capable of shallower depth of field - for me, it would give a greater sense of distance if the softness increased as the lines went away from the trailer.

It's not a particuarly slow lens (f2.8-f4), it's stopped down to f10.

There are two things I deliberately try to avoid - shallow depth of field and wide angles. In the case of aperture I have a starting point of f5.6 at the moment, only opening up if the ISO gets too high, and stopping down to f8 if the light allows.

The only reason I have any fast lenses (faster than this one) is for use in dimly lit environments. My wide angle lenses are for when I can't move any further back , but again I force myself to leave them at home unless I know for certain I'll need them. I've a self-imposed wide limit of 28mm (or equivalent) in force at the moment!

The focal length limitation keeps me looking for ways to frame shots that a wider zoom would see me twisting the zoom ring to the widest setting to get everything in. Setting limited parameters like these is a way to try and keep me thinking.

 

[Boots]

I didn't know about your self-imposed constraints. That is interesting and helpful.

 

[Ed Sutton]

I should have been working but...

The sun was shining, the ground drying, growers working.









Yet again I had interesting subjects and had to shoot into the sun. Bah!





In desperation I tried flash. Which was surprisingly okay for this sort of thing.



I also took a selfie - of sorts.

 

[Cloudforest]

I really like the second. The position of the tractor draws you in and the brighter colours look good against the soil.

 

[Boots]

Yes, the second for me too.

The last one is a laugh, it makes me think I can hear an Ennio Morricone soundtrack playing...

 

[ancient_mariner]

My favourite is definitely the simple line of bags in the third image.

 

[Ed Sutton]

The last one is a laugh, it makes me think I can hear an Ennio Morricone soundtrack playing...

I'm more Painless Potter than The Man with no Name!

 

[Ed Sutton]

Sold some stuff I found hiding in the stock room today so went for a walk in the sunshine to stop myself blowing it all on on-line shopping for frivolous trinkets.

It paid off I think as today I had the sun behind me when I came upon the same field being prepared for more planting out.

Yesterday's plot. Yet another picture of bags and fleece.



This series shows how the soil is prepared to take the rows of fleece.





This one is just before teh roller is lowered. The 'v' shaped times form the trough the fleece is dug into.





Just a general view which shows the good condition of the soil which is drying well after the wet winter..



A random piece of tile which appealed to me. I know it's the wrong name but it made me think of Citizen Kane.

 

[Boots]

Many strong frames in this set, but for me, #2 has it.

And the final one, I would have taken the same shot and made the same Citizen Kane connection. <Wanders off, muttering> "In Xanadu, did Kubla Khan, a stately pleasure dome decree..."

 

[Ed Sutton]

I doubt I'll get out much for a week or so as loads of stuff has finally landed for me to start work on, so I nipped out this afternoon without much luck as far as pictures go. Thinsg were changing here and there. A potato field was being ploughed up, the potatoes still in the ground which had been too wet to get on all winter. It was still wet in places. The yard with teh chickens was undergoing major tree surgery, altering the look of that part of the moss.



I had a bit of a nosey around the back of some greenhouses. Not sure why this took my fancy.



Over the gate of another yard it seemed incongruous to see boxes from Kent. Particularly as someone I know from Kent once showed me a box he'd got marked 'Tarleton Tomatoes'!



More bags in fields.



And, finally, a very subtle 50/50 picture.

 

[Ed Sutton]

Well maybe I will get out a bit this week. Now it's light enough to take photos past seven thirty I can do what passes for a day's work in my worlds and still get an hour or two in with the camera.

I didn't hold out much hope this evening but it was nice to be out in a wind that wasn't freezing. No work going on but I made the most of the light with some more shed/barn pictures.





I look in this shed every time I pass and have never 'seen' a picture until today. Maybe not the greatest but the balance of light is just about what I've had in mind. Better still was seeing a little owl on the roof. I'd heard screeching from inside the shed the other day and thought it sounded owl like. Maybe that was the culprit? I did grab a shot but it's too awful to show the world!.



Even the slurry tanker looked photogenic.



As did the back of the greenhouses where the bath resides.



Gursky mode again...



Light like this makes taking photographs a bit too easy, and I wouldn't like it this way all the time as I find it distracts from the subject matter, but it does provide variety of atmposphere to throw into the mix.

 

[Boots]

I like #2 and your "Gursky"

 

[Ed Sutton]

Lots going on today. The small scale farmers were out in force performing a variety of tasks. It was mostly tractor pictures but there was a pile of red 'white' and blue pallets by the flower greenhouses.



The mylar tape bird scarers are out again.



Unpicked sprouts being ploughed in.


Compared to a self propelled, GPS controlled crop sprayer this set up is archaic!



It had been too wet all winter to get this pile of rubbish burned.



I wouldn't like to contemplate the combined ages of the three tractors and their owners! I know for certain two of the men are 90 and 82 and I'd guess the one with the DB is of similar vintage.

And finally...

A greenhouse picture.

 

[Boots]

My favourites are the pallets and the one with the David Brown tractor.

 

[Ed Sutton]

My favourites are the pallets and the one with the David Brown tractor.

Thanks. I'm quite pleased with the DB one too. Especially considering it was a one-off grab shot.

 

[Ed Sutton]

Out 'early' in the sun and bitter cold wind this morning. Trying for different takes on a familiar subject.

 

[Ed Sutton]

Despite some overnight rain it is much drier on the moss now and most fields have been tilled.



The plot below was grass last year with two cows on it over winter.



Another angle on fleece and bags.



I've seen, and photographed, this countless times but only just noted the faded 'Salad Bowl of the North West'.

 

[Ed Sutton]

A bit of a fleece/insect mesh theme going on today. Some 'randoms' to follow.

 

[Ed Sutton]

The pumphouse work looks to be complete.



I'm not sure who this new blockade is intended to keep out. Veg thieves? Poor photo but it's something that should be there for some time to be revisited.



Another crap photo. I was trying to catch the rainbow colours in the spray but failed. It was odd conversing with someone hidden by a big rack of plants!



I don't know who Graham is...



Some stones and a greenhouse.



A clothes pole and a shed. Why to I photograph this nonsense?

 

[Ed Sutton]

The golden hour.









I also wasted a lot of time failing to photograph a lump of 'bog oak' using flash. It was beyond my capabilities!

 

[Solo man]

Be interesting to see which way you go with curating these images... I feel you could go off on a few tangents. I think the crop tool could be useful. I'm really enjoying following the thread.

 

[Ed Sutton]

Be interesting to see which way you go with curating these images... I feel you could go off on a few tangents. I think the crop tool could be useful. I'm really enjoying following the thread.

Yes, there are a number of sub-themes to this project which could all stand alone. One will soon be a zine of sorts.

 

[Boots]

That's a nice set of images

 

[Ed Sutton]

I found some cheap A2 frames on the ASDA website the other day. I've bought smaller frames from their store in the past and they were good value but I wasn't expecting much from these at £18 for three! Sure enough they are cheap and cheerful - which suite me fine - with thin plastic 'glazing', but they look okay. Fine for the rotation of prints on my walls.

I don't know why pictures look different on screens, printed in books/zines and printed and mounted, but they do somehow. I often think that putting any old picture behind a mount in a frame makes it look like art! It also seems to allow a more objective appraisal of it as a picture. Maybe it's the way a mount isolates the image?

 

[Ed Sutton]

Frost at night, sunshine during the day and no rain to speak of for some time has dried everything out.





Warm enough this afternoon to bring the midges out.



Not sure where these came from. I think they might have been plouhed up and collected as there was a matching pile of broken pipes nearby.





Another try at getting a picture of a Mylar strip. I think I caught the flash well enough.

 

[Ed Sutton]

I spent longer out this morning than I'd intended because the sun was shining and there was a lot to look at. So much to photograph that I can't yet whittle everything down to pick the best stuff out from the things I took too many photos of. These are a few from the loose edit which is on Flickr.

Ploughing in progress. Note the previously spread muck.



Yet more fleece.



I can't recall seeing pegs used to hold fleece down before.





Nor have I seen what looks like oilseed rape (OSR) grown under glass before. Since neonicitinoids have been banned it's become a struggle to grow OSR due to cabbage flea beetle attacking the crop. Maybe this is a response?



A trailer of seed. It's reddish because it's been dressed something to protect it from disease etc.

 

[Ed Sutton]

It was all go on the moss this morning, tractors everywhere and a traffic jam at the junction! While it was all going on I was stuck on one of my extremely rare calls to my mobile to a mate I haven't spoke to for a year or so who only calls when he wants info! By the time I got off the phone I had to get back home and start work. I never seem to have the spare time at teh right time...

Bright but hazy, and the sun in my face again.





The field which was flooded all winter is now dry and dusty. As an aside, there were three wheatears, a couple of lapwings and at least one pied wagtail on the freshly worked ground. having had a close encounter with a barn owl on my way out it was a nice way to start the day.

 

[Ed Sutton]

Rules are made to be broken, especially self-imposed ones which should be smashed! That's why I thought I'd go wider than my usual 28mm limit yesterday evening and take my 20mm lens along. Usually there's plenty of space to step back on the moss, but not always when there's a ditch in the way. I try not to use wide angle lenses to get the wide angle look. Not always possible but it can be done. This one has a little of it but not so much it leaps out, I think.



The angle of view masks the wide angle effect in this greenhouse pic.



But mostly I stuck with my usual focal length range. It being a dry evening and sunset around 8.20 there was still field work going on as the sun set.



The 'bog oaks' have always fascinated me, but they are difficult to take photographs of. If this one stays around I might try and take some better detailed close ups.



This has echoes of the worked earth it was dragged up from.





I guess landscapey sunsets have a minor place in a project like this.





I see it'll be the anniversary of starting this thread tomorrow. I'll take a look back through it later and have a think about what happens next.

Thanks to all who have commented, liked and encouraged over the last twelve months.

 

[Boots]

Love the two sunset shots! The bog oak would be an interesting mini-project.