Kevin Whitworth / Jacurutu

Tonights project was something that I've been thinking of on-and-off for a while. We get bats flying round and above the back garden. Being the height of summer at the moment (honest!), the long days mean they're out at dusk when you can still see them. So, the project is to take (good) photos of them.

My basic idea is to find a spot above the garden where they fly regularly, set the camera up pointed, zoomed and focused on that same location, and light the location from below with a couple of speedlights. Tonight was the first test of this theory.

In principal, it works fine. The problem is the battle between my patience and the bats flying where I want. Whilst I was setting up, there were lots of bats. Once I'd set up, there were quite a few bats, but not flying where I'd set up. For the first couple of attempts I'd used the 18-70mm lens, zoomed out to 18mm to give me a better chance of capturing the bats in the frame. Of course, that results in a tiny bat (hence this photo being heavily cropped). Next time round, I think I'm going to have to develop more patience (or start earlier...) and use a bigger zoom lens.

I shall keep you posted on progress...

Well, I'm trying hard this year to keep on top of editing the photos I've been taking, rather than let them build up, necessitating a massive end-of-year editing session. I'm not doing too bad so far, and here are the photos from a walk we went on around the RSPB reserve at Fairburn Ings at the start of June.

Fairburn Ings is always a nice place to head for a picnic, and being just down the road it's rather convenient place to head if we're at a loose end. However, this is the first time we've actually walked all the way round the main lake (right up to Fairburn village). There's quite a lot to see - always lots of water birds (ie ducks!), and the usual smaller birds we get on the bird table at home, but the varied habitat also supports things like damselflies and (closer to the village) farm animals too.

As a result, the set (available on Flickr or in my Photo Albums on here) has a variety of different flora and fauna, including a series of a pair of pheasants, damselflys, a heron flying overhead, great crested grebes and of course the coot taking flight shown above.

Unfortunately, although I've been trying to keep on top of this years photos, I still haven't managed to do the Kenya photos, or the Northumberland ones (and that holiday is coming up to being a year ago). Hopefully the rain might keep up so I can get on with the editing!