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Just a goldfinch sitting in a pine tree.

I went to the woods to film a morning waking up. There, I captured the beautiful morning light, wild garlic starting to flower, and the first bluebells of the season, before finishing by filming the midday sun shining through the canopy. Filmed from the soft early morning light to the bright midday sun on the Nikon Zf, this cinematic nature film captures the peaceful wonder of an ancient British woodland in spring. Edited in DaVinci Resolve, I wanted to highlight the textures, colours, and atmosphere of a springtime forest, featuring wild garlic and bluebells. Filmed at: Borsdane Wood, Wigan, UK Camera: Nikon Zf Edited in: DaVinci Resolve If you love springtime woodlands, wildflowers, and nature cinematography, don’t forget to like, comment, and subscribe for more peaceful nature films! #SpringWoodland #WildGarlic #Bluebells #BorsdaneWood #NikonZf #NatureFilm #WoodlandWalk #SpringInEngland #DaVinciResolve #NatureCinematography

I would just like to say a huge thank you to everyone who has helped and supported me to pursue man’s greatest invention once again over the last year. Everyone’s kind words and supportive comments have been so thankfully received. It’s been a year of contrasts, full of ups and downs, disheartenment and sheer joy, and so choosing these images was really tough - hence why I’m a week or so late in getting them out there! I’ve taken over 24,000 photographs photographing my little family, to the King, to weddings, to the hills of the Lake District, the Lochs of Scotland and the dereliction of the Welsh slate quarries, and everything else in between! Aside from my digital, I’ve also shot 42 rolls of 35mm film, 29 rolls of 120 film, and 84 sheets of large format! Thank you, everyone, but special thanks to my amazing wife who has put up with me and my moaning in my pursuit of unrealistic photographic self actualisation! 2024’s chosen dozen are: January - White-headed marmoset February - Blackpool Tower March - Panther Chameleon April - Helter Skelter May - Mann Island June - Eyes of an Eurasian Eagle Owl July - Garden Cottage at RHS Bridgewater August - The Old Dinorwig Slate Quarry Barracks September - Sybil at Delph October - Loch Eck November - Seagul Mooching Along December - Seating Shelter at Llandudno Thank you once again, and all the best for 2025!

I went along to photograph the Santa special 2024 at the West Lancashire Light Railway near Preston and Southport. #Santa #steamtrain #lancashire #westlancashirelightrailway

Hindley cemetery chapel has just reopened after extensive renovations so I went along for a sneaky preview complete story Christmas decorations. Here’s a slideshow of my #photographs #hindley #cemetery #chapel

Here I share a series of photographs captured in the heart of Borsdane Wood, Hindley, this November. Autumn has done its thing, painting the woodland with deep reds, oranges, and golden yellows. These images are a quiet reflection on the season—showcasing the winding paths, crisp leaves underfoot, and the soft, diffused light that makes this time of year so special. Shot during a peaceful wanders through the woods, these photos aim to celebrate the subtle beauty of autumn in full swing. Let me know what you think in the comments! #AutumnPhotography #BorsdaneWood #WoodlandWalks #Hindley #LandscapePhotography

Shooting a 1930s Vintage Camera: The Ensign Greyhound at the Lytham 1949s War Weekend 2024 This camera is a lot of fun to shoot with! To find out more head on over to my website for my review, including my calculations for what the true aperture values are. You can find it here: https://www.ollyhitchen.co.uk/post/enfield-greyhound-1930s-camera-review

I started off the day shooting my Bronica SQ-Ai but before too long I got so into the mode of taking the photos with it that I forgot to shoot the B-Roll for the rest of the shots! 😆

This video sees me walking around the gorgeous Great British Countryside around Wycoller Country Park, in the civil parish of Trawden Forest in Pendle, Lancashire, England, starting and ending at The Atom Panopticon It wasn't the most successful trip out in terms of photos... Firstly, when cleaning and resetting my film holders, I accidentally opened film holder containing an unexposed sheet of Delta 100, then on the trip, I shot a double exposure by accident, but although not quite what I was after I didn't mind the end result, so I kept it in. Next, I climbed the hillside to get back to the Atom and the battery in my insta360 One RS conked out as I was filming an absolutely riveting scene of me trying to smooth out drinking a brew which was still ridiculously hot, so the last to images are a bit cobbled together. After my last attempt to film between my Insta360 One RS and my iPhone failed miserably I decided to just stop filming. Soz! On the second to last image, I wanted to see how the Nikon Nikkor-SW 90mm f4.5 would cope shooting into the high sun. Turns out it did take a picture, but I'll not do it again, as the flare robbed a load of contrast out of the hillside. BOOOOO!!!!! As usual, the shutter on my Schneider Kreuznach 150 lens is still slow, so the shots taken at 1/15 saw my shutter speed set to 1/30 to add an extra stop, but that could be a topic for another video, if people wish to know how I cope with a wonky large format shutter (although it's pretty simple really). Anyway, it was great to be out and about again, and going out specifically to document the few hours I was out. It's a beautiful part of the English Countryside so if you're ever up that way and fancy a walk then check it out. You can check out the route for yourself on Komoot here: https://www.komoot.com/tour/1616368736 Shot on my Insta360 One RS Twin Edition, mainly with the 360 lens, but there are a couple of clips in there from the boost lens too (those are the ones starting with me walking down the path after shooting the Atom, and ending with the scene of me shooting the ancient packhorse bridge) Edited in Da Vinci Resolve. Many thanks for watching, and let me know in the comments how you found the video. Cheers Olly Links to Gear in this video* Cameras/Lenses Nikon Z7 II (for digitising the negatives) - https://amzn.to/4atrdm3 Nikon AF-S Micro NIKKOR 60mm f/2.8G ED - https://amzn.to/4bMEsiN Nikon FTZ II Adapter - https://amzn.to/44KtSXf 3 Legged Thing Zelda Dedicated L-Bracket for Nikon Z7 - https://amzn.to/44MFetG Insta360 ONE RS Twin 360 Edition - https://amzn.to/4bAem2A Supports My main tripod: Manfrotto MT190CXPRO4 - https://amzn.to/44qS4Of Analogue Stuff Ilford Delta 100 film - https://amzn.to/3R3unGi Film Holder Pouches - https://amzn.to/4aFReOV Glass sheets for digitising 4x5 Negatives - https://amzn.to/4bZSmxT RALENO LED panel for digitising at home - https://amzn.to/3ynJFz4 Sous Vide for developing at home - https://amzn.to/3WJhftl Bag My Large Format kit bag, Lowepro PhotoSport X Backpack 35L AW - https://amzn.to/3WHnhLb *Hey! These links are affiliate links, and they'll take you through to Amazon if you wanted to check anything out. I'm sure you've seen messages like this before, but in case you've never seen an affiliate link or don't know what one is it is simply a link that earns me a small commission for referring you to Amazon for your purchases to help with the costs of running this site, and it won't cost you anything extra. Thanks!

Here, I head into my local woodland once again to shoot some sheets of film, this time loaded with Ilford's Delta 100. In this video, I pull the calculator app up on my phone, something I'm going to try to remember to do from now on when making a vid to show how to calculate reciprocity failure. Delta has a failure calculation figure of 1.26 so that's the number I used. I got that info from the Ilford website, just searched for Film reciprocity failure compensation on your fave search engine and you'll find a link to their PDF. Alternatively, just follow this link: ➡️ https://www.ilfordphoto.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Reciprocity-Failure-Compensation.pdf At the end I also measured the bellows, this was to measure the bellows draw for calculating the bellows extension factor. I've recently written a blog post on this, so head here to find out more: ➡️ https://www.ollyhitchen.co.uk/post/what-is-and-how-to-calculate-bellows-extension-factor I really like Delta 100 for woodland photography. Its nice and sharp and gives great contrast! Highly recommended, but each time I go and shoot it I'm reminded of the time a few years back when I shot five rolls in 35mm format at Cheshire Steam Fair only to find my Nikon F100 had completely missed focus on about 90% of the shots! That was an expensive day! 🙈 Lately, no trip out would be complete without some gremlins, and today's problems stemmed from the fact that I decided to use my insta360 One RS in flat mode, hoping to be able to grade it in post. The insta footage was alright in the end but took far too much fettling around with and was really noisy in places, so sorry about that! I used my iPhone for the second half of the video, to see how easy it'd be to work between both devices, and obviously the footage was waaaaay different, plus an hour or so had elapsed after taking the first image as I was exploring and enjoying a brew on a log for a while, so the light was completely different. I'm still learning how to use Da Vinci Resolve atm after moving away from FCPX as my ageing iMac is struggling with FCPX these days. Hopefully, the vids will improve in time. Anyway, hope you enjoyed it, and if you did leave me a comment. Sharing, liking and subscribing always helps tiny channels like mine be found so I'd really appreciate that! Cheers, Ol Links to Gear* Cameras/Lenses Insta360 ONE RS Twin 360 Edition - https://amzn.to/4bAem2A Nikon Z7 II for digitising negatives - https://amzn.to/4atrdm3 Nikon AF-S Micro NIKKOR 60mm f/2.8G ED for digitising negatives - https://amzn.to/4bMEsiN Nikon FTZ II Adapter - https://amzn.to/44KtSXf Support My main tripod: Manfrotto MT190CXPRO4 - https://amzn.to/44qS4Of Analogue Stuff Ilford HP5 film - https://amzn.to/3QQcJ8E Ilford Delta 100 film - https://amzn.to/3R3unGi RALENO LED panel for digitising at home - https://amzn.to/3ynJFz4 Sous Vide for developing at home - https://amzn.to/3WJhftl Bag My Large Format kit bag, Lowepro PhotoSport X Backpack 35L AW - https://amzn.to/3WHnhLb *Hey! These links are affiliate links, and they'll take you through to Amazon if you wanted to check anything out. I'm sure you've seen messages like this before, but in case you've never seen an affiliate link or don't know what one is it is simply a link that earns me a small commission for referring you to Amazon for your purchases to help with the costs of running this site, and it won't cost you anything extra. Thanks!