Winter blues (and pinks).

It’s barely light but already I can feel the heartache creeping through my veins. The landscape whistles past in a streaky blur but the tendrils of freezing mist stroking the white ground – attractive on their own – are made doubly so by the vivid pink of the dawn sky. It’s painfully beautiful and it’s painful not to be out there with my camera.

I’m on a train. I’m on a train to London. For a meeting. 9 hours there, 9 hours back and I’m feeling as far from being a nature photographer as I have since I first picked up a camera two decades ago. The last 5 years have seen me working on ambitious communication projects trying (and some might suggest for the most part, failing) to be a marketeer, an accountant, a business analyst, even a politician. In so many ways the results of these endeavours have been rewarding and certainly educational, but it’s not what I do; it’s not what I want to do.

The very kind waitress with a broad Northumbrian accent and a crisp ‘East Coast Trains’ uniform brings me sausage and mash, a perk of an expenses-paid first class seat. The sun is now up and the snow-laden Berwickshire coastline zips by glistening under an azure sky. My meeting is important, don’t get me wrong, but God I wish I was out with my camera, away from the inane chatter of slightly pretentious businessmen on their phones, away from first-class sausage and mash.

Loch Insh/River Spey in Winter, Scotland.

2013 is going to be another busy year but it will be my last busy year in terms of big photo projects with the attendant sitting on planes and trains. I want to go back to sitting in a cold hide, waiting for a creature, or shaft of light that might never appear; smelling the pine, tasting the peat. I want to craft new images, stretch my creative boundaries and tell new stories. I want to drink cold coffee from a cold flask not be served sausage and mash. And I want to laugh again.

As the train moves ever southwards towards the English capital, my heart drifts ever northwards to the Highlands and it’s my heart that I intend to follow in the coming years.


Inspiration and exhaustion in equal measure.

I think it’s fair to say, I normally don’t do cities and I definitely don’t do London. Unless there’s good reason. Good reason this last weekend was the Wildlife Photographer of the Year awards ceremony and the 2-day Wildphotos symposium – both inspiring and at the same time demanding.

I’m really pleased to have landed a place in this year’s competition, but I’m doubly pleased that my son Sam got a runner-up in his age category.

Following the celebrations (great to see so many photographers I’ve not seen for ages) and a few too many glasses of wine, it was onto Wildphotos where I took to the stage with my soapbox in hand. All seemed to pass off without major incident which is the first thing you hope for on such occasions. Thanks to everyone who came up to say hello and sorry it was all a bit manic.

A couple of images below – more on the Northshots Facebook page shortly.