Tim Parkin - Landscape Photographer

A busy week for me which ended with a trip up to Scotland for a Workshop with David and Richard and for the launch of Northern Shores, an exhibition at Richard’s recently extended gallery in Oban, Argyll.

Charlotte and I stayed at Strumhor bed and breakfast near the Connel Straits. It’s a beautiful place with great hosts, food and service.

First thing in the morning we drove over to Easdale to look at the beach where I took ne of my first large format shots.

The morning was very sunny but had a strong sea mist. I wanted to take a picture of the strange tree like feature that Richard had shown me last time we were there.. I’ve still to find out what the feature is but it made for a strong composition, especially with the simplifying nature of the haze.

Charlotte then dropped me off at the Gallery where we joined up with seven other photographers and after a quick bite to eat and a gossip we went off to our workshop locations which was …. Easdale!! Well we didn’t go to the beach (not that I would have been unhappy to) but went instead to the small harbour.

The geology was extraordinary with a combination of slate, basalt, quartz and even some sandstone. I wanted to capture the essence of the place and again the haze helped. A short crossing over a scary wall and I had the raise platform that allowed me to get away from the black stained rocks and up around the polished slate layers. The main photograph was a bugger to expose, with the reflections in the water being incredibly bright.

The photograph above is one I also really like for it’s stillness. The harbour has a natural wier at the entrance which means the water is millpond smooth and I wanted to capture the reflections of the layers of rock in the background but also to capture the wall at man made wall and the way it blended into the rock. I think I capture the nature of the location with these two photographs and am very happy with them.

The exhibition in the evening was predictably very good with some new work by both Joe and David but it was great to see some of Richard’s new work, particularly his amazing picture of Seilabost sands which I’ve included below with a couple more of my favourites of his.

Richard is a challenging role model for someone who has only been taking landscape photographs for four years and now runs his own successful gallery. Congratulations Richard!!