Lakin Farm

There are a couple of photo editing programs that I use, but the one I like best is Gimp.

It is not the easiest software to get to grips with but as its free you can’t grumble. I use Gimp to touch up my photos and remove things I don’t want (lampposts etc).

These examples, although not very good, give an idea of the types of things you can easily do with photo software these days.

For this picture I set up my camera in a fixed position, asked John Luke to do a few poses, then merged the resulting pictures into a single image.

This picture used the same principles as above but added the idea of John Luke interacting with his clone. To do this we put the tray on a brick and took one picture with John Luke holding the glass, then another with him holding the tray. As before the images were merged together (using Gimp) and the brick was ‘airbrushed’ out.

The glass has blackcurrant juice in it, in case you were wondering.

This is one of my favourite pictures of Abby, she has a Mona Lisa-esque smile. I used this to practice a bit of morphing. I have seen software that lets you mess around with peoples faces and make them look strange.

Luckily you can do the same with Gimp.

I don’t really like this picture, its a bit freaky.

I have been helping out with the conversion of the barn behind our house. The barn will (eventually) be where Ruth’s mum and dad live. My job is to plasterboard and tape, but in order for me to fix my boards up I have also been putting in a lot of woodwork.

This picture shows the most difficult bit I have done so far. There were a lot of tricky angles to work out and plenty of trial and error (more error than trial).

Doing this sort of work makes you appreciate how skilled people must be in order to build boats, church roofs etc. Certainly more skillful than I will ever be.

I recently saw some excellent photos in Amateur Photographer magazine that had been taken by a guy from Arran called Andy Surrige.

I have seen images like Andy’s before but never quite got how they were done.

This only shows how out of touch I was, because looking through the father in law’s back issues of Amateur Photographer, there was quite a lot of information on how to create them.

Basically there is a way of creating images by merging three photographs (of the same thing) into a single picture. These pictures are called HDR (High Dynamic Range) images, and can look quite impressive when done right.

So after a while I got myself the required software and started to create my own HDR images.

I have put some of the results on my Photographs page.

With a bit more effort I think I should be able to create some nice pictures.

Just need to get out with camera a bit more.

The Lakin Farm has some very neglected fields. Some are so bad that they have been inaccessible for many years.

Part of the problem is the lay of the land. A couple of the fields sit in a natural bowl and are very wet and boggy as a result.

The other part of the problem is caused by regular flooding from a nearby river which has a big log jam in it.

I took this picture at the junction of two drains which form the corner of one of my ‘fields’. As far as I could see from my side of the ditch the trees and shrubs carry on forever.

The green patch at the right of the photograph was once the start of the field.

There is no way of getting to the other side as the mud in the ditch is a least chest high.

John Luke and I tested it with a pole, and agreed it was a complete death trap.

I have spent a couple of days cutting away the trees on one side of the ditch in order that, one day, I will be able to dig out the drain and get the land dry again.

It took me two days to clear about 30ft of trees, shrubs and brambles.

The drain/ditch is about a quarter of a mile long. So I reckon it will be at least a year before I finish clearing it.

Then I will start the ditch on the other side of the field.

One of the new chickens is laying massive eggs.

This picture shows the size difference between one of the monster eggs and a normal one.

Brings tears to the eyes just to look at it.

When we opened this egg it had two yolks in it.

We weren’t expecting any eggs from the new hens quite so soon. When they are all laying we will be having omelets for every meal!