New website

OK, so technically not a new website, but a revamped one with a brand new look and feel, so I'm calling it new. Head over to Jonathan Carre Photography to view the new look site. I would appreciate any feedback you may have about the site, good or bad, and you can leave any comments on this blog post.

Thanks in advance for any critique you may be able to offer.

A photographer's responsibility

I just saw an image that raises this interesting debate. It is a picture of an orangutan in a zoo, and the image is shot to emphasize the creature's 'sadness'. The image is Photo of the Day over at Photo Radar and you can see it by clicking here.
The image description states how the photographer visited the zoo and was aware of how sad the animals looked. Now 'looked' is the key word here. This was my response -

'This shot emphasises sadness, but is the subject actually sad? Photography is a powerful tool but do photographers always choose to portray the true message? This image is clearly a case of anthropomorphism. We assume the orangutan is sad because of its slumped stance, its downturned mouth, and the lack of 'nature' in it's enclosure. However, a downturned mouth in primates does not indicate sadness, it indicates relaxed facial muscles, which in turn indicates a happy, content primate. An agitated primate would be active, baring teeth. The slumped stance shows the same, relaxed muscles, showing a relaxed primate, rather than an active, agitated one. We assume that because the orangutan isn't in lush vegetation it must be somehow worse off than its wild counterparts, do you really think that the orangutan cares if he/she is swinging from real vines, or ropes and straps? Zoos work very hard to recreate an environment in which an animal can act as it would in the wild, which is why they come up with complex enrichment items, allowing animals to search and forage for there food, puzzles to keep them occupied and mentally stimulated, as well as a host of other things.
The problem with humans is that most of us see ourselves reflected in these animals, especially primates who are so similiar to us. Because of this we anthropomorphise and make assumptions about an animal's welfare/state of mind based on an equivalent human expression without fully understanding the animal itself. As I said before, this is a great photo, but it really calls into debate the issue about a photographers duty to represent the truth, rather than an askewed view of it, altered and affected by human perception. This image will no doubt be debated till the cows come home.'

I would love to hear everybody's thoughts on this. It could very well be an interesting debate.

Weather warnings in July

I'm so glad I moved to Wales, but weater warnings for my area in July! I had plans to go out but they're a bit scuppered. On the plus side, I have just got my weatherproofing for my 7D, so I'm hoping to be able to use the bad weather to my advantage and go out and shoot landscapes and wildlife images that other people might not get out and capture. Always look on the bright side.

Help required with competition

Hello all

Last week I spent a couple of hours one afternoon photographing damselflies. Well, I am particularly pleased with one image (see the thumb below), so I have entered it into Digital Camera Magazine's Photographer of the Year competition. The competition is still open for entries and you can see all of them as they are uploaded by visiting the POTY site.

The images can be voted on by viewers, and the more votes an image has, the more likely it is to garner the attention of the judges. Here's where you come in. If you think my image worthy of a vote in the competition then I would love for you to go and vote for it at the below link. You would really be helping me out and I would be very grateful. While you're there check out some of the other images, there is some cracking photography being entered into the competition.

You have to register to vote but it's real easy and takes just two minutes. Also, they don't send you any email, spam or otherwise, so you don't have to worry about that. Registering just ensures that each person can only vote for an image once.

Anyway, just CLICK HERE to go to my entry, and if you would like to vote, just click on 'Vote to like this' below the image (after registering).

No Hawks, so I climbed a mountain!

I'm a little behind with my editing at the moment, I have just today been editing a shoot from the 18th June at Cwm Idwal. I went down to Cwm Idwal early in the morning (I arrived at about 7.30am) with the intent of waiting around for some RAF Hawks to fly through the Ogwen Valley on their training runs. Unfortunately the cloud cover was so dense that there was no hope of any hawks doing low level flight training, so I decided to scramble up Glyder Fawr, one of the highest peaks in Snowdonia (the fifth highest, over 3000ft!).
It took me about 50 minutes to climb up, I came up from the Cwm Idwal side only to find when I reached the top that there is a path on the Tryfan side, I was hit with a mixed feeling of accomplishment and despair at the same time, I couldn't believe I'd put in all that energy when there had been a path all along, at least I'll know for next time. Anyway, from near the top there were some fantastic views, when I could see them, the cloud cover was insane! The wind kept blowing it over Glyder Fawr, one minute I could see some lovely views, with some great low cloud to boot, the next minute I could barely see 5 feet in front of me! It was a little disconcerting being someone who suffers from vertigo, 3000ft odd up in the air, near the edge and not being able to see 5 feet! Anyway, I ended up with some good shots (well, I think they're good) which will be posted to my flickr account soon, I just thought I'd post this one up so you can see the conditions. This was from near the top of Glyder Fawr looking over Cwm Idwal to Y Garn, you can't see Llyn Idwal or the rest of the recess of Cwm Idwal at all. For a comparison, this is a shot of Cwm Idwal and the lake Llyn Idwal from lower down the side of Glyder Fawr on a clear day. I was higher up the slope, and Y Garn is the peak to the left of this image.

I did get some aircraft shots just before leaving for home, but they were of a couple of helicopters rather than jets. The RAF were out training some of their defence helicopter pilots. I'll be going back for the Hawks.

Cwm Idwal

Well I just spent the evening at the absolutely beautiful area of Cwm Idwal in Snowdonia. I got there at 6.30pm but because of the high altitude and high terrain around the area the sunlight wasn't falling on the areas I had planned to photograph. Still, I got some nice images and will be revisiting, but in the morning I think, to make the most of the direction and softness of early morning light.

I will post the images in the next few days once I have completed edits. I am still editing a few shots from our trip up the Great Orme the other day.

North Wales

Well the move is complete and we're mostly settled in. I love it up here, there is an absolute abundance of different locations to explore and shoot. I have started and look forward to continuing. From countless different castles, to some of the most beautiful coastline I have ever seen (with the exception of some Jurrasic Coast sites), to Snowdonia National Park, the possibilities are endless. I think I'm going to enjoy it here.

Keep up to date with all my photographs by following my flickr account.