Tag Archives: loch lomond
January in the Trossachs
2011 has for me, photographically, been a bit poor. Due to work commitments, I have not been able to get out as much with my camera as I would have liked. I have also been a bit neglectful with updating this blog with new images. So I have finally got around to processing these shots from January this year.
Myself and Cameron decided to visit the area around Aberfoyle known as the Trossachs. This was in the middle of January so it was still in the middle of that amazing long cold spell when temperatures were barely above freezing for 3 or 4 weeks. As usual we decided to head up for the sunrise, which was around 7.30am which meant another 5am start for us to travel the 100 miles to where we planned to try and capture the sunrise. The location we chose was St Johns Church on the banks of Loch Achray. The weather forecast looked quite favourable, light winds and a high of 2-3 degrees C.
The initial thought was to get some nice images of the sunrise reflected in the still waters of the Loch with maybe some images of the church in it too. When we eventually got there we saw that due to the weeks of low temperatures, the loch had completely frozen over!
Although that ruled out some nice reflections it still meant that I would get some sort of decent light hitting the ice of the loch. The sunset wasn’t the best with clouds obscuring the actual sunrise but I did manage to get this shot with the sunlight tingeing the clouds in a nice golden glow.
Once I played around with a few different images and setups, I decided to shoot in the other direction. This is obviously a bit later on and the cloud cover has started to roll in a bit more. The view across a frozen Loch Achray towards Ben Venue is still pretty nice.
After spending a good couple of hours here, we then decided to head back into Aberfoyle. This was to take a trip along what I would say was one of my favourite locations in Scotland, the small single track road to the Inversnaid hotel on the eastern bank of Loch Lomond.
Along it’s route the road passes numerous loch’s with wonderful views of both Ben Lomond and the Arrochar Alps. You can also take a right turn halfway along it and end up at the northern end of Loch Katrine. To my mind if you are in the Aberfoyle area, a trip along this road is a must.
The first stop on the road was to a frozen Loch Chon. The branches of the tree stuck in the frozen loch along with the early morning sun striking the golden leaves of the trees made this image rather special.
Next we moved on to probably my favourite location along this road, Loch Arklet. This man-made loch sits in a small valley so it has more than it’s fair share of still, calm water which means lovely reflections. The only minus point is that the water levels were pretty low which can bee seen by the rocks sticking out of the water. These are usually totally covered.
After a good while exploring round here we decided to start to head back home with a trip along the east side of Loch Lomond up by Balmaha. Our first stop was this small lochan which sat just off the road and made a good foreground to Ben Lomond behind. The cloud cover had started to move in and the late afternoon light poking through the clouds behind me lit up the reeds and the trees on the opposite bank.
Another image taken around the same time but showing the light on the trees a bit more. Note the large frozen patches all over this lochan!
Now back at Loch Lomond it was a chance to try something different. The Loch was quite still so it was a good chance to use my Lee Big Stopper. This image was a 3 minute exposure which helped still the Loch even further and give some movement in the clouds.
Of course, what do you do when you are waiting for the long exposures….you take a short video on your iphone!
As you can see it was a productive trip with a few images that I was happy with. Now all I have to do now is make some time to get out more!
The Lone Tree
Todays archive post is a mono conversion of a shot I took in 2006. This is a tree that has it’s roots in Loch Lomond.
The Trossachs
An early start again for the 90 minute journey up to Aberfoyle. The area around Aberfoyle is one of my favourite places for landscapes. It is commonly known as the Trossachs from the Gaelic ‘Na Trosaichean’. The Trossachs itself is a small woodland glen in the Stirling council area of Scotland. It lies between Ben A’an to the north and Ben Venue to the south, with Loch Katrine to the west and Loch Achray to the east. However, the name is used generally to refer to the wider area of wooded glens and braes with quiet lochs, lying to the east of Ben Lomond. Once I witnessed a rather poor sunrise at Loch Venachar, I headed back into Aberfoyle and towards Loch Ard. The windless conditions help show the colours of the boathouse and trees in the still Loch.
My next stop after this was back along the Dukes Pass towards Loch Achray. It was a perfect windless morning with no one around. I stood at this spot for about 20 minutes just taking in the view and a couple of pictures.
The Panorama gives a much better view of the Loch with Ben Venue behind.
My next stop was to take a trip up past Loch Lubnaig towards Loch Voil. The calm conditions continued, the only disappointment was the cloudless sky.
After this I decided it was time to turn back and head towards home. I ended up along the east bank of Loch Lomond where I waited for the sunset. I found an ideal spot beside Sallochy Woods. The bank had a great line of stones jutting out into the Loch. Ideal foreground material. I took various shots using the stones as lead in lines as the sun set, using various shutter speeds along with an ND filter to blur the Loch. These two are the best of my time here.
After the sun finally set, I started the journey home. Another good days shooting.