Macro Nature

After a prolonged winter here in the UK, enjoying getting out and finding as much colour as possible as the summer finally kicks in…

‘Farmageddon’ by Crispin Trist

 

Farmageddon

Illustrating the actual height of the wind turbines at Cape Bridgewater, Victoria, Australia. The Victorians are proposing a wall of these TWICE the height on other parts of the State’s precious coastline. The turbines in this video are my mother & brother’s disturbing neighbours.

Three Magnificent Women Take On Australia’s Monstrous Wind Power Outfits & their Pathetic Political Backers

STOP THESE THINGS

STT Champion: Alan Jones

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The wind industry in Australia is in full-scale panic because the recently completed Senate Inquiry into the great wind power fraud turned a (long-overdue) blowtorch on the biggest rort in Australian history, with their thumping report on Australia’s wind power fraud – available here: Senate Report

The first 200 pages involve a detailed and thorough analysis of every aspect of the most ludicrous piece of energy ‘policy’ ever devised; the balance – written by the wind industry – and headed ‘Labor’s dissenting report’ – requires the suspension of our good friends, ‘logic’ and reason’, in order to digest.

Last Tuesday, STT Champion, Alan Jones picked up on the recommendations – first, on his 2GB breakfast radio show and, later, on Sky News – on ‘Richo + Jones’.

Alan’s morning radio show reaches some 2 million listeners through over 77 Stations, Countrywide; Sky New’s ‘Richo +…

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Abandoning a Dream

In 2008, I visited my Mum’s new dream home in the country for the very first time. A beautiful little house, standing proudly on its own, near Cape Bridgewater in Victoria, Australia. Built by Irish settlers, now Heritage listed, it is a solid little house, built to last, and importantly, strong enough to withstand the savage winds that often hit this part of the coastline.

On my first visit, I was very excited by the surroundings, and had never been anywhere quite like it. And now it was my Mum’s home. A whole new world was waiting to be explored and enjoyed by us as a family.

Below are some first impressions of the house, the landscape, the wildlife around it. And below these I will include the important point of this post.

Now, in 2015, my Mum is faced with the very sad prospect of having to abandon her home.

This may sound surprising to some, but the reason for this is due to the effect on her health and lifestyle, courtesy of a wind farm which was erected next door, after she bought the house.

Initially it was purely the visual impact that was so upsetting. This stunning piece of coastline now contained a new 29 tower wind facility, operated by Pacific Hydro. Towers that are approximately 120 meters tall, and the nearest one being situated 620 meters from my mother’s home.

She was made aware of the possibility of some wind turbines being built nearby, but her shock when she first saw them was pretty harsh. She had not yet moved into the property whilst the facility was being constructed, and had arrived after a long drive from Queensland to be greeted by them lining the horizon behind her new home.

The close proximity of these towers has effected her far more than just the visual impact however. Her health began to deteriorate and she experienced new sensations she had never felt before. We didn’t know it at the beginning of course, but what she has been suffering from is most likely the effects of the infra sound generated by the towers.

A study by an acoustics expert, Mr Steven Cooper, has recently been published. He worked with Pacific Hydro to perform the testing, and has been described by some as ‘ground-breaking’. The results can be viewed here:

http://www.pacifichydro.com.au/english/our-communities/communities/cape-bridgewater-acoustic-study-report/

So whilst some will argue there is still insufficient evidence that people are being physically effected by wind ‘factories’, the fact of the matter is that my mother, as well as other neighbors of these structures, is faced with the idea of simply abandoning her home. She feels the property is now ‘worthless’ and unless something is done by the owners of the wind facility, she may simply have to leave the property to stand empty, as some other families have already done.

As well as the health impacts, when the sun shines at a particular angle, the blades on the turbines cast enormous flickering shadows across the landscape. They are noisy, often squeaking and loudly whooshing. They operate 24 hours a day most of the time, except of course when there is no wind, which isn’t very often in this area, being so close to the coast.

Below are some images of the reality of her situation, and to illustrate the proximity and scale of this industrial neighbor that may drive her away from a dream.

The last couple of images are from the nearby ‘Petrified Forest’, I have written another blog about that, and how it has been surrounded by turbines, please feel free to take a look:

https://finchertrist.wordpress.com/2015/03/22/petrified-forest-cape-bridgewater/

© Fincher Trist and finchertrist@wordpress.com, 2015. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Fincher Trist and finchertrist@wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Petrified Forest, Cape Bridgewater

10,000 year old ‘Petrified Forest’ near Cape Bridgewater, Victoria, Australia. For more historical info see here:

http://www.visitportland.com.au/things-to-do/natural-attractions/petrified-forrest/

and also here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_Bridgewater,_Victoria

My images focus on what isn’t particularly well advertised in the tourist brochures, the surrounding wind farm which dwarfs the natural feature itself. Trying to take photographs of the ancient rock formations in the landscape is somewhat challenging, if you don’t want a series of enormous man-made wind turbines in the background that is.

Shameful that the Victorian Government should be allowed to make such a huge planning mistake, I’m not sure what they were thinking. They should be embarassed. Australia is home to some of the world’s most unspoiled natural beauty…sadly this doesn’t seem to apply in some areas of the coastline. In my humble opinion it just beggars belief…see for yourself and of course make up your own mind. I realize some people are fascinated by wind turbines & find them lovely to look at, but really, in a setting like this? Disgusting. SHAMEFUL!!!

The road leading to the Petrified Forest…

One of just a few wind turbine free pictures, the start of the path into the forest…

And another, looking out to sea with the wind farm behind us…

And how I wish more of my photos had turned out…

Sadly,however, the towers lurk eerily behind the majority of the natural rocky features, along the entire length of the walk through the park. I guess they could always be Photoshopped out later…hmmm…

Something a bit ironic about some of the warning signs placed around the sight…protected from what exactly? Obviously not modern technology and industry giants claiming to be ‘looking after the environment’…

To give an idea of scale, some of the turbines are very close to the road edge, and also the visitors car park…a typical motor home looks more like a toy car next to one of these towers…

A wider view of the visitor’s car park…

And another tower right up near the roadside approach…

Another size comparison, here is one of the nearby towers alongside a traditional farmyard windmill…a common and very iconic symbol of much Australian landscape imagery…

Down near the beachside at Cape Bridgewater nearby was this prominent signpost. Shame the local Council can’t practice what it preaches…

An area full of even more natural beauty such as a seal colony, blow holes, freshwater lakes has been trashed and littered by many more wind turbines, which in my view is absolutely tragic and should never have been allowed to happen. The wind industry may have some value on this planet, I’m undecided, but in a country the size of Australia, surely they should at least be making better choices about the placement of these enormous and imposing structures, not just around special & supposedly treasured tourist spots, but also the proximity to residential homes. HOW CAN THIS BE ALLOWED TO HAPPEN??

© Fincher Trist and finchertrist@wordpress.com, 2015. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Fincher Trist and finchertrist@wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Brighton

 

A walk on Brighton beach on a windy Spring day with my Canon G15.

© Fincher Trist and finchertrist@wordpress.com, 2014. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Fincher Trist and finchertrist@wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

My Backyard

Recently, I had to accept that right now is not a good time to get myself a puppy or a kitten. But having been brought up with animals in my life one way or the other, I realised that at the very least I could make the most of the little bit of wild life I have going on in my back garden. So I started buying different types of bird food, and a few bird feeders. As my garden sadly lacks the presence of trees, I resorted to hanging feeders from the back railings, and placing some on the wall. After a little while I happily noticed some of the food levels were going down. Initially I was aware of a Robin, and a Blackbird family, which were obviously nesting in the overgrown ivy bush near my ‘feeding wall’.

As the year has progressed, there were signs of nesting activity, and the sound of little ‘cheeps’ in the bushes. Currently, the baby blackbird is starting to venture out, and is being very closely guarded by ‘dad’. Very sweet watching the pair of them together, and baby mimicking dad’s feeding actions etc.

In the mean time, I wasn’t sure who was eating the peanuts. Now I know exactly who….the local mice! I know they are a pest, but they are so cute! And I figure as long as they are fed in the garden, maybe they will stay out of my kitchen! I do love they way they peep over the wall to check for danger, before boldly stepping out and having a little feast. The biggest guzzlers though are a pair of very fat wood pigeons, I need a bird table! And a tree.

I decided to start a little photo project of the goings on in the garden, oh and the local stray cat adds yet another complication to the whole scenario!

© Fincher Trist and finchertrist@wordpress.com, 2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Fincher Trist and finchertrist@wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

A Very English Bank Holiday Monday

Anyone who has been in the UK for the last 6 months or so, will appreciate the long dull cold harsh winter we have endured. So, when suddenly presented with a Bank Holiday Weekend with sunshine, it is understandable the nation comes to life, almost like animals coming out of hibernation. What is typically a 30 minute drive from Bristol to Weston-Super-Mare, became a 2.5 hour journey. Madness, everyone all thinking the same thing, get to the nearest beach. Lemmings sprung to mind. The traffic was crazy, and the destination was exactly as expected, mayhem! But hey, sometimes you just have to embrace these things, go with it, and see the funny side of it 🙂

© Fincher Trist and finchertrist@wordpress.com, 2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Fincher Trist and finchertrist@wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Walks with Old Lenses – Episode 1

This is the first of a series of ‘test walks’, the aim being to try out some old FD mount lenses that I have, attached to my Canon 600D DSLR, using an adaptor which I purchased on eBay for about £28. I have had these lenses for a while now, some since I was a teenager, but have been wondering whether to sell some of them on. I thought I should give them a bit more of a chance though, before deciding.

The images on this post are all taken with a Canon 35-105mm FD f3.5 Macro lens. If I remember correctly, I bought it a year or so ago, from a local camera store, and paid no more than about £20 for it. For that kind of price, I thought it was worth the risk.

I’m pleasantly surprised by some of the results for a quick test run. All handheld, and of course full manual mode is compulsory with this approach of mixing old with new. I quite like that though, as it makes me ‘think’ more about what I want to shoot.

I like to think there is a touch of retro to the results. Focusing is quite ‘soft’, but not too much so. Nothing that can’t be enhanced slightly afterwards. All of the above have, I admit, had a bit of post-processing applied, but generally nothing too drastic. All are originally from RAW files.

Looking forward to the next chance I get, to take another lucky old lens for a wander…Episode 2 coming soon! 🙂

© Fincher Trist and finchertrist@wordpress.com, 2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Fincher Trist and finchertrist@wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

West Country Snow

It’s been a pretty uninspiring winter visually so far, here in the West Country of England. The camera has been gathering dust which is frustrating! Today, however, the scenery was transformed by a big dumping of snow which occurred through the night. It took me most of the day to actually get my boots on, and the camera around my neck, so the light wasn’t great & I didn’t feel like going too far, tip-toeing over the already icy pavements! It always amazes me how beautiful the first coating of snow can be, and also how it transforms grown-up adults into small, playful children! Hopefully tomorrow there will be another chance to get some more shots 🙂

© Fincher Trist and finchertrist@wordpress.com, 2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Fincher Trist and finchertrist@wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.