Photographically I find Crowdy reservoir is a struggle. It’s one of those places that you think must offer something, being within sight of Roughtor on Bodmin Moor and in a spacious and otherwise mainly unspoiled setting. It’s not though. Attempts to relay the sparse and bleak views end up looking pretty boring to my eyes.
I generally take a camera on my walks there but end up using the binoculars more to see what species of migratory or local water birds have dropped in to rest and feed up. As one of the only expanses of fresh water for miles around, it forms a food rich and safe from predators drop-in spot for them.
There are a few hawthorns growing on the windswept banks at this elevation but otherwise it is given over to patches of regular fast growing plantation trees and sheep.
I found one viewpoint to make a frame with and then carried on viewing a pair of Great Crested Grebes and flocks of Canada Geese doing their thing out on the water with my binoculars.
I’ve found this often with photographs when I’ve been somewhere scenic and hilly on holiday. It’s been breathtaking there in the flesh but back home the photographs are pretty boring! I think what works very well in your image here is having some foreground interest too. It really frames the landscape in the background. Notes taken for my next trip to somewhere scenic!
LikeLiked by 1 person
That’s the trick I think… and it’s the foreground interest opportunities that are missing up there. What I use often is getting myself down low to emphasise it, which often results in one muddy knee on my trousers.
LikeLike
Ah, a muddy knee is a small sacrifice for our photography. 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
I think its beautiful. Its peaceful!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thank you. I know it looks that way but the wind howls, Canada Geese honk and assorted Gulls cry and caw to each other. At least it’s all the natural world though, no traffic or human hubbub noises.
LikeLiked by 1 person
O yes id rather here the geese honk than smelly cars !!
LikeLiked by 1 person
This photograph came out great! I love how the density of tree and brush captures your vision in the lower left and then it expands out to take in the low rising hill in the upper right with the partially overcast sky. I bet the color copy of this image would be really amazing too, with the gray, blue, green, brown scattered about.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks, for some reason I always find the colour version has too much distraction for my eye to be led around the frame. One day I’ll surprise everyone and put a colour picture up here though!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Nice one. What camera/lens do you use?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thank you. Currently on Sony A 6000 mirrorless camera using an old Minolta 24-105mm via an adaptor which means no AF. I have other lenses from my Minolta days too.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Stunning photo
LikeLiked by 1 person
Very glad that you like it, worth a muddy knee then! 😉
LikeLike
Lol indeed! That visual only makes it better!
LikeLiked by 1 person
I love all your work, Bear, but this one I think I can say is my favorite! I love the texture of the bark on that tree and the way it has become the frame to a view of the water and hills in the distance. I love it!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks Gwen. The gorse bushes and hawthorn trees take a right battering from the winds up here so you can almost see the twisting and turning, desperately trying to find some shelter in their shapes.
LikeLiked by 1 person