A journey begins with a first step

I have always been interested in photography, intrigued by the melding of technical knowledge and creativity the artform represents, but I had never acted upon that interest until my partner planned a trip to the Isle of Skye for us and her friends. Knowing this would entail a lot of walking through incredible natural beauty, a welcome change given how 2020 was, I decided now was as good a time to explore my interest and so I bought a Canon EOS 250D with a 18-55mm IS lens in preparation.

Waterfall, Fairy Pools

I enjoy the composition of this shot, the two cliffs framing the waterfall with the mountain behind crowning it. My editing could be better, but overall I’m happy with this.

My intent was to get to know my camera and so I shot exclusively in manual, focused on the technical settings usually at the detriment of composition. I had read up on the trinity of shutter speed, aperture, and ISO and had a grasp of how they interacted with each other, but putting that into practice whilst controlling for exposure with the light meter was really throwing myself in at the deepend. Despite this, I think I captured some decent images.

This was also my first foray into editing, and so I used these photographs as a way to get familiar with the tools available in Lightroom which I had, naturally, never used before. Some of the results are less than satisfactory, but as a first effort I am satisfied that I know more now than I did when I started.

Nierst Point

This turned out quite well, not only from a technical perspective of capturing the shot and the composition, but also how it looks post-edit.

This is the baseline by which I am going to judge my progress as I continue learning, from the technical aspect of how to capture a shot to composition to editing in post-production.

White House, Portree

A white house in Portree, with a cloud covered mountain in the background. One of the first photographs I took.

Moored Boat, Portree

A small boat, moored in Portree.

Boats, Portree

I thought the way the boats created a line pointing out into the bay was interesting, although I’m not sure I captured it well.

Small Waterfall, Fairy Pools

The overcast but bright sky gave me some challenges shooting this, and I’m not sure the edit works particularly well. It looks a little sepia toned, like a bad Instagram filter.

Nierst Lighthouse

I think this might be one of the better photographs I took on this trip. I like the composition and the edit.

Sheep, Nierst Point

I was attempting to use a wider aperture to capture this grazing sheep in a shallow depth of field, with limited success. I do still like way this came out though.

Nierst Lighthouse

Captured from the top of a nearby hill at the base of Nierst Point, I think this may be the best photograph I captured over the course of the weekend.

Quaraing

I like the composition of this shot, but I think I could have done a better job in the edit.

Old Man of Storr

This was captured at the end of the day, stopping the car when we drove past unintentionally. The climb up to get this angle was tough but the shot came out well. The edit could be improved though, the yellow tints to the clouds are a little overdone.