In Search of Spring (2025)
new love and new beginnings
Hey everyone! How's it going?
As the hangover of winter rolls on and the aftermath of tragedy lingers like a smothering fog, I found myself at the beginning of Spring falling in love. And the subject of this love is none other than St. Mary’s Lighthouse. Admittedly not the most Springlike of subject matters but its at this time of year, along with Autumn, that vibrant sunrises tend to be most common and I need something timeless and monolithic to stand against the sky.
Truth be told, having returned to my native north east for just over years now at time of writing, the appeal of St. Mary’s Lighthouse has always eluded me so I went along to see what all the fuss was about. And what better way to show what an idiot you’ve been by having a very special sunset draped behind it.
I’ve since returned here a number of times now - for sunrises, storms, aurora and long exposure shots as well as exploring the textures of the surrounding landscape - and no doubt I will return here many times in the future.
Of course, Spring to me as a landscape photographer is the rebirth of woodland and the wildflowers that herald it. Blooming in the last pinch of wintersun before the forest canopy takes leaf and blocks out the light, I head out to haunts old and new in search of that one composition that conveys the delicate and temporal touch of nature.
I don’t know why, but I keep heading back to Morpeth’s Bluebell Wood in the vain hope that I’ll find a bluebell or ramson shot that’ll change the world. I won’t of course - there simply isn’t the landscape here for it - but its nice and peaceful just to wander around and its a good test of the eye to find even just that one shot amongst all the detritus. This year, it appears the forester was hard at work making things worse as several, presumably storm damaged, trees had been cut down and dumped in a big pile of logs.
Ramsons are so plentiful around here that I can't help but feel I should be doing more with them each year and when I think of ramson compositions, I'm always mindful of Chris Frost's lovely 'Woolland Woods' image. What I wouldn't give for a pristine misty woodland like that!! My aim though is always drawn towards creating an expansive landscape filled with white flowers when maybe I should be turning my attention to something more macro that focuses on the ramson petal's delicate, fragile nature.
To the rescue though came Durham’s Hollingside Wood with its near-pristine meadows of bluebells seemingly compartmentalised by hillside ridges. And this year it was sunny!! Oh my days, what a sight!! The latitude of sunrise and the easternmost ridge of the hillside prevents any low level light skimming across the forest floor, but it does mean the light dapples softly and playfully once the sun rises high enough over the ridge.
I made a beeline for my favourite meadow where a lot of time can be spent exploring the miriad of different vantage points and compositions. But it was completely off the beaten path where I found my best bluebell image to date. Atop the ridge and with some very deft and delicate footwork to navigate through the plantation, I came across this image of sunlight crafted onto the forest floor to light a seemingly zigzag path through the trees into the valley below. The positioning of the trees - for me anyway - was just perfect.
Serendipity struck for my next favourite image of the season as the farmland surrounding Cornhill in Northumberland was this year awash with a vibrant carpet of oilseed rape. This is a viewpoint I check out whenever I drive past it, waiting for and imagining the right moment and conditions with which to grab what is a really lovely shot of the foothills leading to the eastern limb of the Cheviots.
A lot of Northumberland farmland this Spring was golden but not to this extent where they rolled away to the horizon. If I was being picky, I would have preferred a more cloudless sky but on this occassion the clouds allowed for pockets of shade to drift across the land, exposing the contours and layout of the meadows.
And lastly, no Springtime photography is complete without a visit to Bolam Lake where last year's fluffy ducklings became this year's fluffy goslings. The light wasn't as ideal on this occassion but I was very grateful to both parents for introducing me to their kids even if they did spy me from afar and were just hoping I'd toss them some bread. Sadly, the tree in this image is now no more having eventually succumbed to one too many storms.
Spring also saw me pushing another aspect of my photography that I’ve long been meaning to move into and that’s content creation. To begin with, it's just short form videos exploring various photography locations around Northumberland and what there is to look out for from a landscape photography perspective. The feedback I’ve received from my social media followers has been overwhelmingly positive and therefore, as life now slowly calms down again and I have the means and freedom to pursue my passion, I look forward to the future with excitement.
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