finishing off with a brief visit to Lumley Castle in the neighbouring town of Chester-Le-Street. Well, the second Autumn Stroll of 2010 again found me in Durham City but this time it was around dusk that I was taking my photographs, from a spectacular viewpoint near the railway station. The station itself is perched quite high on a hill near Wharton Park, and as you can imagine, it offers some of the best views you'll come across in Durham City centre.I planned this one a few days in advance but the weather conditions had me cancelling my visit at least three times before I actually made the trip along the A690 to Durham, Land Of The Prince Bishops. No overcast skies this time, plus there was little or no wind, even up a height. I arrived at my location a couple of minutes after the sun had set over to my right so it was now a simple case of waiting a few minutes until the sky darkened and the illuminated cathedral became more prominent.
It wasn't long before I was taking my first shots. The conditions by this time were as near perfect as I could have hoped for, so I wasn't going to waste my opportunity. Just in front of me stood a tree with it's golden-brown leaves - an ideal subject for some Autumn foreground interest. Even at low-light, the colours on the leaves were clearly visible and I knew a long exposure would capture them quite well so that was my intention as paired the shutter speed with a mid-range aperture. A very mild breeze ensured very little movement in the tree's so I expected very little blur in my finished shot. It was a good one - the leaves weren't pin sharp, but no more than you'd expect from a two-second shutter speed.
The second shot, shown here, saw me pulling in the Cathedral with manual zoom. Different settings, but once again I was running with selective spot focusing, 
magnified through 'Live View' and set precisely on the furthest point of Durham Cathedral. The Canon 7D has an excellent auto-focus facility and after zooming in the finished shot it was apparent just how pin-sharp the shot was, right across the frame.
magnified through 'Live View' and set precisely on the furthest point of Durham Cathedral. The Canon 7D has an excellent auto-focus facility and after zooming in the finished shot it was apparent just how pin-sharp the shot was, right across the frame.Before packing my gear away and heading back to the car I panned the 7D across the rooftops of Durham City Centre, grabbing a series of staggered shots (portrait format) to use later in a panoramic stitch. Retaining identical exposures, I ran off six frames that overlapped approximately 30% which would make stitching a lot easier in post-processing as the details would be identified easier by the software - an important element in photomerge. Stay tuned as I will be uploading the resulting panoramic image in the next week or so.
In the meantime, I hope you like these two efforts, taken during 'Another Autumn Stroll'
Until the next time...see ya.
Ashley Corr
