log_hauler

Envious- Sea Bream are an underated eating fish IMHO.

Great photo. One thing I didn't mention that I often do with fungus shots, is tidy up the foreground and background a little before taking the picture. By this I mean you should pull away any grass stems, twigs, leaves and other debris before pressing the shutter. In the exictiment of finding a nice group of fungus it's easy to miss some intruding twig or background object that might spoil the picture when viewed later. In the case of your picture I think I would have pulled aside the grass stalks and some of the twigs in shot. So, before taking any shot, take a step back and look for things which might later look intrusive. Taking this a step further- you could add some fallen leaves or someting to the scene. Study some of my photos and you see some autumnal leaves around the fugus. They didn't fall there- I put them there! Fakery I know!

All my photos (and probably most other photographers) undergo some form of tweaking before posted on the web. The most obvious thing is an image resize (to bring a 4000x3000 pixel image to a web friendly 800x600 size). Always after re-sizing an image you should apply the 'unsharp mask' filter. This makes the photo a little sharper. I like my images colourful so I sometimes boost the colour saturation a bit- but never to the point where it looks unatural. Flash photography can be a bit hit & miss. My DSLR is always spot-on. But the Canon compact usualy needs turning down (there are three flash level settings) in order to avoid over exposure. Obviously if you're right up close to the fungi you don't want to hit it with full power. Experimentation is the key- the good thing about fungus is that it doesn't move very much! So you you should have plenty of time to compose the shot and try a few different settings. Once you mastered fungus try photographing something that flies off the instant you come near it - if you want to increase the difficulty levels!! Wild birds & dragonflies are hardest.....

Thanks for the positive comments. Mostly taken on Aperture Priority setting at F8 and lowest ISO (film speed) setting. This will usualy mean you need a tripod and/or flash- geting the lighing right is everything in fungus photos. It's also nice to get an unusual or low angle. I had to lie on the forest floor for some of the shots! I've just noticed by the file name that the last photo (fly agric) was taken on a DSLR (Fuji S5 Pro) so I'd expect the quality to good on that one.

Thanks- mostly taken with a Canon G9 I think. Here's another one I like

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Some shots I took in local woodland last year. Enjoy!

Is this make any good? Advertised as a 'professional' brand but I'd never heard of them till recently. 80.7cc 28" Professional Chainsaw | Northern Tool + Equipment Would you be better sticking to the well known brands at this kind of price level? Stuff like spares, servicing and re-sale value concern me.

I agree hawthorns are a great burning wood. Got some nice 10" dia logs from a recent job sitting in my pile. My only gripe with the stuff is when cutting off the brash the thorns can be a menace. Not quite as bloody vicious as blackthorn though......

Everything you ever wanted to know about axes & felling and a lot more stuff besides can be found in this book Amazon.com: The Ax Book: The Lore and Science of the Woodcutter (9780911469165): Dudley Cook, S. Lawrence Whipple: Books[/ur A very interesting read.

3.0L TD Hilux every time. Had mine 11 years, done 220,000 miles (including many offroad miles) and I still haven't managed to it kill it yet!

Willow's okay if dry- burns quick but if it's free- what the hell! You'll often find it's left behind when felled but we've burned plenty of trailer loads without issues.

Keeping any logs inside your house presents a risk of infection. I'd always advise anyone to keep only a day or two's worth of wood inside- keep the rest in a dry woodstore outside. 'Display logs' seem to be a popular thing these days (I have a nice looking stack of perfect round logs by my fire) but they do need to be treated in some way first. Personnaly I 'treat' my 'display logs' by placing them directly on top of a woodburner for 30 mins or so until they are too hot to pick up (mind they don't catch fire though). This kills any creepy crawlies living in the log so they can left inside safely. Even then you should keep an eye on them for insect activity. I grade my personal wood stores in three ways: 1) Newly cut green wood gets left outside, partially covered to dry out side naturaly. 2) I have other stacks of dry but sound logs which are ready to burn but could kept long term if needed. 3) My third pile is the 'imediate burn' pile- all the wormy, fungusy cuts end up here- my aim is to burn these logs first and get rid quickly. They never spend more than a couple of hours inside my house.