One of my favourite places to visit within an hour of my home is National Trust Stourhead. I have a National Trust membership, so there’s no additional cost for me to enter – though this October I voluntarily paid extra to get in early. The NT offer an ‘early bird admission’ geared towards photographers who want to capture the delights of golden hour as well as capturing the gardens before the masses arrive. It’s only £10 and means you can enter at 7:30AM, so a good deal.
Stourhead is a fantastic place to visit if you’ve never been before; it’s actually a fantastic place to visit if you have been before. I’ve been countless times, and every time I visit I spot something new. The beauty of photography is that it often encourages you to stop and see things from new perspectives.
For this trip, I knew that I’d be there a good few hours and that I wanted to take my tripod – I wanted to experiment with some long exposures and first thing it would be dark. I knew that I’d also be taking my Nikon Z8 for the extra megapixels. The only issue I had was the lenses I had; I knew that the 24-70 f4 would offer the most versatility but I wanted something with greater reach. So I sold the 24-70 and setup an eBay alert – I was after the 24-120 f4. A lens I foolishly sold before, it’s absolutely superb for travel and landscape work. It’s razor sharp and perfect at all focal lengths. The only downside is the f4 maximum aperture of course, but f4 is absolutely fine for 90% of the stuff I do. If you’re in the Nikon ecosystem and looking for a great all-round lens, I throughly recommend the 24-120 as something to look into.
I used the PhotoPills app to ascertain where the sun would be coming from in conjunction with the OS Maps app, and planned where I’d spend the start of the day. I wanted to shoot the Temple from across the lake whilst capturing the island in the foreground. On the day, I setup my tripod and waited for the light to appear.
Composition 1
This composition worked well in the end, though the first ones I took were far too dark and the temple just blended into the background. Once the sun peaked over the horizon, it was just right.
I also zoomed out a bit for another composition, because I wanted to create a panoramic crop of the scene. The result was quite pleasant:
Social media has clearly infected me, because I nearly always try and take a vertical shot too. On instagram, landscape shots don’t come across nearly as well. The 24-120 lens came in clutch for this, as I zoomed in on the temple and removed some of the distractions from the frame:
I did take one more panoramic shot of the scene, though far more zoomed out:
I made the most of the 24-120 and zoomed in all the way for some close-ups of the temple. The sharpness of the lens is clear to see in these images:
Overall I was really happy with this spot; I had an idea in my head of the shots I wanted, and I think that I did them justice. I was worried I might want something wider than 24mm, but that wasn’t the case.
Other Compositions
Whilst waiting for the sun to appear, I met up with some other photographers from my local group who I then walked around the lake with. I had a few shots I knew I wanted to take, such as a closer shot of the temple, but didn’t know how lucky I’d be. The rain came out and looked set to turn the day into a wash out, but the sun fought a valiant counterattack and created the best conditions possible for the next two shots:
I have taken this shot many times before: the temple on the left, the cottage on the right, with the lake in the foreground – it’s a great shot. But today the photography gods were on our side: a rainbow appeared in the background to finish things off. This shot deserved a more vibrant edit, and I think it looks great.
Other shots from the day are rather mundane compared to these two, but I’ll put together a gallery at the end of my favourites from the day. The only other shot I always take is of the smaller temple from the opposing hillside. It’s a beautiful view, and in autumn the colours are sublime. I have two different edits of the same view; one is vibrant and colourful, the other leans more into the browns for a vintage look…
The Long Exposure
As mentioned previously, I also took my tripod as I wanted to take a b&w long-exposure from the bridge end of the lake. I did this once the park had opened to the public, and the benefit of a 2 minute exposure was it managed to make the crowds disappear! One woman even walked in front of the camera as it was capturing it, but during a 2 minute long exposure it didn’t really matter.
The result was ok – the light wasn’t great, but the water went nice and smooth:
Best of the Rest
The trip was a definite success, and I came away with some photos I’m really proud of. The Z8 is a brilliant camera, and its weakest component is definitely the guy behind it pressing the buttons. The new 24-120 was also a great purchase; it’s got a reputation for being a superb travel & landscape lens, and from my experience it’s well deserved.
Here’s the best of the other shots from the day…
