Skeletal I, II, III

It's always good to visit somewhere new, and even better to find somewhere fascinating that also appears to be relatively under-photographed. 

Such a place is Alkborough Flats, a vast area of reed beds and marshland, bounded by the rise of the Lincolnshire Wolds and the River Trent as it reaches the Humber Estuary. This is very much a birder's paradise, and even on this, my first visit in early February, the bird life really was terrific. 

What caught my eye photographically were the skeletal remains of long-dead trees, seemingly being slowly consumed by the reed beds. I deliberately went late in the day, not so much in the hope of a spectacular sunset (that did arrive, as I was driving back home), but rather for a lower and softer light than would have been the case had I started my walk earlier. With a little cloud in the sky providing a shield from any direct sunlight, I was able to focus on the silhouette of a single tree, reflected in a shallow, marsh pool in front of me.

As the cloud and light conditions gradually changed, I tried a variety of camera settings, and that's what you see here, together with mono and colour processing. 

I asked my family to say which they preferred and the voting was split, with each version having at least one supporter. So, I thought it was worth showing them together, so that you can deicide for yourself.

Camera settings: Nikon D850, Nikon 24mm tilt shift lens at F8, ISO 64 with exposure times of 101 seconds (Skeletal II - middle image), 1/40 and 1/50.


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