Ice, snow, alpenglow and aspect ratio

The forecast was for light winds, temperature inversion, excellent visibility, hill fog lifting and clear skies, with snow still lying on the ground at high levels. I didn't fancy dawn, but a leisurely afternoon/evening wander somewhere in Fforest Fawr seemed promising. The forecast was that good, the wife was motivated to go for a walk too, I did suggest she take her camera gear as sunset/dusk could be good, she just wanted to stretch her legs.

View to the Black Mountain escarpment and upper reaches of the Tawe valley

Parking up in the Upper Tawe valley, it became evident that it was a 'sensational' winters day for walking on the hills, plenty of snow still lying, the sun shining and no wind.  In my eyes, there's a huge difference between sensational weather and conditions for hill walking and landscape photography. Powder blue sky, harsh sunlight and blue shadows are probably the most uninspiring combination for making images, however for hill walking these are probably as good as it gets and a scan around suggested plenty of walkers on the popular summits. Whilst getting 'suited n booted' the options were considered;  a trip up to Fan Hir/Fan Foel might involve some trail breaking on the ground under the escarpment and considering this was an excursion for views, only one of the party would be trail breaking and trail breaking for someone to follow with shorter legs, oh, and that other member of the party didn't like long descents under head torch. I suggested the summit of Cefn Cul. A hill with views, but rarely visited, so other hill walkers footprints wouldn't be an irritation or issue in any composition and the clincher, was sunshine all the way up Cefn Cul, whereas most of the walk in to the Black Mountain would be in shade. To the north and east, high pressure and a temperature inversion revealed itself with a band of haze obscuring the most distant views 20km+, but this band of haze could hold some potential, come sunset/dusk.

Moorland topography and 'texture'

It was an enjoyable walk up across the moorland, the ground frozen, only a few inches of virgin snow, a few spots with maybe a foot in depth and the warmth of the sun, meant layers were soon discarded down to base layers, fabulous. There was no urgency, so plenty of stopping and wandering around to soak up the views over the Tawe and Crai valleys, a look through the binoculars revealed just how many people were out and about on other hills, we came across a solitary set of footprints partially infilled with snow, testament to this hills solitude.

Fan Gyhirych

The prospect for dusk seemed good too, as a distinct yellowy/cyan band in the sky on the horizon became more prominent. A slight concern, from a photography perspective, was high cloud to the west. There's a couple of low knolls on Cefn Cul that vie for the highest points, both give views and it was great to just sit there in the sunshine and enjoy the moment.

Fan Gyhirych II

Instead of staying on the summit area for dusk, I thought there was an area lower down with potentially more interest and along the way the moorland grasses offered some compositional interest at dusk. It was also apparent the Fan Gyhirych would be prominent in most compositions and some high cloud might afford some interest in the sky if it caught the dusk colour too.

The wide view 

As the sun set the cyan/yellow band on the eastern horizon started to turn red and the last light of the setting sun catching the summits also was a crimson red, this lighting phenomena is called alpenglow. This dusk ticked almost all the boxes for perfect alpenglow, with reds turning to magenta as the sun sank lower below the western horizon and I did have a small pang of regret for not being on Fan Foel on the Black Mountain.

Ice, snow and alpenglow

The wife was just enjoying the spectacle of  watching dusk unfold, blue shadows turn magenta and the sky colour intensify slowing going through the warm spectrum. My Xmas present of a Down Jacket paid dividends, as there was no moaning about the, by now, fast dropping temperature over the snow fields and increasing windchill from a breeze. What the photos don't convey was the absence of noise, it was complete silence, no roar of engines or any bird calls and the hill summits had emptied of walkers. It was as if everything was stood still entranced, watching the magic of dusk unfold.

3:2 view composed for 5:2

On a more mundane note, above and below are a 3:2 image composed for a 5:2 image crop, I personally think there are many views in the uplands that suit this format and it is something the 5DS R will be evaluated on. A single image is far preferable for a panoramic crop, than stitching a number of images as the colour changes/light intensity can be fairly dynamic at dusk and dawn. In high winds making a series of images for panoramic stitching, becomes a lottery, ditto with squall/storm lighting too.

5:2 aspect ratio crop

The walk off was an uneventful  the colour fading from the sky and the car reached just as head torches were needed, it was one of the better excursions with a magical dusk in the hills.

Dusk/Twilight colour

Image integrity and digital manipulation

The announcement of World Press Photo awards, followed swiftly by Adobe's announcement of the 25th Anniversary of Photoshop highlights the contrast in the acceptance of image manipulation and image integrity.

The World Press photo awards, preempted any speculation of award winning images being manipulated, by stating that in the penultimate round of judging, RAW files were asked to be submitted to compare against the Jpeg images entered. It transpired that 20% of images were disqualified for failing to meet the basic ethics of journalism. The integrity of the images were compromised. The Sports Stories category was notable, as they were unable to award a 3rd prize due to everyone else having been disqualified. It was reported that every category had images disqualified. The New York Times published an article on the World Press Photo awards, with insights from the awards Judges and comments on the extent of manipulation NYT article

Excessive crop to image top and base to achieve a composed aspect ratio, is it image manipulation?

In 2014, World Press Photo produced a Research Project report by Dr David Campbell titled 'The Integrity of the Image' - Current practices and accepted standards relating to the manipulation of still images in photojournalism and documentary photography'. The report provides guidance to News and Documentary photographers, on what is and isn't ethical in manipulating a digital image. Integrity of the Image report.pdf   It makes for compelling reading and some salient points from the reports Executive Summary are

'4 Manipulation is seen as involving material changes to an image through the addition or subtraction of content, and is always deemed unacceptable for news and documentary pictures. Manipulation is therefore a specific form of processing, where the material change to the image through the addition or subtraction of element(s) is designed to deceive or mislead the reader/viewer.
5 Adjustments (such as limited cropping, dodging and burning, toning, color adjustment, conversion to grayscale) to photographs are accepted. These are usually described in terms of “minor” changes being permitted while “excessive” changes are prohibited.
6 What constitutes a “minor” versus an “excessive” change is necessarily interpretative. Respondents say that judgment is on a case-by-case basis, and suggest that there will never be a clear line demarcating these concepts.
7 We are now in an era of computational photography, where most cameras capture data rather than images. This means that there is no original image, and that all images require processing to exist.
8 A further consequence of this is that the darkroom analogy is no longer a useful guide for debates on manipulation. This is the case firstly because all manipulations are possible in a darkroom, and secondly because digital photography has changed image-making more than is usually appreciated.'

The insights into Digital Forensic technology hinted at the sophistication of fraudulent images, if not the scale. The scale was hinted at with the statement on page 5 'increased levels of fraud in scientific research images was one area of particular concern'. A Google search, suggested the Scientific Community are all to aware of image manipulation and a succinct article published in May 2007 in the Journal of Biolological Chemistry titled 'A JBC Editorial Photoshop: Friend or Fraud?' highlighted the issue, concluding with the words 'The integrity of science relies on a very high standard of conduct upon which the public trust and the progress of science depend'.

Foot prints in Snow - ethical to clone out?

By coincidence, Adobe then announced Photoshops 25th birthday link   Photoshop is also used across a wide spectrum of users as the software of choice to creatively work with digital images and it is the Industry Standard for the graphic arts.  Adobe also produces Photoshop Elements and Lightroom software tailored specifically for photographers, with a much reduced feature set of 'creative' features. Surveys suggest that Photoshop is still the preferred software for photographers, by some margin too, if the survey results are to believed. 

After 25 years Photoshop is a mature and complex software, requiring a significant investment in time to understand the tools and capabilities. To facilitate the learning process are an industry of authors, trainers and workshop providers to educate and enlighten users on the software, most often for a fee. There is also an extensive online presence of websites, forums and blogs dedicated to photoshop enthusiasts.

It's fair to suggest that in contrast with the early years, Adobe now actively markets the photoshop software with an emphasis on its 'creative manipulation' abilities, as on the same blog are posts titled :

Celebrating Manipulated Photography with the Photoshop ‘Faking It’ Contest link

Show Off Your Image Manipulation Skills in the Photoshop ‘Faking It’ Contest link

Faking It: Manipulated Photography Before Photoshop link

Magenta/Reds/Yellows heavily desaturated - acceptable image manipulation?

So, what has this got to do with Landscape Photography? Well, if you declare yourself a fine art landscape photographer or a contemporary landscape photographer, there's no real standards or ethics for landscape image integrity. Pretty much anything goes in manipulating your images to match your artistic statement and creative vision of what YOU saw, but the unemotional camera failed so miserably to capture. Yup, clone away anything that creates tension, enhance a sky, or just cut, paste and blend in another sky. In fact pretty much anything can be added i.e sun beams, sunlit foreground, added drama in the sky, an oversized moon, some extra colour or saturation for the emotional impact ...  There are layer masks for saturation, luminosity, sharpening and colour space channels to be blended. There are blending modes, opacity sliders, different images exposed for shadows, mid tones and high lights can be blended, the creative manipulation potential is endless.  It would be surprising to discover a fine art landscape photograph(s) that hasn't been manipulated.

A few years back many landscape photographers would have a statement somewhere on their website declaring that they didn't digitally manipulate their images, you have to search long and hard to find a similar statement today.  More truthful, were the claims made that their digital processing never exceeded what could be achieved in the traditional 'darkroom' with film, which as it turns out was quite a lot. Todays landscape photographer statement is some vanilla flavoured fluff, with the words; joy; privilege; natures beauty; wilderness untouched by man; photographs are the culmination of years of experience; creative vision; blah, blah, blah ... Any reference to digital image manipulation is avoided or digital 'processing' (cough) of an image is a necessary evil, to accurately reflect the memory of the photographer of the scene captured. Of course.

If anyone raises the integrity of digital landscape photographs and photoshop, the usual replies will be
- Everyone else does it.
- Worse was done back in the days of film.
- Ansel Adams manipulated his images.
- It is the digital 'darkroom'.
- It is my artistic vision.
- Photography is a manipulation of reality.
- The genie is out of the bottle and you can't put it back in.
- The photography world has moved on.
- No ones telling me what a real photograph is.
- I only clone out man made objects.
- It improves the composition.

Which suggests that what defines the integrity of an image, rests heavily with the photographer and their own ethics.

For myself, starting out in landscape photography, I invested heavily into photoshop as that was the recommended software for processing digital images. I was at first beguiled by and then with time, all too aware of the tools and commands to change the essential truth of an image in content, lighting and colour. To become familiar with photoshop you need to use it on a fairly regular basis to remain up to speed, I discovered if I hadn't used it for few weeks, then I had to spend time re-familiarising myself with short cut keys, tools, commands etc Then thankfully in addition to the Camera manufacturers RAW image developing software, two  additional products were released, Apple's Aperture and Adobe's Lightroom.  For me, this was a timely development, as I had already come to the realisation that improvements in my composition, awareness of lighting, weather conditions, experience in the field and better camera gear, were rewarding me with better photographs, that required far less time spent in photoshop. Come to think of it, I can't ever recall a Photoshop acolyte suggesting that the radical idea of improving your photography was a better investment of resources for more rewarding images. Apple's Aperture was first on the market, I tried it, found it intuitive, liked it and have used Aperture ever since, I only take single shot images, all edits are at the RAW level and it also has a direct printing capability. My last Photoshop edition was CS2 and from an upgrade feature perspective, it at least underlined the maturity of the software for photography image processing.

What sealed the deal, were comparisons of images processed in Aperture compared with Photoshop both for print and computer display. A set of images were processed and printed and then stored away. A couple of months later the images and prints were again viewed and with one exception, I preferred the less 'over processed' look of Aperture. The one exception, was a less than optimally crafted photograph, that photoshop produced a better image.

Ethical to clone or crop out car headlights?

Aside from the early days where images were manipulated to 'see what was possible', my philosophy has always been to convey a truthful representation of the scene, there's less personal angst with morals.  Certainly with the switch to Aperture my processing has been in pretty much in accord with the World Press Photo guidance for digital processing of image files - if needed lens corrections; clone nothing out or in, except for dust and sensor blemishes. I generally agree with only minimal cropping of the image, my current view finder has 97% coverage and that 3% sometimes needs cropping. However I will also crop to an aspect ratio that I have deliberately composed for in the field, this doesn't apply too often with a 21MP sensor, but I definitely envisage more panoramic aspect ratios with much higher MP sensors. Tone, saturation and contrast are from minimal dodging/burning/curves/levels in a RAW developer, but I am conscious that my current camera manual WB and AWB have issues with dawn/dusk/twilight colours as they lack my eye's chromatic adaption.
So, if in the unlikely event of Landscape Photography ever having guidelines and standards akin to those set out by World Press photo,  I'd like to think my images would meet the criteria of image integrity.

Plan A, oh yes indeedee

The UK was gripped for a few days in an 'Arctic blast', the Mountain Weather forecast noted snow falling, less endearing were the words upland gales and wind chill in minus double digits. I thought it best to wait for the wind to ease and finally initiate Plan A.

A 20 second exposure

When the forecast finally predicted that winds would drop, Plan A was finally rolled out. Parking up at Blaen-y-glyn car park and there was a lot of cloud overhead, maybe it would break up?  Ice was conspicuous, but there wasn't as much snow as I'd been expecting and not full on winter conditions. I appreciate the effectiveness of crampons, but the convenience of Kahtoola micro spikes generally wins out for the Brecon Beacons terrain, the crampons were left in the boot. The path up had some interest in parts with sheet ice, consolidated snow and thigh deep drifts, the going was good though, courtesy of walkers who had trail breaked on the preceding days. Up on the plateau a few things became apparent.

Caerfanell valley

Extensive hill fog covered the Brecon Fans and higher ground, which was disappointing, as these summits were to form the main composition viewpoint. The northerly wind was also a lot stronger and buffeting, this was bad for both windchill and tripod stability. Conversely, the northerly wind was a good thing too, as cold, clear, moving air offers excellent visibility and clarity, not something that can be typed too often, as the UK has a maritime climate with moisture laden air. The cloud overhead was extensive, but the south easterly horizon appeared clear. There seemed little point in heading off to be enveloped in fog and plenty of time to spare before dawn to revise my plan and find a viewpoint. The chances of side lighting were minimal, a pity as the landslide under Cwar y Gigfran might have had some potential,  a view of the sunrise down the Caerfanel valley offered the best hope, with the misfit streams in a glaciated valley.  I dumped the rucksack and spent 30 mins scouting the edge of Craig y Fan Ddu for i) a sheltered viewpoint and ii)  I needed to keep moving to keep warm.

I was fortunate enough to get a red sky and horizon for dawn and sunrise, less fortunate was the wind strength and buffeting, which made most long exposures soft and forced a move to the sheltered ground around Blaen Caerfanell.

With sunrise over,  I decided to cut across Gwaun Cerrig Llwydion to the Craig Cwareli overlooking Cwm Oergwm, the aptly named cold valley. Gwaun Cerrig Llwydion is a plateau. in part covered with an eroded and eroding surface of blanket peat and as the ground was frozen solid, the joys of shin deep bog were negated. In any case the snow mantled peat hags would offer some interest, whilst waiting for improved weather to hopefully manifest itself.  Wind ablation of snow created this mildly unnerving scene amongst the peat hags, anthropogenic snow heads with grass for hair.

Snow heads

The mechanism(s) for blanket peat erosion, forming peat hags, hasn't convincingly been proven, but  whatever the cause, the peat hags on Gwaun Cerrig Llwydion are impressive in their size, number and extent. I also managed to disturb some the resident Red Grouse on my wander.

Brief sunlight

Before everything had froze solid, water draining from the blanket peat had formed icicles and the weight of ice hanging had visibly stretched and pulled down on the vegetated layer covering the peat. Once this protective vegetation mat is removed, the underlying peat is exposed to the elements and weathered away. From my limited observations, icicles indicating water draining from blanket peat usually appeared in the 'head wall' of an erosion embayment, cutting back into the blanket peat.

Icicles

With the sun showing signs of breaking through the cloud and Cribyn's summit clearing of hill fog, it was heads up and time to explore the views.

 The cloud masking Cadair Arthur refused to play ball and clear, sigh.

Cwm Oergwm

Craig Cwareli was fully exposed to the wind, the windchill was pretty severe and I was thankful to Canon engineers for designing a camera that I could operate wearing gloves.  At the head of Cwm Oergwm there's a suite of landforms at the foot of the escarpment that have proved elusive for me to photograph, I was hopeful that snow cover and a BW conversion would reveal their nature, with the benefit of hindsight, I probably needed a better point of view, perspective and more snow. Some of the landform features represent cirque glaciation moraines, other landforms are more contentious and have provoked some discussion on their nature.

100mm BW

After 6 hours on the hill, the ominous darkening of the sky and lowering of cloud base, signalled an end to day and time to head home. Plan A had at last been rolled out, but I'd have liked the hills to have cleared of fog/cloud for dawn and try again to get the views I'd last seen in 2013. On the other hand I'd probably have missed the views over the Caerfanell valley.

2013 Dawn

2013 Sunrise

Finally an upgrade path from the 1Ds3

Canon released the 1Ds3 in the UK at the end of 2007, I read the user reviews and realised how useful Live View was in assisting manual focus. The frustrations of trying to manually focus with a 5D made it a no brainer, I bought a 1Ds3 and haven't looked back.

When Canon announced the 1DX as the unification of the 1D series, I was less than impressed. The specs suggested this wasn't a camera optimised for Landscape photography. There was no upgrade path within the EOS system, even for my limited needs. Still, one key attribute of Landscape photography is patience and endurance.

Nikon, released the FF D800 and D800E DSLR's, after the initial hype, all went strangely quiet. Except for the discussion of the Live View implementation and image colours.

Leica, announced an M240 digital RF, with an R lens adapter, live view and an external EVF. Sadly, Leica's idea of Live view implementation didn't match mine and the tripod haptics were interesting. A pre order deposit placed, was cancelled after a hands on demo revealed the flawed nature of the camera for Landscape photography with a tripod. 

Sony, announced and then released a FF mirrorless interchangeable lens camera. I suspected the camera with a mount compatible with it's E mount lenses was primarily aimed at its Nex user base. The short registration distance of the camera, meant that with a 3rd party smart adapter FF Canon EF lenses could be used, in fact pretty much any FF lens, ever made, could be used via an adapter. The pre release hype was incredible, febrile even. However, as with so many Sony photography products, with the camera actually in the hands of photographers, the hype died down. It was soon apparent that there were some issues with the design and build quality viz. the materials of construction, the insubstantial mount design caused a mounted lens to wobble and leak light, there were ZERO weather sealing gaskets, excessive shutter vibration, battery life was poor, an issue with the sensor cover glass thickness, EVF, complaints of lossy RAW files, image posterisation, the list went on and on and on. Even the 3rd party EF to FE 'smart' adapter had some issues too, with reflections and tolerances. You can't believe all you read online, so I made a trip to check out the Sony camera. Even with low expectations, it still underwhelmed massively.

Canon, had released FF 5D3 and 6D DSLR's and the specs were biased to High ISO, FPS, Auto Focus, Video etc so these weren't an upgrade path either. 

Nikon, then released a D810 and soon after used D800's could be picked up for a very reasonable outlay. I could switch, if the ageing 1Ds3 expired, the Canon lenses hold their value well, and for a reasonable outlay join the Nikon system. Buying a used 1Ds3 seemed more practical and realistic.

Then, on the 6th of February, Canon Europe announced to those gathered in London the EOS 5DS R 50MP DSLR.

The online forums filled with speculation and no little negativity. The underwhelming High ISO,  Low FPS and frankly lame Video implementation, meant some sports, events, street, wedding and wildlife photographers were not impressed. Happily, Canon had not addressed this market segment, oh no. At long last there was an upgrade path from the 1Ds3.

A quick check on the image pixels for 3:1, 5:2 and 2:1 aspect ratio crops from a 50MP FF Sensor, hmmm interesting.  I've found stitching multiple images of landscapes in storm/squall lighting and especially around dusk and twilight when colour temperatures can change rapidly, to be an exercise in abject frustration and gave it up a long time ago. A FF 50MP opens the door for single shot panoramic images. There are other and more important factors to just MP's though.

The weather sealing was stated for "extreme weather". A more robust body chasis for tripod mounting than previous 5D series. Crippled video features - oh yes, a camera optimised for Low ISO stills - deep joy, colour filter array optimised for colour ALA 1Ds3 - the clincher. Improved rear display resolution screen and live view over the 1Ds3. Optical view finder ...

There were some minor gripes - 5D body and smaller battery, no OVF shutter blind and some other things that I can't recollect.

It was all too much, the silence from Sports and Wildlife photographers and whining from Wedding and Events photographers was all the confirmation I needed. So, I pre ordered with Clifton Cameras and have now settled down to wait for buyers remorse to kick in.

Plan C

The next outing was after there been a thaw, followed by more snowfall in freezing temperatures, an earlier rise too, to take into account the weather warnings for Ice and extended journey times, Grand Plan A for a high summit view on the Brecon Fans was firmly in my sights and with no travel delays, everything was good. Turning off the well gritted A40 onto a minor road and the ungritted road conditions weren't the best. Parking up the car and exiting it, 3 things were apparent - everywhere was covered in ice, even low down the wind was decidedly breezy and the summits seemed covered in cloud, not good. Now I've stood around in windchill, waiting for summits to clear and suffered for my optimism, so Plan A was abandoned.

Plan B, initiated carry on west and take the A road from Defynnog to Craig y Nos  for a location on the south side. Plan B was abandoned when it was soon evident the road hadn't been gritted and a convoy of tail lights in the distance, suggested more crawling.

OK, Plan C carry on the A40 and head for the moorland north of Y Mynydd Du where the headwaters of the River Usk rise. The ungritted minor roads would be interesting and didn't disappoint.

Winter tyre conditions

Parking up and the view south revealed that Y Mynydd Du was wreathed in cloud and the view North to an impressive train of shower clouds tracking eastward, hopes for a dawn spectacular faded.  The spectacle of spindrift on the hills underlined the wise move to have abandoned an excursion to higher elevations.  I'm conscious writing this, just how many times my plans are changed at short notice to accommodate weather conditions, I don't believe it is indecisiveness, more case of experience of actual weather on the hills and fallibility of a Met Office weather forecast.

The ability of animals to endure the elements has to be respected and this was illustrated by a couple of dozen that had hunkered down in the lee of a small scarp/clumps of rushes and adjacent to the infant river Usk.  In comparison with the terrain on offer, this was an excellent choice - the high river bank and rush clumps provided some shelter from wind and ground relatively well drained and dry. 

Shelter

I'm giving credit to the local hill farmer, that these sheep are the ewes left out on the hills all winter to accrue the survival knowledge of shelter and food resources of this terrain, the over wintered upland ewes, then guide the main flock when it returns in more clement weather. I thought there is a name given to these ewes and a search of the web to find the correct terminology for sheep left out on the hill over winter, was unsuccessful.  My search did throw up one of the more tragic episodes in sheep husbandry in the upland environs.  The Gonial Blast in late January 1794 witnessed a storm hit the Southern Uplands of Scotland, when the snow melted the following was reported "there is a place called the Beds of Esk, where the tide throws out and leaves whatever is carried into it by the rivers. When the flood after the storm subsided, there was found on that place and shores adjacent, one thousand eight hundred and forty sheep, nine black cattle, three horses, two men, one woman, forty-five dogs and one hundred and eighty hares, beside a number of meaner animals" these bodies washed down were the ones resting close to or in water courses, the actual death toll must have been staggering. 'Gonial' or  'Goniel', is the term applied to the mutton of sheep found dead, from which the smoked mutton-hams are got.

Prior to this trip I'd packed a 100mm prime and 80-200 tele zoom and for this excursion I'd swapped the zoom for a 180mm prime. Sod's Law dictated I could have done with a 130-150mm to abstract a meander loop and the cloud colour reflected from the water. The concept was good, the DoF, execution and point of view less so.

Reflected colour

A view to the north, with the 180mm prime, over the meander loops, two flavours of the cloud colour and the silviculture of the Glasfynydd Forest, was more acceptable.

The cloud to the south over Y Mynydd Du finally started to break up and clear. Now despite the cliche of a landscape image with the ubiquitous glacial erratic in the foreground, on a featureless moor an erratic is not to be sniffed at, especially as the provenance of the erratic was highly likely, to be from the Y Mynnyd Du escarpment and hints strongly at the direction of glacial ice flow.

Cliche glacial erratic I

Cliche glacial erratic II

Cliched landscape foreground glacial erratic images satiated, it was time to wander. It's fair to say the wanderlust was short lived as the novelty of trail breaking through increasingly deeper snow, the wind increasing and clearing sky, rapidly translated into sinking enthusiasm and a trip up to Llyn y Fan Fach was saved for another day.

Instead the longer lenses were brought out to play, to try and capture spindrift on the spur of Fan Foel.

180mm

100mm

Then it was time to head back for some entertainment on the ungritted roads.

Snow, yay!

The UK winter of 13/14 was the wettest since records began and snow events were at a premium, so it was with some anticipation with snow falling, that I made plans for a dawn excursion. Snow cover has the ability to reduce the visual complexity of a landscape, by blanketing vegetation and reveal land forms. So, great plans were made, winds were at an acceptable strength for longish exposures and I even allowed an extra 10 mins for clearing the car of snow in the morning. Sadly, the plan slowly unravelled during the journey. The majority of UK drivers seem content to carry on with normal tyres and mitigate the hazards of snow/ice by travelling at crawling speeds until gritted or snow/ice free roads are reached. If conditions get too bad, they simply abandon their car, which really adds to the congestion misery. Whilst slowly crawling along behind a dispiritingly long line of tail lights, I reflected on the aforementioned and that whilst my investment in winter tyres is a sensible move, I really should have set the alarm for 1 hour earlier when snow fell overnight and as the extended travel time, ate into the walk time, Dawn at Great Plan A was scuppered and others too, eventually a trip up to the oh so familiar enivrons of the Black Mountains southern flank was settled on.

Cumulonimbus Incus

The walk up was initially over a dusting of snow, until the Ffridd wall was reached and then the snow depth increased to several inches. Where the 'mountain wall' has been sited in empathy with the upland environs and not with a surveying line, I have noticed the 'mountain wall' often seems to demarcate fairly accurately the zone of snow accumulation.

Onwards and upwards and with views opening up, a band of cloud was present to the south extending across the horizon from the SW to SE, sigh. so no alpen glow or warm red light. It was very much a case of waiting for something to happen towards sunrise. A cumulonimbus incus cloud offered some interest and if the cloud had arrived 30 mins later there would have been some very nice lighting.

Instead there was the opportunity to experiment with the camera white balance (WB) settings, as sometimes manual settings have produced a more pleasing image colour than the camera auto WB. Conventional wisdom says WB can adjusted in RAW post processing, I think it is probably best to get it thereabouts in the field and it is something I'm still experimenting with, a better memory would help too.

A belated sunrise

The effect of snow and low angled light reduces the complexity of a landscape and highlighting landforms was  illustrated by the view across the Usk valley to Craig y Cilau on Mynnyd Llangatwg where the landslide scar/glacial cirque were revealed.

Craig y Cilau and Mynydd Llangatwg plateau

One landform that I'd seen on previous trips was a lobe or debris tongue, with depression and debris ridges. The snow cover highlighted the form and nature, with the intriguing possibility of a rock glacier origin, or alternatively winnowed landslide debris. The south facing aspect of the slope and the gradient are potential settings for ice cored debris flows that form in severely cold climates.

Boulder lobe from a rock glacier or winnowed landslide debris?

Spin drift rising from exposed ground was a visible indicator of the wind strength increasing, sadly my efforts to capture spin drift failed miserably. With cloud sheets approaching from the west and thunder snow forecast it was time to head back to the car, whilst the weather was still good and photograph the Ffridd wall and trees mantled in snow. An enjoyable trip and always a childish pleasure to walk on virgin snow that's not too deep.

Stock pen and Ffridd wall

Field beech and graze line