January 2025

2nd January 2025

An absolutely amazing evening over Glen Coiltie tonight with the smallest slither of a moon sitting over Meal Fuar-mhonaidh.

4th January 2025

The holiday's are over - just a day tomorrow of packing away the decorations and evicting the tree... then back to normal on Monday.

Weather dependant!

This is the view back up from the village towards the house up on the hill, high above the landslip and slowly becoming icebound! Next week is looking generally pretty chilly so it is going to get interesting!

I am still not used to writing “2025”….

10th January 2025

The last of the day’s light illuminating the hills above Drumnadrochit on what is the coldest night of the winter (so far) with temperatures already at -9 C here and -18 C not so much further north!

12th January 2025

Well, that’s it - the last day of snow from this particular weather event. We almost made it half way through the month!

It’s been lovely - properly cold in that arctic kind of way with cold, dry air and powder snow that peaked at around 6” deep up here.

On the plus side though, my electricity useage will drop off with the warmth (this week has been savage!) and hopefully I will start to see a little more work starting to come in! I also have a couple of deliveries overdue from inaccessability from last week and the new video system should arrive in a few days too. I think I may have a software upgrade to buy as a result of over-reaching ambitions on that front… and perhaps some kind of a console would be nice too.

I really do have ambitions of breaking into the film market!

18th and 19th January 2025

A weekend in Edinburgh for a 50th Birthday celebration… not much in the way of photography carried out!

21st January 2025

Portsoy on the Aberdeenshire Coastline was today's destination. I arrived a little early for the job so spent twenty minutes or so having a wee mooch about the old harbour which is one of the most scenic in Scotland, and certainly one of the oldest dating back to around 1550 when Mary, Queen of Scots, granted a charter.

23rd January 2025

Out to Ullapool today and the weather on the way out was just lovely! The weather started to close in by midday though ahead of the storm due to hit on the 24th.

25th January 2025

We survived the storm!

Actually, it wasn’t too bad here - I expected to see some trees down, or at least a few branches, but no - not even that (at least not between our house on the hill and the village store, but that encompasses my world most of the time anyway!)

I have been putting some feelers out recently to take on some more quality work as I need to both push myself forward and also find more recognition for what I produce and what I can produce in an attempt to keep the demons at bay that are for ever chuntering in my head. I have achieved a lot already but with agency work being underpaid and largely drying up over the last year I feel that it is time to go out and tell people what I can do for them and take another step up the ladder. Plus the lack of agency jobs has freed up space in my schedule to take on some more rewarding work!

I still plan to launch workshops and really explore the fine art photography markets, but I want a solid foundation in the commercial photography world first!

Onwards, ever onwards!

27th January 2025

This old bridge crosses Eskadale Burn on the southern edge of Strathglass in the Scottish Highlands. It's a scene I have been meaning to photograph for quite some time!

The shoot this morning was postponed so only floorplans required for the moment leaving me some time to kill travelling between the job and Drumnadrochit for my other appointment, making this a perfect place to pause!

1st January 2025

New Year's Day arrived with fresh snow fall, which makes a change from the incessant rain. We start the year though, not snowed in, but "rained in" as the road out of the glen is now precariously positioned at the top of a loose mud cliff with quite a considerable drop into the river below. The river has continued to undercut the escarpment, so more is quite likely to go, and the angle of the slope looks too steep to be anything close to stable too. We do have a work around, but that isn't really sustainable either and still the tourists keep driving up to look at the falls....

Anyway, I thought this was a good photograph to launch my 15th "Photo a Day" project that has mapped life over the last decade and a half!

3rd January 2025

Out for a walk down to the bridge, and inspect the devastation caused by the river bank collapse on Hogmanay. Hopefully we will hear something about a plan of action to repair the road soon!

6th January 2025

First job of the year - and off to Portknockie in the snow to complete it!

It was a little touch and go getting out to the job with heavy snow on the A96… and then touch and go getting home as we live up a steep, rough and currently very icy, track! But all done safe and sound!

8th January 2025

The glen is so peaceful when the snow falls - we had more last night and a substantial freeze too. Angus was off school due to a heating failure (now fixed) whilst the others were in, and I seemed to have enough grip today to get down without snow chains too (this is now my cut off point for snow days, if I need chains we ain't going as I need to put them on, take them off at the bottom of the track as I hit tarmac, then repeat the proceedure on the way back, so it adds about 45 minutes+ to the journey!)

I stopped off on the bridge over the Coiltie to take a photo of the winter wonderland though. Quite a contrast to how much water was coming down on Hogmanay when the river undercut it's banks and caused a massive land slide!

14th January 2025

Loch Ness taken on a quick stop on the way home from Elgin today. The light was very “sunsetish” at only 2:40pm, despite the days starting to slowly draw out. There was beautiful light all the way home to be honest, thick golden hues, but I needed to make sure I was home for the school run! By the time I hit this point on the loch I know I am okay with the time left in hand so I can afford a 5 minute pause!

Loch Ness gets a lot of flack from the press and a certain demographic of visitors/photographers. They call it boring, unscenic, unimpressive… but they couldn’t be further from the truth. It is an absolutely spectacular body of water, it’s just a wee bit tricky to photograph and portray that to others.

This is one of my favourite “easy” viewpoints of the loch. I plan to explore a few more soon - and probably video them for the You Tube channel too, particularly as I have the new camera ready to go now!

16th January 2025

Just out putting the chickens and ducks to bed and thought the floodlights gave an interestingly sinister look to things....

Always fun playing with different lighting!

29th January 2025

A local job today, and one that required no drone - but with light like this, and a view of Loch Ness, I figured I would send it up anyway!

Drumnadrochit after the rain.

5th January 2025

Sunset as we say goodbye to the holidays - tomorrow is back to reality, both work and school. I am kicking the week off with a trip out to Portknockie which will be a nice change of scenery!

The snow is still very much present that fell on Hogmanay and is sitting on a sheet of ice which makes driving down the track a little treacherous but I haven't needed to break the snow chains out.

Yet.

Hopefully this week we will get some kind of update regarding the collapsed bank/road situation too. And I am praying for a rapid resolution - whilst anticipating a lengthy delay (this is a worry as the longer it waits, the greater the chance of complete failure!)

7th January 2025

The first “snow day” of the year. It isn’t a huge accumulation, but sitting over ice in parts makes the road out the glen particularly trecherous. Particularly the section where the current diversion ejects you directly towards the sheer drop from Hogmanay’s landslide. Ending up 10m vertically down from the road in the river is not how I want to start my day!

The gritter has been up now so tomorrow it may be worth trying the school run, and if successful, carrying on out to Elgin to get a couple of early year jobs wrapped up!

9th January 2025

Another day and more snow! There was a fairly good amount that came down in the early hours this morning after a good hard freeze. The schools are closed, not that I would have attempted to get there anyway (I can… but putting snow chains on and off for a 3 mile journey and the same at home time is a faff - once the chains are required it is emergency travel only!)

This is the view down the track this morning!

11th January 2025

Today we took a wander along the Caladonian Canal to make the most of the last cold day before the thaw sets in tomorrow.

There was a driftwood log wedged on the weir that had a passing resemblance to Nessie!

Following some discussions with a potential client yesterday I took the plunge on a new video camera when we got back that should combine perfectly with the drones to give a really unified look to combined aerial and ground videography. I still plan to use the big cameras for video too, along with the gimbal, but this may provide an easier integration into the workflow as well as being a little more manageable in confined spaces!

It will also be ideal for my own productions I think combined with a few other bits and bobs as I try to make video a much larger part of my remit! I think this is the potential growth area as faster web speeds allow more video content… I could be wrong though!

13th January 2025

The River Gods are Angry - today the Coiltie is in spate (again) following a rapid thaw of a rather good quantity of snow. I checked on the state of the abyss earlier on and it seemed to be holding, but the angle of the lower slope seems too steep to be stable (to my only partially educated eye) and the upper part I am damn sure is highly unstable as it is vertical or overhanging in parts! The whole thing has no structural strength being, basically, mud so any changes in saturation or further undercutting could cause further collapse!

Certainly adds to the excitement levels in January!

I stopped for this one on the way back from the council tip as our bins haven't been collected since Christmas and the refuse mountain was getting a little bit much!

15th January 2025

It turned into a rather lovely afternoon - my plans to get ahead of myself were completely derailed by the wind and a squally rain shower so I decided against getting the drone out for a job next week early and came home. On the way I managed to get several jobs booked in for next week as well, so it has gone from nothing to nicely busy... and quite a lot of driving as I will be spanning an area from Ullapool to Portsoy (two places that I rather enjoy heading out to!)

This is the view over Drumnadrochit and Loch Ness from just along the road from our house, it was catching the light nicely so popped over for a quick shot.

17th January 2025

I stupidly forgot to check my bag when I went out today - turns out I had a selection of lenses, memory cards, batteries and other accessories. Even 2 tripods and 2 monopods... and half a lighting rig.

But no actual camera!

So today is brought to you by the power of a DJI Osmo Pocket 3!

Tomorrow I am off on an adventure… so a bit of a change of scenery coming up!

20th January 2025

It’s good to be home - heading away for a weekend is all good and fine, but there is nothing like getting back to your own surroundings!

Today I was working in Inverness, which was lovely as work has been very slow to start emerging after the Christmas break! I have a busy week for the first time in a while coming up but could really use a few more jobs to arrive before February otherwise next month could be a bit tight to say the least!

22nd January 2025

There was some pretty spectacular cloudscapes this morning as I crossed the Culnakirk between Drumnadrochit and Beauly to complete one of this weeks big jobs. It’s nice having work this week, but at the moment next week is completely devoid of anything booked in whatsoever, which I am not keen on!

I do have 3 jobs in Moray waiting to be scheduled so I am hoping that some of those come to fruition, all are agency jobs though and I could use some direct before the month end otherwise February is going to live up to my experience of being the most depressing of months!

31st January 2025

Well, we have made it through the first month of the year, pretty much unscathed. Work has been quite slim on the ground, which is going to make February a bit challenging, but signs are looking better already as we head into the first week!

Am I done with winter yet though? Am I looking forward to Spring?

Well… a bit. I would like a little more dramatic weather whilst I am in the right place to make the most of it to finish off the season - but at the same time the thought of some warm sun on my back and the re-emergence of nature and life in general is highly appealing. I also want to start getting back out and doing “outside stuff” in a bid to regain even a little bit of health and fitness.

By the end of February I am usually absolutely fed up of the weather and the dark, and willing March to get a move on and change things around. But February and March are usually the most wintery of months so I won’t hold my breath for that nice weather for at least another 8 weeks yet!

Progress report on the Fast 800 - looking good. Down 5kg I think. But Hamish is out at a party tonight and out to rugby early doors tomorrow so I suspect I shall be falling off the wagon, even only for a day….

24th January 2025

Storm Eowyn is now well underway, and Roki is less than impressed with this turn of weather!

So far it’s not been too bad up here in the Great Glen, but I have been seeing and hearing reports from Ireland and further south in Northern England/Southern Scotland which are quite terrifying for the folk down there. The main brunt of the storm won’t be hitting here for another couple of hours though, and I think we are out the main path with “only” an Amber warning rather than the Red of the central belt.

26th January 2025

Angus telling me how big he thinks tuna fish are.

It’s been a funny old weekend - we haven’t done much other than eat a marvelous haggis from Fraser’s in Dingwall… and a haunch of Red Deer that came off a local estate.

Jen was out with friends on Saturday night for a few down the pub and was saying that we are both struggling a bit at the moment with identity and sense of purpose. Angus is the youngest and he is starting to find his independence now - he would rather play in his room rather than hang with us (although we did get him to sit and watch a program about Loch Ness tonight)… and I think she probably has a point. Although the boys are all still too young to leave alone for too long, Lachlan and Hamish I could probably leave for a working day, but Angus is too small to be left with them as yet. So we are in a weird kind of place - of not being needed but still being required? Neither of us are really able to indulge in the stuff we would like to or use to (pre kids), and I get a huge sense of guilt if I go away for a weekend because it is just me having a weekend away, not both of us.

It’s not really a moan, just a statement of where we are at just now. It’s a strange time… but it will pass!

28th January 2025

Been a pretty hectic day today, running around chasing some jobs that need tying down. No actual paid work, just organisation really, so I didn’t get out and about anywhere interesting!

30th January 2025

Looking out over Kirkhill today towards a rather splendid, snow covered, Ben Wyvis.

The light hasn’t been great today, but mostly I have been running some errands in town (the recycling centre and dropping keys back with an agent from yesterday’s shoot). Then just a little video editing before the school run (about now) and RNLI tonight.

Even when I stop (due to a rescheduling of a job) I don’t seem to actually stop!