TULIP

I will not have a cable for my laptop until next weekend, so in the meantime all images this week will be from older stock. You may notice my real name appears on them as these are my copyrighted images from my sales site. I will answer emails and comments as and when I can. Basically when I can get access via the and only internet cafe or my partners laptop, when it's free, which isn't that often.

Hopefully the laptop situation will soon be sorted in the meantime it's given me the opportunity to peruse my old stock images and here's one I found, long forgotten about that was taken in my own home in Ramsey earlier this ths year.

Even I can name the flower here. Obviously it's a tulip, but a tulip with a twist a study in black and white. This is me playing around with composition, textures, light and monochrome using a macro lens. I nickname this my "Ikea" image. It's the kind of image multi chain stores charge a fortune for, even though they are mass produced, therefore paying for the name of the store rather than the photographer or an idividual image. I disagree with this philosophy. I sell this image en mass, therefore the price is reflected as such, and the image is priced as per my other images, a lot cheaper than Ikea and the like. If this photo were for a sole client, a unique piece of artwork, then the price would reflect that and obviously retail at a higher premium. Does anyone else agree with me on this, or am I a lone voice tilting at modern day corporate windmills?

MARSH ORCHID

Moghrey mie. That's good morning in Manx.

Ramsey in Bloom, another local event, will be here soon and I thought it was about time I posted more of the flora from the island. After viewing some of the lovely orchids for last weeks ABC (hosted kindly by mrs nesbitt ) on so many bloggers posts, I thought I'd show one too. Orchids though aren't the easiest flowers to find, especially Marsh Orchids. You can hunt for hours for one to no avail and then find one by accident, like this one from the Wildlife Park, Ramsey. Have you noticed you always find the perfect flower to photograph on a windy day? So no tripod, no macro, and a not so gentle a breeze couldn't prevent me from snapping this Marsh Orchid.

Actually I'm not so sure what this is? Can anyone identify it correctly. What kind of Marsh Orchid is it? I googled Marsh Orchids and wow, what a variety. So hard to narrow down and pinpoint using pc images, well it is for the enthusiast, but not expert. I'm confident that in the world of blogging more than one of you stoping by today will be able to help the photographer identify what she's capturing. Of course I'll be sure to give you can mention on fridays post for helping me out.

POINT OF AYRE

The Point of Ayre is the northernmost point of the Island, roughly 10k north of Ramsey. It's the closest point on the Isle of Man to the British Mainland, which is Burrow Head Scotland 26k away.

The name Ayre comes from the Norse word Eyrr meaning gravel bank. The oldest lighthouse on the island can be found here along with the disused foghorn in the photo above.

A carpet of gorse and heather surrounds the lightouse mingling with the sand dunes. This is why locals and tourists are attracted to this area for it's fauna, flora (some rare flowers even) and groups of grey seals.

Unfortunately today I didn't see any seals, which is why you got the foghorn.