Essex Locations #01 Blakes Wood
As an Essex landscape photographer, I intend to produce in this blog section of my website a series of posts highlighting some of the best photography locations across the county of Essex.
Blakes Wood is the first of these location, it is near the village of Danbury and is one of the best Blue Bells wood in Essex, with numerous area of bluebells in differing habitats dotted around the wood. Blake's Wood is an ancient woodland on a sloping site, with valleys and streams. The main trees are oak, together with other species such as hornbeam and sweet chestnut.
First Location
The carpark is located in in Riffham Chase and the nearest postcode is CM3 4AU, The carpark can easily be missed from the road in addition it is small, only holding around 8 -10 cars so its advisable to get there early. ///frock.nuns.tastings
As you take the gate out of the carpark to will notice there is sometimes a small pond on your right which is surrounded by low hanging trees and bluebells.
Moving along the path you will notice there are an abundance of bluebells either side, although there are no wide shots as its a little bit to messy. There are however many intimate images feature single or parts of individual trees and foliage.
Follow the path until you pass through a small wood where the path veers off to the right and uphill. As you following this you will come to junction were you need to turn left and drop down into a small valley with a stream running along the valley floor. As you get to the bottom you will see a small bridge on your right, crossing the stream, this leads to the first location. This is a more open area and contains not only bluebells but many other wild flowers together with younger trees which are more vertical in nature as the image above. In addition at around 8-9am in April-May there is some nice side lighting falling in from the east.
Retracing you steps return across the small bridge and turn right along the path, cross the next small bridge on your right and follow the path all the way to the top where you will hit the boundary of the wood.
This second location where there are abundance of bluebells and images, the trees in this area are older and more established than those on the first location
There is a small path which runs through this section of the bluebell wood and it is important that you do not stray of this and not trample the delicate foliage.
This area should be visited first when going to Blakes Wood as its possible to capture images with the morning sun glimpsing through the trees .
Second Location
Blake Wood is best visited just before or at dawn, this applies particularly to second location as at this time of day it is back lit from the east. As the sun rises a little higher in the first location it tend to receive good side lighting on the new planted trees.
The first location also lends itself the use of either a macro or long lens to capture the more confined scene, the light in this area is more diffuse that other areas within the wood. Wider and medium lenses are of more use in locations 1 As you can shoot into the rising sun in location 2, its possible with a small F stop of around 16/22 to produce a starburst effect.
Location 1
Location 1