Romsey Abbey... with Stars

Friday 29th August

Following on from previous day's -

...the reason why that Blip didn't have the Abbey floodlit, is because there isn't any floodlighting. No lights, or lamps anywhere to be seen, on the ground or on the Abbey itself.

But, as I stood in almost darkness, in utter quietness and with the tripod in the vicar's parking slot, only six feet or so away from this huge slab of west front splendour, the lens pointing right up into the night-sky, needing a pee and only a few minutes in which to get the last train, I quietly panicked. Got to get the shot, got to get the shot...

LARGE

Only lit by one lamppost - to the left - I did really feel as if I shouldn't be there. A retirement block to one side and large posh old houses with their lights off to the other.

I was watched by an intrigued cat, though...

Those of you who have extremely wide angle lenses, such as this 14mm for full-frame, know that their humungous fishbowl front elements catch flare and blobs and spots like magnets. Hence, I had a huge blob to the right hand side on all the shots. I edited two that were earlier and they took ages. I couldn't do a good enough job.

This one was better in that respect because the lens was stopped down to f5.6, from the f4 of the others, but which gave a better exposure. That gave a smaller, neater 'blob' that I was able to completely remove. The green light is inside the building, not sure what it was from, but I rather liked it!

I did make the last train - and use their on-board 'facilities', so it all did work out rather nicely in the end!

Lens is Sigma EX 14mm f2.8