Photos from France: Part Two

I love taking photos of food but I also love taking photos of wildlife, animals and occasionally people. The house in France is very rural so there were plenty of opportunities to photograph some wildlife, including a frog who enjoyed the pool a bit too much and a cricket who clearly was happy to pose for the camera.

I think my photography is getting better however most of the time it is just a case of playing around the with settings and trying again and again until I have produced the photo I was after. Because of this I find food the easiest…it doesn’t move! In France I was using my mum’s camera so I found it interesting seeing the differences between the two, I think I soon picked it up though.

Here are a few photos I’m quite proud of and wanted to share with you all 🙂

Cricket on the pool net

He’s an Iberian frog we found hiding in the pool after the spring dried up

He was a friendly little chappy!

As you can see the swimming pool net features in all of the photos since we were forever saving things from the water and then I’d rush to try and photograph them before they got away!

I saw one of our cats Tibbs looking very excited sat by a bush waiting patiently and after going to investigate I found a few more interesting looking crickets. Unfortunately for Tibbs I had to shoo her away to get a good photo.

Clinging on for dear life!

One evening we went to a fireworks display in Sauveterre de Rouergue, a beautiful little town in Southern France. It was a very relaxed evening with a bar selling wine or beer in plastic cups, children playing in the square and entertainment which, for a small town, was simply fantastic! The apartments lining the square all had candles in their windows and we were all handed a candle as we entered so once it got dark there was a real peaceful ambience, helped along by some orchestral music!

My favourite parts of the night were the chinese lanterns and the acrobatics show which we weren’t expecting!

Our candles – We drew a heart in the sand and wrote France Rocks around it

Some children concentrating hard on lighting their lantern

Girl sitting on her fathers shoulders

All of a sudden some dramatic music came on and the crane which I had not really noticed before began lifting this giant metal sphere into the air, from it were some ropes dangling. Everyone stood watching in suspense wondering what would happen as people ran around the bottom of the ropes securing their places. What followed was just magical. Some girls dressed in old fashioned bloomers with lights attached to their skirts climbed up the ropes and began doing acrobatics and balancing.

Like little Glow bugs, these girls were amazing at capturing the magic of the evening

Don’t you just love that you can be stood in any country with any language and the visual power of humans doing mid air acrobatics can cause hundreds of people to simutaneously say “oooooh” and “aahhhhh” with admiration.

Acrobatics

The night ended with fireworks which were bigger than any I’d ever seen! For 5 Euro entry this really was an unforgettable night. I tried to photograph the fireworks however there were none worth showing off! After a while I decided to just enjoy the show rather than try and capture a firework through the lense.

Finally I had to share a photo of the new addition to the French family – Lottie. She is seriously cute and such a sweet natured dog! Very playful and loving 🙂