Skull

Pruning and pond clearing this morning, getting rid of old leaves around the hellebores and dredging up mud from the bottom of the pond. I was surprised to find newts in the water, thought they would be hibernating still. Must find a nice way to blip a newt (and a hellebore when they're properly out).

The gardening was dull and the dog was harassing me - she bites the garden tools which is a real pain in the bum. So I thought it was time to blip something. I'd forgotten this roe deer skull which is always being moved by the foxes - they like moving things. I found it a couple of winters ago when fishing near Elstead and put it in the garden. Since then it has moved around quite a lot and it's become pretty bleached by now.

I dug over the top of the compost heap and plonked the skull on the muck, then photographed it from various angles: colour, B&W, high ISO, low ISO, macro lens, 50mm lens; then came inside and started playing around with filters; then went back outside and photographed it again and tweaked the results again.

By the time I'd finished I didn't know whether I was coming or going. I loaded various results in to what has become a kind of gallery for experiments, then asked Gill what she thought. "Yes, that's all right," she said at the first one.

"No you have to see them all," I said.

"Yes, they're fine, it's a skull, what do you want me to say?" she said.

I liked the ones that glowed when given the filter treatment but settled in the end for a B&W unprocessed image. I'm not saying it's my favourite. But it is my blip.

Having created something of a Bateman moment in the Landscape group by submitting an objectionable image of people in an underpass, I think I'll see if this one can pass muster in the wildlife group. If anyone objects to the lack of animation I can always say it's resting.