High as a kite

The title refers to me. I did a day's teaching for the North Pennines AONB today entitled Beginners' Wildflower Photography. I love teaching and haven't done any for ages- not since I retired - so this was great fun, both to prepare and then to deliver.

I had a group of 10 - any more would have been tricky - and most had compact cameras. I had to warn them that by the end of the day they might want to buy another camera, but my aim was to help them get the best out of the cameras they possess now. We had a bit of theory then a practical session outside. It was much too hot and the sun was presenting all sorts of problems, but that was useful to show some solutions. They were such a keen group and by the afternoon practical session everyone produced better images than in the morning.

I'm sure they wondered why they were asked to bring a dark umbrella because the forecast was for dry weather. We used the umbrellas to create shade for plants and to create shade to see the back of the cameras.

I took only one short series of photos; I had no time to take any more. This is P who is checking out his last image. This picture reminded me of The Jumblies by Edward Lear but maybe that was the effect of the heat on my brain!