These are images from the latest visit to LSW. They are all unprocessed 5x4 neg scans and below is a selection that I've editied and processed in photoshop.

I took these images more as a test shoot than anything else, to see how LSW would look on 5x4 compared to 120 film. Overall I am impressed with the quality and the detail in the negs and I do feel that the format captures the wood with an extra impression of reality, as my tutor Rob Ball would say, that ultra reality.

In fact there's a sense that because we are not used to seeing such high quality and detail that they look almost unreal. This is because of a couple of reasons. Firstly, as mentioned above, the extra quality adds an extra dimension to the images and is something that we are not used to seeing. The second point relates to this, because we are not used to such quality - it is not what we expect to see - it produces a sense of the unreal. It reminds me of Susan Sontag in On Photography when she asserts that even just looking at a photograph we expect to see something different, something surreal. So because of this expectation, which is then captured by the extra quality of the 5x4, it produces a sense of unreality through the use of ultra reality.

Below are a series of images from the above that I have processed through photoshop, they've been cropped and then the contrast and brightness have been adjusted. I've tried to simulate what I would do in the darkroom instead of going too extreme with the manipulation. I feel this is important because it keeps an element of genuineness about the images.

I've also printed these in the drkroom as well, to see how they would appear on paper rather than on a screen. The results are closely similiar but not identical, but close enough to produce a sense of the results.

I am pleased with the images and I do feel that the 5x4 works well with the subject matter and especially the extra quality. I was initially disapointed because there is no wide angle for the 5x4 camera, but what one element that I really do like about using the standard lens is that the perspecive is kept the same as the human eye. So the objects look the same distance apart, there is no stretching or foreshortening of the perspective. Because of this it produces an extra sense of reality, which then helps the extreme detail look super real and thus consequently, unreal.

Out of the 10 images, most of them I really like, but it would be easier to talk about the ones I'm not overly keen on. Image 9 shows the dappled light shining onto branches and thin trunks, which looks distracting and becomes a barrier to seeing what the rest of the image shows. The same can be said for image 8, again dappled light just hasnt worked, the highlights are too distracting.

My favourite image at the moment, though this does tend to change almost daily, is the first image. Having the trees backlit but not silhouetted does produce an impression of romanticism but also claustrophobia because of the lack of space within the image, it really does seem as if the trees are blocking your way. Following on from this theme of a backlit photograph, image 7 of an oak tree backlit and surrounded by smaller trees does also look good. Again it's that combinztion of threat and romanticism that draws me to the image.

But is romanticism the right word? Would it be better to describe the images as a combintion of threat and beauty, rather than threat and romanticism?