Low tide in Bognor Regis.

March 26, 2026 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Landscape, Leigh Kemp, Photography, Travel | Leave a comment

Hi Everyone,

As it was a quite sunny day and the bitter cold wind we’ve had of late had at last abated I thought I’d take a stroll with my PEN-F camera and Lumix 14mm f/2.5 lens.

Kind regards

Leigh

Another shot of some trees.

March 25, 2026 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Landscape, Leigh Kemp, Photography, Travel | 2 Comments

Hi everyone,

The title says it all. 🙂

Kind regards

Leigh

Travel adapter.

March 25, 2026 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Leigh Kemp, Photography, Photography equipment, Travel | Leave a comment

Hi everyone,

As my trip to Canada is very much on the cards for later this year to visit my elderly father and my sister and her family as well as (of course) 🙂 an exciting photographic adventure I decided to beef up my travel plug adapter/USB charging capability a bit. I have my trusty Anker 4-port USB charging hub with a selection of interchangeable figure of eight mains leads to fit all countries which is always packed in my travel kit but thought I’d add this as well. To give it its full name: “Bigfish Universal Travel Adapter with USB C PD 35W Fast Charging(C3 Port), Worldwide Travel Plug Adapter with 5 USB(2A + 3C), Dual 10A Fuses International Travel Adapter – EU UK US AUS Plugs”

They do them in different wattages up to 65W but the 35W one will suit my needs and the additional/backup USB ports will no doubt come in handy. It’s quite a few years since I travelled across the pond and I really wanted an additional adapter to convert to the USA/Canada/Mexico type 2 flat pin mains sockets although it will also work converting to/from European and British plug types, important as most of my travel is in Europe. All my devices are dual voltage 100-250V so that’s not an issue. I like that it’s fused with a spare fuse included, looks solidly built as well. Two USB type A ports, two USB type C ports as well as an additional fast charge USB type C port on the side. You know how dedicated I am to multi-device USB charging at home or when travelling. 🙂 I also like to have a backup charging solution in case of a fault or accidental damage etc.. As the old saying goes “Don’t put all your eggs in the same basket”. 🙂

All the best,

Leigh

The sound of running water and a gentle breeze.

March 24, 2026 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Landscape, Leigh Kemp, Paintography, Photography, Travel | 2 Comments

.Hi everyone,

Another work of West Dean Gardens,

Kind regards

Leigh

Another West Dean Gardens shot and U-GREEN SD Card reader/USB Hub.

March 23, 2026 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Leigh Kemp, Photography, Photography equipment, Travel | 6 Comments

Hi everyone,

Firstly another shot from my recent visit to West Dean Gardens. Olympus E-PL8 camera, M.Zuiko 14-150mm lens and Tifffen combined Black Pro Mist 1/4 and CPL filter.

A while back I purchased a small, inexpensive 4in1 U-Green USB 3 card reader hub which I’ve been using on the computer. The device has two USB 3 (blue) type A ports, slots for micro and full size SD cards and the hard wired cable terminates in a USB type A connector with an attached adapter to USB type C. I decided to buy another one to go in my travelling kit. I’m using an app. called USB Media Explorer on my Android phone and, with the hub attached along with an SD card and USB flash drive inserted it copies RAW files from the card to the drive very quickly. I have a dedicated device for this in my RAVPOWER file hub/travel router/USB power bank but this is a nice compact alternative/backup card backup solution. I like U-Green products, I have one of their Ethernet Switches attached to my network router which works very well.

Kind regards to all,

Leigh

West Dean Gardens, W.Sussex.

March 21, 2026 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Landscape, Leigh Kemp | 2 Comments

Hi everyone,

I’ve not been able to get out for some while, a combination of bad weather, lack of transport and ongoing health issues but I did manage a trip out yesterday to the beautiful West Dean Gardens.

Kind regards

Leigh

“Pure Nostalgia”

December 21, 2025 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Leigh Kemp, Photography | Leave a comment

Hi everyone,

I spotted these jukeboxes in an antique shop window., Takes me back to my youth with my workmates when we’d go over the road lunchtimes for a beer, some food and to feed the jukebox, happy memories. Everyone’s gone their own way, the pub has long since been demolished and the beer hasn’t been made for years but the music’s always there and that’s all I need to evoke the memories.

Kind regards

Leigh

Shoreham-by-Sea by night.

December 20, 2025 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Landscape, Leigh Kemp, Photography, Travel | 2 Comments

Hi everyone,

I finally got the opportunity to get out yesterday and get a few night shots. I took my Olympus OM-D E-M1 camera and M.Zuiko 12mm f/1.8 lens. This shot from the opposite bank of the River Adur looking across the river to the town.

Kind regards

Leigh

“The stream by the church”

December 13, 2025 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Landscape, Leigh Kemp, Paintography, Photography, Travel | Leave a comment

Hi everyone,

Another of my works of Bosham.

All the best,

Leigh

“Here come the swans”

December 12, 2025 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in HDR, Landscape, Leigh Kemp, Photography | 2 Comments

Hi everyone,

I took a trip into Bosham harbour today.

Kind regards,

Leigh

As I sit here looking at my modern digital cameras I’m reminded of my first camera and, in particular, the first photograph that I ever took. Nowadays we take cameras and camera technology pretty much for granted but when I was a child I can’t remember many photographs. The only time our camera saw the light of day, and it had to be the light of day, as there wasn’t a flash, was on a few family occasions, the usual thing, school sports days, birthdays, etc.. My interest in photography didn’t start until my grandfather “loaned” me his camera to take with me on a week-long school trip, sleeping under canvas, in Snowdonia, North Wales. It was a somewhat battered old twin-lens reflex camera in which one looked downwards in to the viewfinder when taking a photograph.

I remember being very excited at being entrusted with the family camera, film wasn’t cheap and I had very little to no idea how to use it. The experience must have made some kind of impression on me as, after all these years, I still remember taking my first photograph. The coach stopped en-route at Blenheim Palace, the ancestral home of Sir Winston Churchill and it became the subject of my first photograph. Although, sadly, like my other photographs from the trip, it has long since disappeared, however, I really don’t need the photograph to remind me as the experience is indelibly etched on my mind. I wonder if this is perhaps where my interest in landscape photography stems from but that’s probably too much of an assumption. As far as I remember I was the only kid on the trip to have a camera, that’s how different things were, nowadays, just about everyone has a camera of some sort built in to their mobile phones. It also taught me to be disciplined to the point of being frugal when taking photographs as the trip was for one week and I only had a 12 exposure black and white film in the camera.

Some years later I really got the photography bug and bought my first camera, an Olympus OM-1 35 mm film camera and I went on to own their OM-2 and OM-4ti cameras and a range of lenses. Film was still pretty expensive considering I earned about £20 a week in my first job so I got in to developing and printing my own black and white and, later, colour films to help keep the costs down and make things more affordable. Not only did this experience teach me an awful lot about image-making start to finish, many of the techniques and skills that I learned in my makeshift darkroom, a small room adorned with genuine World War 2 blackout curtains fitted to keep out the light, another hand-me-down from my grandfather, these skills would re-surface and be invaluable some years later when I started working on processing my digital images.

I put myself through University as a mature student and I badly needed the money so I had to very reluctantly part with all my photographic equipment, but needs must. After I graduated I bought my first digital camera, a small fixed lens Kodak compact camera, reduced in a sale. It had, by today’s standards, a laughably small maximum image resolution of 640×480 pixels or, to put it another way, a stunning 0.4 Megapixels!. For all of this and further equipped with screw on wide angle and telephoto lens attachments, it proved to be a fabulous little camera which I took all over the place with me. Put simply, digital photography was a revelation, to me, no requirement for film, no real running costs and a lot of image capacity on a small memory card which I found absolutely liberating.

A few years before that I had discovered some free graphics editing software on the cover disk of a computer magazine and that started off my real passion for working with graphics and, ultimately, photo processing. So I then had all the tools I required to develop, pun intended and further, my interest in digital photography. Processing is where the magic starts for me, I am totally absorbed in and fascinated by the range of options that digital processing affords me. It encourages me, if, that is, I ever need encouragement, to constantly experiment with new styles, new techniques and is such an important part of my enjoyment and interest in photography.

I went on to own several DSLRs but, as I got older I began to find that they were simply too heavy and bulky. I switched over back in 2013 to Micro Four Thirds cameras and lenses. My choice of MFT system was heavily influenced by my experiences with my Olympus film cameras, maybe it was, in truth, part based on nostalgia that I decided on their OM-D system. As a landscape/travel photographer I have to carry my gear around all day and the weight and bulk saving is highly significant. I’ve been very impressed with the image quality of my Micro Four Thirds equipment, it has traveled with me extensively, never let me down and I have never had cause to question my decision to go over to that format.

So my 50-plus year photographic adventure has led me from twin-lens reflex and single-lens reflex film cameras to digital cameras, from stumbling around in a dimly-lit darkroom to working with my images on my computer. I’ve heard it said on occasions, including a comment I read some while back by a very famous photographer, that cameras being so much an every-day item now and available in mobile phones etc. devalues photography. I feel quite the opposite, I firmly believe that it empowers everyone with affordable technology to take photographs and enjoy photography and that, in my opinion, is fantastic. Although I’ve very much enjoyed my personal photographic journey I do confess to feeling a slight tinge of regret that the technology wasn’t available when I started out but one can’t put the clock back and I intend to keep on embracing all these great technological advancements, experimenting and enjoying my work.

Cameras:

Olympus: OM-D E-M5 Mk II (titanium) & HLD-8G grip, OM-D E-M1 Mk I (black) & HDL-7 grip, OM-D EM-5 Mk I (silver) & HDL-6 grip, PEN EPL-5, PEN EP-5 (silver) +VF-4, PEN E-PL8 (Silver) +VF4, Tough TG-5 (red), PEN-F (silver), Canon Powershot G10, Nikon Coolpix A100

Lenses:

Olympus: M.Zuiko: 12 mm f/2, 17 mm f/1.8, 25 mm f/1.8, 45 mm f/1.8, 30 mm f/3.5 macro, 9 mm f/8 body cap fisheye, 15 mm f/8 body cap, 9-18 mm, 12-50 mm, 12-40 mm f/2.8 PRO, 14-150 mm II, 40-150 mm II, 12-45mm f/4 PRO, MCON-P02.

Sigma: ART 60 mm f/2.8.

Samyang: Manual focus 7.5 mm f/3.5 fisheye.

TT Artisan: Manual focus 17mm f/1.4, 23mm f/1.4, 35mm f/1.4.

Panasonic Lumix: 14 mm f/2.5, 20 mm f/1.7, 12-32 mm x2 (black and silver), 12-60 mm, 14-42 mm II, 35-100 mm, 45-150mm.

PEN E-P5, 9-18mm,12-32mm, 40-150mm II. A lightweight kit with virtually continuous coverage from 18mm wide angle to 300mm telephoto.

OM-D E-M1 I, 14-150mm II, 12-40mm PRO. . Heavier than my other kits but with complete weather-sealing. Coverage from 24mm wide angle to 300mm telephoto with some overlap for backup.

OM-D E-M5 II, 17mm, 35mm, 12-60mm. A balance of two fun manual focus lenses with a weather-sealed body and zoom lens.

PEN E-PL5, 9mm, 15mm, 25mm, 60mm, 12-50mm. Another lightweight fun kit with a zoom option.

TG-5, OM-D E-M5 mk1, 7.5mm, 12mm, 17mm, 45mm, 30mm macro. M-CON.

PEN-F, 14mm, 20mm, 12-32mm, 35-100mm. Probably my favourite lightweight day-to-day kit. Two fast primes and two zoom with almost continuous coverage from 24mm wide angle through to 200mm telephoto.

Software:

Corel: Paintshop Pro Elite 2020 & Video Studio 2019.

Skylum Software: Aurora HDR 2019, Luminar 4, Luminar AI and Luminar Neo.

DXO Labs: PhotoLab 5 Elite, Viewpoint 3, NIK Collection 6, Film Pack 5 and PureRAW.

Anthropics Technologies: Landscape Pro Studio 3 and Portrait Pro.

EyeQ: Perfectly Clear

Topaz Labs: Studio 2, Sharpen AI, A.I Gigapixel, AI Clear, AI Adjust, DeNoise AI and Various legacy plugins.

Adobe: Lightroom.

GreenScreenWizard Studio Pro.

Serif: Affinity Photo

Microsoft: Image Composite Editor (Free).

Darktable (Free).

Olympus: Olympus Capture, Olympus Workspace and Olympus Webcam (Free to Olympus owners).

Sony: Movie Studio Platinum.

Lighting Gear:

Godox TT350o flash, Godox X1T radio flash trigger, Godox Lux Junior flash, LED ring flash, GVM RGB LED light, Olympus MAL-1 Macro Arm Light. Two Godox LED36 lights, Godox Litemons LED6R light. Three Bowen studio flash heads, barndoors, honeycombes, umbrellas and flash meter.