Yes, I used that, and on the second one I did notice that it does include a link to the forum thread that it was called from. I just meant a button alongside the post, really. Other forums I've used take varying approaches - one has a "report" button on each post for general reporting of u/a advertising, abuse etc where a form appears for more details on the specific perceived misuse, and a separate "spam" button that requires no other user input other than to press it. Filling out a form just to report obvious spam, and going through the second step where it tries to send me off to an FAQs page, is sometimes sufficient to stop people bothering to report stuff.

I guess if you're watching over it that may be why I don't see that much spam on here.

It would be nice if it were easier to report dodgy posts - many forums have a "report" button along side a post as an easy way of bringing to the mods attention. I've just gone through the steps to report new users "haige003" and "guru0" and it's a bit of a pain, especially when it seems to try to second-guess whether I want to send the report or not.

I appreciate these spammers don't seem to hit this forum very often, but I think it would be a worthwhile addition as making it easier for people to report issues will make people more likely to do so.

Sorry this is here - I can't post in the "announcements" forum. Mods, feel free to move this where you like, or delete it or whatever.

I prefer the middle shot, maybe a little extra contrast might help it out and it would have been better if you could get the top of the smoke rather than cutting it off. The third one is a little too close for my liking, and the first would benefit from being zoomed out a little further so as to not crop the chap on the right, if possible.

It's always a problem with moving steam, whether to go for a motion blur to try to reflect the movement but risk missing the shot that can't be repeated, or go for a static shot but get the picture - I can never decide what to do.

Isn't there a viewing area - I believe they have one at Manchester so you'd imagine that if they're happy with spotters and photographers at one, the same would apply at the other.

I can't offer any specific advice on photographing ships, though I'd think that the key with a container ship is to get as pin-sharp an image as you can - motion blur or prop blur won't be an issue here. I'd think a container ship with a nice varied load of differently-liveried containers could make an interesting image. As it doesn't seem like anyone else has specific advice either, I'd go with experimenting until you get images you're happy with.

I do like that one too.

I think they're very good, I'd certainly like to get something anywhere approaching that kind of quality.

You do find a lot of classic car events are held at this kind of venue. I display a car at some local shows here in the North West, and we do places like Tatton Park, Cholmondeley Castle, Bodelwyddan Castle and so on. If you're there for the full day (as I am when the car is on display) it does help to have somewhere to go and look around once you've finished chatting or looking around stalls etc. I must admit that I rarely take many photos at static car shows nowadays - partly because it's difficult to get a "different" shot, and partly because there are(hopefully) lots of people milling around in the way. Case in point being the Traction Engine Rally at Astle Park (I noticed you have a set from there earlier in the year) last weekend - probably have six or seven photos in total, just because I recognise most of the vehicles from last year, and couldn't get a decent shot of most of them.

Some venues get a little boring - Bodelwyddan is a very nice place, for example, but there is a limit to how many different shots you can get year after year in a historic building that (of course) doesn't change.

Cheers, I'm not sure there's enough there to do it - it's too light on the left, for sure. It's a pano done by autostitch, and although there are lots of options in there I've never really played with them. The sky on the first image was darkened quite a bit compared to the lower section, though maybe I've gone a little too far.

I've been a bit disappointed at the image quality on these images (well, a lot of my images, really) and am playing a bit to see if it's down to the Kx and Sigma 18-200 handheld combination, or what I do with them afterwards. I'm on a very old version of PS which doesn't support DNG files, so I'm working with JPGs and the clarity of stuff like the tower window frames just doesn't look as good as other peoples stuff.

This was Saturday afternoon, it was a bit mixed weather-wise. I'm a bit far away to be doing early mornings or late evenings there unfortunately. Or too lazy at least.

Took a short trip out around Bala and Llyn Celyn the other day, wandering around looking at a few landmarks and so on. I was quite taken with the tower in the reservoir, and the overflow at the end although it's not easy to get a decent angle on that.


IMGP9609-web by Mike Edwards, on Flickr


IMGP9635-web by Mike Edwards, on Flickr


IMGP9642-web by Mike Edwards, on Flickr


pano3 by Mike Edwards, on Flickr

As always, any comment or critique welcome. The panorama was done with "Autostitch", I'm finding it hard to resist doing at least one of those anywhere I go now.