Formerly retired, but active volunteer for the Wiltshire Wildlife, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire (BBWOT) and Woodland Trusts, Action for the River Kennet (ARK), UK Butterfly Monitoring Service (UKBMS). Reincarnated as a Teaching Fellow at the University of Bath in late 2015 after a lengthy period 'on the heap'. Primary school teacher between 2003 and 2012 and prior to that a Senior Lecturer/Researcher specialising in the marrow stromal system of bone and marrow. I became interested in photography in my mid-teens and purchased my first SLR in 1980 (Yashica FR1, a.k.a the poor man's Contax RTS). Became interested in macro/close-up photography and moved on to Contax SLR's with lenses from Yashica, Sigma, Tamron and Contax before deteriorating eyesight resulted in my kit remaining essentially unused for a number of years. Woke up one morning in 2010 and decided to sell the lot and enter the world of DSLR with a Samsung GX-10, which was joined 18 months later by an immaculate, second-user K20D. Since then, I have acquired a wide range of lenses, including a number of older MF primes which I particularly enjoy the challenge of using. Currently the 'collection' consists of an
Irix Dragonfly150mm F2.8 Macro 1:1, various Pentax 50/55mm primes (K, M, A and F-series; f/1.8, f/1.7, f/1.4 and f/1.8 respectively), FA* 200mm f/2.8, 35mm f/2.8 DA-L, D-FA 100mm f/2.8, Macro, SMC Pentax-DA* 50-135mm F2.8 ED [IF] SDM, SMC Pentax-A 400mm F5.6, Sigma 24mm f/2.8 Super Wide II, 30mm f/1.4 EX DC, EX DG HSM 50mm F1.4, 70mm f/2.8 EX DG Macro, 17-70mm f/2.8-4.5 DC 'Macro', 70-300mm f/4-5.6 APO DG 'Macro', APO 100-300mm f/4 EX DG, Super Ozeck 135mm f/2.8 CF, Tamron SP AF 70–200 mm f/2.8 Di LD (IF) Macro, Adaptall-2 SP Mirror (55B) 500mm F8, Vivitar (Cosina) 19mm f/3.5 MC and 28mm f/2.8 CF (Kino Precision). For reversed macro (on camera or camera bellows) I have an EL-Nikkor 50mm f/2.8. Current APS-C DSLR: K5 and K3. Although having no professional aspirations, nor skills for that matter, I use the appellation Garrulus Apis to identify my uploaded images, as it represent (phonetically) my initials (Garrulus = Jay and Apis = Bee), reflects my main interests (wildlife/nature) and characterises, through word play, one aspect of my character (garrulus vs garrulous).