Wayward Spirit End of April Update

Fast, Fast, Slooooow

That is the story of this month really, some things have been running off at a million miles per hour, other things have been dragging slowly.

I have been all over northern Scotland working (again) although not off to any islands which require boats!  A couple of trips over to Skye being as much as came my way!

The first of the big changes was biting the bullet & making the move from Nikon DSLRs to Nikon Z Series mirrorless cameras.  I went for a second h& Z6 mk II just to test the water with a couple of used lenses that cover most my day to day bases.  I have been impressed by the quality, versatility &… most importantly… the flexibility that the camera affords me so I have decided to start the process of going “all in” & will be selling my Nikon D850 imminently along with most of it’s lenses – I am going to keep hold of the 200-600 f5.6 zoom for the moment & buy an adaptor to allow it’s use on the Z.

So far I am running with a 14-30 f4, 24-70 f4 & newly acquired 70-200 f2.8, which in itself has been a revelation  to the point that I am certainly going to add the 24-70 f2.8 very soon.  I am not 100% sure whether the ultrawide will see the same upgrade, at least not in the short term, as f4 is absolutely fine on that & it allows me to use filters easily unlike it’s more expensive sibling.  Instead I think I may opt for the widest prime I can get (currently a 20mm f1.8) for low light landscape & astro work.

What is the future of the Fujifilm system in all of this… well… I am not sure.  I was going to keep it, but the plan is to add another full frame Z camera to my set up & possibly investigate a crop sensor 3rd body at some stage too as these will allow more accessory & lens sharing.  Jen is using my oldest Olympus now (an E-M5 mk 1 that had so little value I didn’t see the point in selling it, although it is a fantastic little camera & I have won several awards with it over the years so I am also rather attached to the battered old thing).  I am also in the process of adding a bigger drone so I can go after some more interesting & high profile contracts, the camera system on that drone happens to use Olympus lenses!  So I think that the Fujifilm may also be on it’s way out the door despite being a fantastic camera, & I may look at building up another small Olympus kit, or perhaps a few kits, that I can then use for teaching, for Jen, for the boys & possibly for mountain biking trips if & when I get back to that!

Speaking of which I have made big strides forward this month by acquiring the services of a massage therapist whom has been described as a miracle worker by more than one client/former client.  We have had an initial assessment & session & she instantly spotted the core problem that everyone else has missed – that the injury does not stem from my back but from my hips which have been rotated & tipped!  She did some work on that, but it is an old injury & it is going to take a lot of re-alignment to get it all to “stick” as it were.  But perhaps… just perhaps… I am finally on the right path to rehabilitation!

The accommodation business has taken a few more steps forward over the month too & hopefully we will be in a position to break ground on that fairly soon, provided we can find a civils company able to take on the work!  But I haven’t really got much news on that whole front other than the relief we had this week on learning that our water supply is more than good enough to cover the needs.  We only have electric to worry about now & I am looking into off gridding the whole system anyway (including our home!)

Finally, having been depressed & then angry about certain work related situations I have decided to do something positive & proactive.  New marketing materials are being produced as I type & I am going to start spending some time every week distributing them, talking to people & generally trying to let the world know I am here, I am available & I am pretty good too!  I have started taking the opportunity to portfolio build whilst on jobs where the architecture, interior design & natural light all come together too, although this produces a lot more work for me for little reward it should make my galleries look a lot more impressive!  I will get gallery sales up & running at some stage soon too… I have been saying this since the beginning, but I will get on to it soon!

Perhaps