These are the very first shots taken by my Canon XH-A1.

So, the first requirement when acquiring a new camera is a test card, some people use their pets, others like myself prefer to use nature's own camera testing facility, the woodland. There is so much detail to be captured in the woods, all angles, straights, curves and colour tones to show off the camera's capabilities.

Twas a grey grey day
In early May
All the sun
Was hidden away

So I have used quite a bit of colour correction in Sony Vegas Pro 8 in order to liven things up a little. I also reduced the speed to 25% for the blue-tit as it was difficult at normal speed to determine what was going on here.

Camera settings were fully auto. No tripod unfortunately.

The locations are approximately a 5 mins car journey from junction 15 of the M6 in the UK.

Hanchurch woods: The woods were presented to the people by a previous Lord Stafford for our 'perpetual' enjoyment. They are maintained by our local council.

A little of the recent history of the cave: This was used by the military during WW2 for the storage of ammunition, hence the extensive brickwork, and though not so visible a tiled floor.

Of course now it is used as a rave venue, though I can see why this cave was chosen for such an activity, I have to seriously question the safety aspects here.

But then, youth is, has and always will be 'youth' to whom health and safety violation means excitement, of course as youth fades one finds the scene a good video/photo opportunity.

I am still experimenting with SVP8 hence the fancy logo work, apologies, I intended to remove this, but ran into my new weekly storage quota. With a new project coming up this week, I don't yet know how much of my quota needs reservation.