While I was on the train to Glasgow last Tuesday I got a text message from Libby telling me to make sure I photographed the house on Jura where George Orwell wrote 1984. He was there in 1946 (to 1947), and stayed at Barnhill, a house owned by David Astor, the editor of the Observer. Orwell was in ill health - he died just a few years later - was recently bereaved, and struggled through one of the harshest winters of the century: but he finished a first draft of the book while he was there.

If you're interested, there's a good article here with a lot more detail.

When I looked into it didn't seem likely that we'd be able to get there. The house is at the end of an eight mile track, close to the northernmost end of the island, and we didn't have a 4x4, nor did I fancy a 16 mile walk. As luck would have it we had a boat trip planned for Wednesday morning: from the jetty across the way from the Jura Lodge up to the Corryvreckan whirlpool, and we passed Barnhill on the way.

Next time I go I'll hire a 4x4.

I'm currently sat waiting for a train at Glasgow station, on my way home to Blackpool, but at 5.30 this morning I was on Jura photographing a very beautiful sunrise.

This is my first shot from my three day trip to the Isle of Jura, taken from the Jetty just across the way from the Jura Lodge. Today's my last day on the Island, and we have a fairly busy schedule, so I'll write more when I head back to Blackpool at the weekend.

In the meanwhile, I hope you enjoy this one.

I've spent most of this week talking about black and white photography, particularly in terms of the launch of our new assignments-based course. As I mentioned, we scheduled two occurrences of the course: May and June. May sold out a couple of days ago, and there are only a handful of places left in June, so we're really pleased with how well it's been received.

So, enough of black and white photography for a while: time for something a bit more colourful.

This one was taken at the same time as the one below, but I didn't post it at the time because they were both processed in much the same way.

Today though I thought I'd try something a bit different, so started by changing the white balance to fluorescent and took it from there.

As always, let me know what you think.

It's not often that I post two shots side-by-side but in this case I couldn't decide between the two and didn't think it was worth posting them as separate images. Both were taken during our photo tour to the Venice Carnival earlier this year.

In other news ...

I'm really pleased to announce that we're launching a new course today: The Art of Black and White Photography: ASSIGNMENTS, designed to follow on from The Art of Black and White Photography on Udemy.

It's a four week, online, assignment-based course, and if you think you might be interested, just click the link below.

The Art of Black and White Photography: ASSIGNMENTS

We've scheduled two occurrences so far – May and June – and while there are quite a few places available for June there are only for (from 25) left for May: so sign up soon if you want to take part! Oh, and if you haven't signed up for the Udemy course yet (which you'll need to do before you can work through the new course), we're offering it at half-price for anyone who signs up for The Art of Black and White Photography: ASSIGNMENTS.

And if you're interested, Antony Northcutt has posted a great article on his blog about why he's going to be taking the course in May. Thanks Antony :-)

From what I can remember these two dummies have been in the textile souq in Dubai since my first visit in 2007, and while I've photographed them before I haven't come up with anything worth posting until this shot.

I spotted this 'clock' during our recent trip to Venice, in the glass blowing factory we visited on Murano, and while I messed up the exposure – it's almost two stops underexposed – I am pleased with the final result.

Here's another RX1 shot from Dubai: a portrait of one of the drivers who took us out into the desert for my Landscape Photography workshop.

I've already posted three images from this shoot (1, 2 and 3) but held off posting this one because I couldn't work out how to process it. It was taken just as the sun had breached the horizon, and the light was quite flat, but there was something about it that kept drawing me back. I tried black and white, which didn't work, and a whole variety of other styles, but none of them suited the image: they either looked too brash, or too forced, or both.

In the end though I think this slightly cross-processed look works a lot better, mostly because it splits the dawn light from the colder light that preceded it. It probably won't be to everyone's taste, but I'm pleased with how it turned out.

This is the second shot I've posted of this guy, one of my students from my Art of Black and White Photography workshop in Dubai and, while this one isn't nearly as dramatic, I do think it does a better job of capturing his personality: he wasn't quite as serious as my first shot would suggest :)

I spent about twenty minutes photographing this guy, switching between being fascinated one minute and cringing the next. And I guess the cringing must have been obvious because about ten minutes in he stopped, leaned over, and, in a slightly puzzled way asked me "Do they not do this to meat in your country?" And I guess they do, though maybe not quite on the same scale, but it's not something I'd normally watch.

And I do appreciate that it's a rather gruesome shot – it still makes me cringe – so my apologies to anyone who now wishes they hadn't seen it.

This is a shot of my good friend Issa AlKindy, posing on the helipad of the Burj Al Arab in Dubai. It's a shame we didn't have better weather – it was a very hazy day – but it was a great location to shoot from.

On the basis that my last couple of shots were rather unattractive – an abandoned microwave oven and a pile of goat's legs – I thought I'd post something a bit prettier today: one of the fabulous models we worked with during our 2013 Venice Carnival Photo Tour.

A few years ago now I realised that if I go someplace, and don't take a camera, I don't look at things. Or, more accurately, I don't really pay a great deal of attention to my surroundings: I just wander around, do what I'm doing, and the visual nature of my surroundings is definitely secondary to whatever else I'm doing at the time. When I do take a camera though, I see things differently.

And this shot is a good example: it's certainly not something I would have paid a great deal of attention too if I'd just happened to be walking through the market – I simply wouldn't have noticed the odd juxtaposition between the foreground and background.

That said, you might not see it either, but to me it almost looks like a bunch of flowers, possibly tulips, right up until you work out what it is you can see in the background.

Let me know what you saw first.

Another one of my fabulous students from my Landscape Photography workshop at #GPP2013.

What can I say about this one? Not a lot beyond the fact that it was shot in the desert near Dubai during my Landscape Photography workshop.

This is one of my students, shot during my Art of Black and White Photography workshop at this year's Gulf Photo Plus training event. My reason for shooting it was twofold.

First, he was a great looking guy. Second, I wanted to shoot an image to illustrate a point I make about converting portraits to black and white, i.e. that you can vary the black and white conversion process to either minimise or maximise facial detail. For example, if you use the Channel Mixer or Black and White tool and apply the Red Filter preset you can minimise facial detail (great for women and kids). At the other extreme, if you use the Blue Filter preset (as I did in this case) you can emphasise facial detail.

There's a counter-intuitive element here – using the Red Filter can make a portrait overly bright (there's lots of red tones in a person's face), while using the Blue Filter can make them too dark – but if you compensate for this using a curve you can create some very striking portraits.

On which note, if you're interested in learning more about black and white photography/post-production, take a look at my latest course on Udemy, The Art of Black and White Photography. It covers pretty much the entire black and white workflow, including portraiture, and usually costs $79.00. For the rest of this week though (up until midnight on the 24th), you can use the following link to sign up for just $39.00 and join 13K+ people who have already enrolled.

https://www.udemy.com/the-art-of-black-and-white-photography/?couponCode=chromasia_blog_offer

This offer is open to anyone, so please feel free to share the link.

Here's another shot from our Venice Carnival Photo Tour earlier this year, and I was going to post this one on Monday – to coincide with the public launch of our 2014 tour – but I'm putting it up today because we've almost sold out: there are just two places left out of a maximum of 12!

So if you think you might be interested in coming along, please take a look at the page linked below, and sign up asap. I suspect we're probably going to sell out very soon!

http://www.chromasia.com/training/events/venice_2_14.php

This was shot in the Fish Market in Dubai, and while I have absolutely no idea what he was trying to tell me, or show me, I'm pleased I took the shot.

This is the first of quite a few portraits I'l be posting from my trip to Dubai, and it's probably one of my favourites: shot in the Hindu temple in the Textile Souq during my Shoot the Street workshop for GPP2013.