Never waste an early morning

So our son needed to be at Heathrow airport for an 8am flight, but Heathrow is only an hour away, and by 7am I was back in the valley. The light from a slightly overcast sky was lovely, with the sun barely breaking through - enough modelling and shadow to give 3 dimensions but without harshness.

Images 1-4 were taken with a Nikon 80-200 f4.5 manual focus zoom at f5.6: I wanted enough depth of field to keep the subject area sharp, but shallow enough to soften the background. For image 5 I used an old Sigma 20-35 zoom at 20mm f9.5 to enable me to 'get right inside' the foreground and preserve good detail most of the way to the horizon and in the clouds.

These needed careful processing to try to acheive a natural look: conditions were very bright despite the overcast, causing deep shadows that needed careful recovery in some cases, and care not to bleach the highlights of the light toned flower and seed heads. The colour of light also changed according to whether the lens was pointed toward or away from the sun, being either warmer or cooler according to whether it was being reflected from or passing through the plants and flowers.

As far as possible I've tried to retain the light, delicate nature of the meadows while picking out points to catch the eye and lines to lead it through.