This is a picture of The Orca – she is moored on the banks of the River Thames near St.John’s Lock, between Buscot and Lechlade in the Gloucestershire countryside – I think this just counts as the Cotwolds (especially as she is moored on the north bank of the river!)

I took this photograph on Saturday while taking a short circular walk – this part of the south bank is a permissive footpath, the Thames Path runs along the north bank at this point – using the Thames path would have meant retracing my steps – as you can see, the river is not very wide at this point, unlike that seen in recent days at the Thames Barrier and the Woolwich foot tunnel (some 60-70 miles downstream).

Lechlade (a mile or so behind me) is now the furthest navigable point for most boats.  At one time there was the Thames and Severn Canal that linked the Thames through to the River Severn at Stroud, but the Kennet and Avon Canal from Reading to Bristol was a shorter and more popular route – The Thames and Severn Canal ceased operating in 1910 – there have been plans to reopen it, but a lot of work remains to be done and sections are now filled in and tunnels have partially collapsed.

The original shot (above) was much wider than the final image – I decided to cut it down to this panoramic aspect (mostly due to a big patch of bland sky in the top right) – that part of the sky was blown out and I was unable to recover any detail.  I was going for the trees and their reflection in the water – but I still like the result.

The image above shows the post processing before exporting to SilverFX PRo – I had pulled back the highlights, lifted the shadows, applied some clarity and vibrance – I applied a graduated filter to improve the sky (though as mentioned, not much to recover from the top right) – I also used a brush to darken the dead grass on both banks and a separate brush to lighten the boat a little. The shot was also sharpened.  In SilverFX Pro, I converted to Black and White, applying a selenium tint and improving the contrast and structure.  Back in Lightroom, I cropped to the 16×4 aspect ratio to focus in on the boat.

Technical details

Fuji X-E1;28mm(XF 18-55mm f2.8-4 R LM OIS);f/5.6;1/220s;ISO200; Handheld; Processed in Lightroom and SilverFX Pro