Scottish Nature Photography Awards: Winner Charles Everitt on Scotland’s botanical landscape

From delicate wildflowers to dramatic landscapes, this year’s Scottish Nature Photography Awards create timeless portraits of our picturesque wee nation. For this year’s winner Charles Everitt, Scotland’s botanical landscape provides the ultimate inspiration.

His picture Lily of the Valley, taken in Edinburgh, placed first in the Scottish Botanical category and was crowned the winner of this year’s award.

I developed an interest in taking photographs when I was in my late teens. I enjoyed producing mini-albums of landscape pictures taken during holidays. That sat as a latent interest until my knee bent the wrong way playing rugby forcing me to choose a more sedate pastime. I bought a better camera and initially set about taking landscape photographs of Scottish castles around Edinburgh and the Borders before developing an interest in wildlife.  I then set about photographing everything red – red grouse, red squirrels, red deer – and other wildlife while also learning fieldcraft in order to photograph the animals within the law and without disturbing them.  

By 1998 I was taking my photography seriously. I had a small exhibition of nature photographs at Edinburgh’s Festival Theatre. I am a self-taught photographer which meant I made countless errors along the way but that only accelerated my learning. I also enjoy a large and ever expanding library of wildlife and landscape photography books which provides a valuable reference to the types of pictures currently being produced by contemporary wildlife photographers.  

These days I am driven by photographic projects close to home in Edinburgh. They revolve around wildlife, landscape, wild flowers and natural abstract images; when all combined, they tell a visual story of a place or time. I usually draw my projects to a close by producing a self-published book to give a tangible record of the photographs taken and which I sell on my website. I also enjoy the challenge of entering photographic competitions which shows how your images stack up against those of other photographers!

Wildflower photography came to me when I was persuaded to examine an eyebright through a hand-lens. It blew me away. What I always took to be a tiny, nondescript, white flower actually contained beautiful splashes of yellow and purple in its petals. I promptly went off to buy a macro lens. These days I photograph wildflowers extensively and always look to give them a bit of an artistic feel. 

I first became aware of the flower Lily of the valley when we grew it in a pot at home. I loved the unusual, dainty flowers they produced. However, I had never seen it growing in the wild until I learned of a wood in the Lothians where it thrived. I attended in the spring and found an abundance of it. The opportunity was too good to miss and I spent a half-day grabbing pictures. I find that time passes so quickly when photographing flowers as I am constantly shooting, checking and refining the image, then shooting again until I am happy with the end result.  My objective with the Lily of the valley was the same as with all my flower photography – simply to produce an artistic and atmospheric image of the plant.

There is so much variety for the nature photographer in Scotland, I try to embrace it all. What I enjoy most about it is that it takes you to some wonderful places where you can see the most amazing things that nature has to offer. By spending time photographing the wildlife, flora, landscape and natural abstract patterns of a place, you are witness to all the individual parts that make up its beauty and can capture its true essence. I find that this all comes together wonderfully well when able to share the stories and the journey through a slide show presentation which I enjoy giving to groups and organisations.

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