Dan

@theassentofdan.bsky.social

99 Followers 134 Following

Happy soloist, wanderer, photographer, writer, illustrator, and graphic designer - doing more of what I love and less of what I'm told. All images my © unless reposted or credited. www.etsy.com/uk/shop/PrintsByToornDesigns Hire me at: toorndesigns.uk

Noctule bat hunting a moth agasint a blood moon illustration by me.
A photo I took of a classic Morris Minor (I think) parked in front of the railway crossing barriers at the vintage railway near Pickering. An old deisel train is coming through the crossing.
A photo I took of a sunflower. Bright yellow petals and a ring of stamens around the geometric mandala pattern at the heart of the flower. A bumblebee collects pollen.
https://printsbytoorndesigns.etsy.com/uk/listing/4362515221/colorful-plankton-t-shirt-ocean-life
Black and white photo I took of Whitby pier and beach huts. Brooding sky and rain on the horizon.
Wild Tees is Tees Valley Wildlife Trust's membership magazine. They are a charity working for wildlife conservation in the Tees Valley. This issue features a Little Tern protecting the skies from a Herring Gull.
Shapes from sunset - an image I took of a sunset with some blurring and movement added. It appears a melange of reds and yellows and blacks with lateral movement across the image.
A photo I took one evening as the sun was setting. It's of a quite rural lane leading away into the distance where th sun is going down.
A black and white photo with a light-green colour grade. Depicted is a stone barn amongst stone-walled pasture.
Black and white image of a poppy I took out on a walk.
A black and white image I took of a plastic chair thrown away in an icy pond.
A photo I took of a Common lizard itting on a fencepost.
A black and white image taken in London, near Trafalgar Square (I think - I took it some time ago and can't quite remember). It features two tourists (?), a man and a woman, feeding the pigeons. The woman stands looking down, phone in hand to take a photo of the hundreds of birds around them. The man kneels in front of her, passing out seed from a paper bag.
A black and white image from a London trip. It shows a man laid-low by a life story I do not know and can only guess at. He's sitting slumped over on some steps outside a large wooden door. Inscribed above the door is: UNIVERSITY OF LONDON EXAMINATION LABORATORIES.
A photo I took of the Teessworks skyline near Redcar. The image is black and white. In the foreground a round-topped wall cuts across the image at an angle; a telegraph pole rises up to the left of frame and the wires mirror the angle of the wall below. The sun peeks through a dark sky and illuminates the sea between the gare, where I'm taking the photo, and the works in the distance. The industrial buildings are a hazy silhouette and slashed with many chimneys.
A photo I took of some kind of trifolium plant (not sure which) growing in a limestone wall full of moss. The green leaves have feathered edges that are just catching the light.
Came across this ramshackle old farmhouse while out wandering. It's barely holding itself together with the help of some big wooden props. The pantile roof is pitted with missing tiles, the roof-line is all wonky, the windows are boarded. The ruin of a barn lies next to it.
A photo I took of a sunset over a misty valley on the North York Moors. I added some horizontal movement to blur the colours slightly. It has a nice graduated effect from blues and blacks at the top and bottom of frame, through streaks of pink, orange and yellow nearer the middle.
This photo I took of a chatty Wren in the whsipy branch of (I think) a Damson sapling. They have compact little brown bodies and characteristically upturned tail-feathers and, for their small-size, have a really loud song.
A photo I took of a fibreglass water buffalo I came across while out exploring. It's painted gaudy red, oange, yellow, brown and black - with black horns and menacing red eyes.
A photo I took of a dead ash tree. I've treated the image to remove a lot of the colour, keeping only a pale blue in the sky; this has made the dead branches look like bones.
This is a photo I took of an LED warning sign telling drivers to take car of sheep on the road. It only illuminates when a car goes past, so I had to wait quite a while to get the right shot. I used camera movement to create multiple images in the one shot.
A photo I took of the wildflower Comfry. The leaves are deeply textured and the flowers are bell shaped and striped with pink and magenta.
This is a photo of part of an old barn. I've pulled the frame in close on the intersection between a brick column and the thick wooden beam that braces the roof above the barn opening. The red bricks are crumbling and the wood is old and craggy; dead ivy stems criss-cross the facade.
A photograph I took of a Turnstone walking along a pitted concrete slipway. A coastal bird with beautiful, if muted, plumage. It has a white breast, mottled brown wings, head and neck feathers, and orange legs.
A photo of a loan oak tree in a field with a hedge and a woodland of larch trees beyond. Experimenting with recolouring, I've dulled down the greens and turned up the reds and oranges in the sky.
A photo of mine taken while on a local walk. It's a black and white featuring an older gentleman riding a fat-tyred bike and wearing a leather bomber-jacket. When you're cool, you're cool for life!
A photo I took of a sky blue Morris Minor in a parking space near metal railings and a tree.
A Golden Ringed dragonfly on a grass stem eating a wasp.
A black and white image I took on a walk near Hawnby in the North York Moors. It features a lamb on a tree stump. The lamb has been given the number '20'.
An original illustration by me: wood block style art print of a smiling cat with the phrase "You're Purrrfect". In orange on a cream background.
A black and white photo I took of a beach tractor for towing small fishing boats out to the water. It's white bodywork looks bent out of shape. In the background is Saltburn pier, people playing on the foreshore and another tractor with the boat trailer attached.
One of my photos of a discarded dolls-head lying on the edge of a puddle. Black and white.
A photo of mine from earlier in the year featuring the common wildflower Coltsfoot. The photo is of a grassy bank with a patch of light falling on a cluster of Coltsfoot flowers, their many butter-yellow petals, and yellow hearts, making them look a bit like miniature sunflowers.
One of my black and white photos of an interior detail at the British Museum. It shows the triangular paned skylight, the classically-styled entranceway with columns, and part of the curving stairway.
Under the bridge, black and white photo I took looking through the arches of a bridge giving a repeating frame getting smaller into the distance. An old van is visible in the last window.
Abondoned shoe and shoebox I photographed on a trip to London. Black and white.
My photo of Skinningrove beach, looking along the sand dunes and crumbling cliffs. The sky is blue with white clouds and reflected in the water on the foreshore. The leading lines of horizon, foreshore and dunes, meet at a point where you can find an old and dislodged concrete pillbox. A couple are waling their collie dog in the bottom leaft corner and heading out of frame.
My photo of Puffins nesting on a rocky outcrop on the Farne Islands. The grey rocks are streaked with white from years of droppings. While there are many Puffins in the photo, the main subject is two puffins greeting each other with a 'kiss'.
My photo of the old - and now destroyed - Wilton steel works in Redcar. The massive blast furnace building with chimney stacks issuing steam, and lots of other infrastructure and buildings. The buildings and high-level conveyor housing make a triangular composition. There is grassland in the foreground and blue skies above.
My photo looking over steel grey waves towards Redcar. Rain clouds are abating.
My photo of Saltburn pier with a man in shorts and a black t-shirt walking his dog down the middle of the boardwalk. The sky is summer blue, the sea azure, and the leading lines of the pier railings direct the viewers gaze towards the man and his dog.
My photo of a vintage retro recovery vehicle spotted in Goathland. It's an old truck with rust and flaking red and black paint. The white hand-painted decals on the bonnet are very worn.
My photo taken under the A19 flyover. The clay-wight structures are streaked with black, and impossibly inaccessible grafitti. A shaft of light cuts diagonally under the roadway onto a parked van. It doesn't sound very nice, but I thought it was interesting!
This phot is of the South Gare lighthouse station near Redcar. It shows a typically moody grey sky with shafts of sunlight and squally sheets of rain out at sea. The puddles in the pitted concrete and the surface of the waves reflect the light. The features of the lighthouse station include: lighthouse, radio masts, some small buildings, and palisade fencing around the site.
A photo I took near Farndale. It is a landscape scene with a steel grey and cloud filled sky over a hilside with trees and sheep in a field leading up to the moorland edge. A rare moment of sunlight is creating wonderful golden contrast over the field.