About

There’s very little traffic on the extra mile-Jamie Peacock

My name is Martin Standley and I have been interested in the natural world all of my like. My dad used to take me out fishing, digging bait and gathering seafood for as long as I can remember. There is no doubt that this early introduction has given me a lifelong passion for being outdoors.

I first became aware of the power of digital photography when I was given a Nikon Coolpix camera for use at work. I remember taking a photo of a wall brown butterfly and marvelled at the detail that was captured in all 3 megapixels!

I moved on to digiscoping and bought myself a decent Kowa scope and used the Nikon Coolpix 8400 to reasonable effect given its limitations.

Unfortunately I was finding myself with some very good photographic opportunities but my kit wasn’t capable of delivering the standard I wanted. I particularly remember a bluethroat at Kilnsea that was skulking among the rocks and every now and then popped out giving stunning views. By the time I had located the bird through the scope and got the focus somewhere near, the bird had disappeared. All the while people around me with their digital slr set up were taking stunning photos.

So in 2010 I took a massive plunge and bought a camera and lens which  was very close to the top of the range at the time. I I had a Nikon D300s and a Nikon 500mm f4 lens. 

It took me a while to get used to it, but after a while I was taking photos that I could only dream of if I stuck with digiscoping.

I bought some more kit namely a D810, a 300mm f2.8 lens and a D500 camera.

All of that was great at the time but also very heavy. In 2025 I had another change and traded in all of my kit in favour of a Nikon z8 camera, and  z600 f4, Z400 f4.5 and z105 lenses. 

What a difference-the sharpness, and speed of this kit is off the scale.

Most of my wildlife photography is done at Spurn on the East Yorkshire coast, but also on the Humber, especially in winter, with the odd trip further afield.

I have become more focussed on my subjects as time has gone by and I have a few ongoing projects that I keep going back to. (Raptors in winter, waders at dawn, winter wildfowl and moths to name but a few).

I have found that learning about a subject and a place (taking things like tide, time, weather systems and season into account) has made my photography much more interesting and indeed rewarding.

I have been running wildlife photography workshops for a few years and whilst I don’t do it for a living, I find passing on knowledge very rewarding.

I have been inspired by various people in both my professional and photography career. None more so than Jamie Peacock (ex rugby league player). I was fortunate enough to work with him for a short while and one thing he kept saying was ‘there is very little traffic on the extra mile’. What he meant by that was if you wanted to be the best, you had to put in the hard yards. If it means getting up at 3am to be on site before dawn in summer so be it. If it means sitting out for hours on end waiting for your subject to turn up so be it. If it means spending hours and hours researching your subject so be it. Some of my photos have been taken when most people are just thinking about getting up. Jamie was right-there is very little traffic on the extra mile.

I hope you enjoy your visit and keep coming back to check out the blog or updates in the gallery.