As we stood among the enthusiastic crowd, cheering for our daughter and thousands of other runners, we couldn't help but feel a sense of pride and excitement. This year's London Marathon was particularly special for us, not only because our daughter was participating, but also because it presented the perfect opportunity to test our new camera. The energy in the air was palpable, and capturing those precious moments of determination and triumph was a truly unforgettable experience.

I do love the AI tool built into Paragraph! It took the very small amount of info that I gave it in the title and sub heading text after all!

I've started to write some posts in advance of events or explorations taking place, it gives me a little headstart when it comes to going through a large number of photos that I take on the day and to write up my journal, which is what Nick's Paragraph is and what I think I wish to continue using it for.

An early start to the day in order to reach Canary Wharf (on the 19 mile marker) for the start of the marathon, my wife and I met up with Matt, our son-in-law who is with our two granddaughters and in my pocket, as I alluded to in the title of this post, is a new camera. Oh yeah, not bought a new camera in quite awhile, it's been 5 years! Matt had accompanied Alice to the start at Greenwich and then caught the train to meet us at the location we chose to watch the race and spend the best part of the day. We found ourselves outside the shiny KPMG offices, where there was some shelter from the rain and room for the children. Loads of space and the crowds were nowhere near as heavy as they once would have been.

Now I love my Sony system but there are times, when travelling around, I want something that sits between the A7R3 and my current iPhone which is of a decent quality. I follow people like James Popsys, Sean Tucker and Neale James have all used, reviewed, bought and raved about the two versions of this camera. The GRiii with it's 28mm equivalent lens and the one I've just bought, the GRiiix that has a 40mm lens. I deliberated over which I wanted to get and tend to prefer images with a tighter framing, as that fits with my style of photography best, so will be great for street photography and documenting events; the London Marathon being a great one to photograph, plus we are travelling to Madeira soon, more on that in later posts.

I used to be a press photographer and one of the very first events I ever photographed was the Great North Run that takes place up in Newcastle's Gateshead and finishes on the coastal town of South Shields just north of Sunderland. I got my first ever published photograph (Paula Radcliffe broke a world record) that day in September 2003 and my daughter took part the day before in the junior run. She is now 31 and would have been 11 all of those years ago, so 20 years later, she gets to take part in her biggest event to date. She has taken part in a number of half-marathons and the Brighton Marathon, so she can most certainly do it with relative ease.

Anyway here are the photos I chose as my highlights from the event.