Six of the best from award-winning landscape photographer Paul Kingston

AWARD-WINNING Paul Kingston has built a reputation as one of the country’s best landscape photographers – and yet it all happened by accident.

Paul’s previous job was working as a youth worker for Darlington Borough Council and his hobby was watching his beloved Darlington Football Club play.

He happened to be on the terraces at a Quakers’ match in the days before George Reynolds built his stadium and, for some reason, the photographer didn’t turn up.

The commercial manager at the time, Ken Lavery, shouted across to Paul in the stands “Do us a favour” and that’s how an eminent career as a photographer began.

After learning the ropes as the football club’s official photographer, Paul joined the North-East’s biggest media agency, North News and Pictures in April 2002 and his career went from strength to strength.

As someone known for going the extra mile for a goood picture, he became North-East Photographer of the Year in 2005 and was voted Weather Photographer of the Year in a public poll organised by the Royal Meteorological Society and the Royal Photographic Society earlier this year.

“I just consider myself to be really lucky to do a job where I’m out and about in the midst of some amazing locations, capturing and sharing views that not everyone will get to see,” said Paul, a father-of-two who was born and bred in Darlington.

“We are so lucky in the North-East because we are surrounded by wonderful countryside – an hour from the Lakes, and close to the North York Moors, the Yorkshire Dales and the Northumberland coastline. We’re spoilt for choice.”

We asked Paul to select six pictures from his outstanding portfolio:

1. GAPING GILL: Near Clapham in the Yorkshire Dales, Gaping Gill is a fault in the earth’s crust which leads to a cavern so vast that York Minster would fit inside. In May this year, I photographed members of Bradford Potholing Club being lowered into the cavern. I enjoyed taking the picture because it’s out of this world – you wouldn’t imagine something like that being below your feet.

2. THE HOTTEST DAWN: This is Priest’s Hole, at Dove Cragg, in the Lake District. I’m always on the lookout for locations that I can go back to and I’d taken pictures there in the Spring for a feature about Britain’s cheapest bed and breakfast because food and foil blankets are left inside for walkers to use for shelter and nourishment. I returned on the hottest day of the year in July 2015 because I liked the way the sun lined up with the gaping window of the cave.

3. TORNADO IN STEAM: I’ve chosen this picture because it was taken from a perspective that had never been done before. It’s actually taken from the roof of a house that happened to have scaffolding on at the time so I was able to get up there and get this shot of Tornado steaming over the viaduct with Durham Cathedral in the background. There was a lot of interest in the picture from railway enthusiasts.

4. PERSEID NIGHT SKY: This was taken at a farmhouse in Forest In Teesdale in August 16 and is actually around 180 pictures taken over a few hours and then collated to show the rotation of the star trail around the North Star in the centre. It shows how spectacular nature can be.

5. SUNRISE NORTH YORKSHIRE: This isn’t the picture I set out to get when I drove to North Yorkshire in November 2015. I’d actually gone to get a shot of a lone tree I’d spotted in an empty landscape off the road to Leyburn but when I got there, I discovered it was in a military zone and I couldn’t go in. I didn’t want to waste the journey so I headed down to the Middleham Gallops. The sunrise was getting better and better and it was at its most spectacular just as the horses emerged.”

6. SUNSHINE SUNDAY: Taken in May this year, I like this one because it just captures the essence of England. The whites of the cricketers against the backdrop of Bamburgh Castle and a stunning blue sky – it says everything about England.