DESPITE limited vision, the art of photography has brought out a new found confidence in an armed forces veteran.

After suffering a detached retina in his right-eye, Will Philips found his sight deteriorating and unable to see fine details and small objects.

The 57 year-old from Fareham, had trained as a photographer at the Portsmouth College of Art and Design as part of his product design course, before joining the Territorial Army in 1975.

Forced to retire due to ill health in 2011, Mr Philips, pictured, wanted to get back into photography, but wasn’t sure if he would be able to due to his poor vision.

He discovered the charity Blind Veterans UK, who helped him reignite his love for photography.

He said: “I have had to relearn some skills, as well as some new ones like using Photoshop.

“When I first got into photography It was all film camera’s but now it is all digital and it is about fine tuning an image.

“With my limited vision a lot of my images are guess work, but using Photoshop I can create an abstract image which looks nothing like the original.”

Since joining up with Blind Veterans UK, Mr Philips photographic skills were recognised at the Army Arts Society Exhibition, in London, where judges were impressed with is close up of a fist.

• To find out more or support the charity visit blindveterans.org.uk

The image was from a statue of a naval field gunner, at the Historic Dockyard in Portsmouth.

“I placed my DSLR camera by the fist and pushed the shutter button.

A pleasing lens flare also appeared luckily in the right position,” added Mr Philips.

Daily Echo:

“It was an experiment that happened to work out successfully. I prefer creating more abstract images in black and white compared to studio photos, purely because I would rather be out and about taking images.”

Blind Veterans UK plays an important role in helping blind and vision impaired exservicemen and women to adjust to life with sight loss and live full independent lives.