The light is the key…

Posted on December 24, 2018 by Guthlac

For my sins I watch a lot of photography related vlogs on YouTube.   Some are really useful and most are mildly entertaining.   Perhaps the most interesting thing about their output is the divide between the young and old:   The younger vloggers are all about kit and equipment and noise and fury where as the older vloggers tend to have a more considered opinion on photographic kit and photography in general.  I guess this is art imitating life.

However, what is not mentioned enough in all of these vlogs is light – the one ingredient that most photographs need.   This morning I was able to explore the suitable effect that diffused light has on  my local park and it changed it into a menacing place – not least because the river was in full flow having burst its bank yesterday.   It was wonderful if a little cold.

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It’s manic out there….

Posted on December 23, 2018 by Guthlac

I have a very ambivalent attitude to Christmas.    For more years than I care to recall I have worked on Christmas day or night – strangely enough I can’t recall actually ever working on lates on Christmas day.   So my family Christmas could well be before or after the actual day and I always have a rye smile on my face when I hear people talking about working on or near to Christmas day.

Anyway this morning we went out and did our normal food shopping, Christmas for us had been on Friday due to other family complications.   What I didn’t think would happen is that our local supermarket car park would be almost full half an hour before shopping was supposed to start.   However, whilst the shop was busy most of the people who had parked their cars in the car park weren’t shopping there but rather across the way at the shopping centre.

As we sat drinking our coffee  watching the Christmas shopping mayhem below it was rather a relief to know that we had done all that and now Christmas day is just another day.   I wonder what we might get up to?

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Mrs Weber…

Posted on December 21, 2018 by Guthlac

The only way is up from today (well at least up here in the northern hemisphere).  Tomorrow the long haul to summer starts.  Thank goodness for that!

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Going blank…

Posted on December 19, 2018 by Guthlac

Oh the joys of a lack of sleep or is that getting older?   Not sure but out this came this image – I haven’t got the first clue if this means anything at all.

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Variations…

Posted on December 17, 2018 by Guthlac

So what have I done today?   Well let me see I have mapped out where all the medieval religious institutions were located in and around west Leicestershire.   I know this is a very niche pursuit but it is one I find very rewarding.

 

Apart from that I have prepared a selection of images to be printed and framed.   They are all images I have published on this blog before but this time I have cropped them to fit a square.

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It’s grim up north…

Posted on December 12, 2018 by Guthlac

What a totally unfair thing to say…I have had some of the most beautiful days in the North and of course ‘ …the North remembers…’.  In truth it has been one of those horrible days all round as far as the weather is concerned: not that cold but damp and dull.   The food at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park was very wholesome and just what you need to deal with the dull nothing of a day outside.

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A very long time ago…

Posted on December 11, 2018 by Guthlac

 

A long time ago I read the Arthur C Clarke short story The Sentinel.   It was the inspiration for the film 2001: A Space Odyssey and formed the first act.  In the story a structure of incalculable age was found on the surface of the moon.  The story ends with the transmission of a signal out into space – although Wiki suggest more but I cannot recall that.

This book flashed back into my mind this afternoon as I clambered over the rocks of Beacon Hill in Leicestershire.   This time the structure’s age – less than a hundred years.  However the age of the Precambrian rocks that it is sitting on are incalculable.  Actually that is not true as their age is known to around 561 million years, but they are some of the oldest rocks anywhere on the surface of the earth.  So unlike the structure sitting on the surface they have seen the rise of life on earth and no doubt will still endure long after we humans have passed into dust to be replaced by what no one can know.

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Polishing my arse…

Posted on December 8, 2018 by Guthlac

I suspect I may well be spending much of the day working on Beryl.

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Bag full of primes…

Posted on December 8, 2018 by Guthlac

 

If you are a photographer then there is nothing more enjoyable than walking the countryside on a cold winter’s afternoon with the sun slowly setting.   This is the golden hour for any photographer.   Through in a bag of primes and well you will have gone to heaven.    Nonsensical conceit  I know but it did feel a bit special yesterday as I took my new 25mm f2 out for its serious workout.   I have decided to move away from the weight of zooms and return back to to my roots with a bag full of primes.   It will take a while to truly achieve what I want to do but I’ll get there.

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Just a thought about Max Fac…

Posted on December 6, 2018 by Guthlac

This could be a country lane anywhere in the UK.   Nothing out of the ordinary and really nothing to see.   Unfortunately, come the 30th March next year this will be the border between the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the European Union.

Same as this.

And this.

Everytime I hear a Brexiteer talking about a no deal they always try to reassure people that all we are doing is reverting to our trading position before we entered the EU – back then it was called the Common Market.   However, in 1973 these lanes would have been blocked on the Northern Ireland side and there would have been army patrols along the whole of the border.   Also in 1973 253 people were killed as a result of this border being in existence oh and the patrols weren’t that effective!

So next time you hear someone banging on about no deal Brexit just spare a thought for the Irish on both sides of the border between the European Union and Great Britain and then ask how a no deal brexit will deal with this border?

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