ambientaether

My friend Mark did me a favour and let me go to photograph his friends band ‘Undersmile‘ at a Rock night which he runs with two of the band members. This was greatly appreciated as I am taking every chance I can get to practice.

I got some ok material but this was the first time I had used my Flash (an SB900 if you care) which is more complex than the camera and will take a lot of practice to get to grips with.

Here are the photos. Notes to follow…

Most of these were taken whilst attending a location photography course
in Oxford. The course did not really deliver what I had hoped and had zero focus
on any technical aspects.

Despite this, it was good for getting into environments I am not comfortable in,
namely people I do not know.

To a certain degree, a decently sized SLR says ‘photographer’ to people so they
label you differently and probably do not mind. Especially as I do not look corporate
or official in any way.

Despite this, directly taking a photo of someone you do not know without asking
is tricky. If I did ask them then that would change the whole dynamic of the moment.

The technical answer is simple Get a better Zoom or Telephoto and get the
shots from a further distance …

The creative one is better though. Go and ask them and just see what happens. It
is still fairly spontaneous.

So desperate to only display photos which I want to look AMAZING. This is causing several problems, the main one being that this somewhat arrogant criteria means that I have no photos to display.

Also its buggering up the bladder of creativity (or is it a gland?).

So … I will display anything and stop being a toff

We explored this old quarry and concrete works several years ago when you could just wander right in as there was not gate. Sadly this is no longer the case but I am glad I got the chance. This is probably my first ever foray into the world of filters for a camera. No expenses Lee filters here. No, I just stuck an eyepiece from my Laser Protection Goggles over the lens of my Instamatic Fuji and conjured instant apocalyptic beauty, simple, spontaneous and good fun.

I need to do more of this.

I visited Christchurch Cathedral (where some of Harry Potter was filmed (the Great Hall)) a few days ago hoping to improve on my last visit with my newly obtained tripod. Upon entry I was promptly told “No Tripods” in case I try to sell the images. A trifle stingy in my opinion.

By leaning sideways against a large pillar to stabilise myself as best I could I took this image which I liked and got a reasonable exposure.

I edited the RAW files in RawTherapee and also got my system using a colour profile for my Nikon D80. Sadly in Linux there seems to be no way to set a specific profile for my screen. …

The Stokenchurch BT Tower visible on the M40 between Oxford and London is strange site. As a young child the tower used to be taller than it is today before the removal of a large upper portion containing an extensive metal superstructure.

Later on in life when I became interested in abandoned sites and anything cold war related I learned of the purpose of the Stokenchurch Tower and how it formed part of the Backbone relay towers.

More information can be found here:-

SubBrit

I contacted BT to see if it was possible to arrange a tour with SubBrit but I was sadly declined.

Still it was possible to get these photos without trespassing. A main road runs close to the tower and you can get quite close to the perimeter.

Festive Photos. Brambles, Mistletoe, Baubles … you can tell the inspiration in running wild …

I really am just not a blogger type person.

I never kept a diary when I was younger and I find it hard to find things to type about. This is compounded by the fact that I find most online tools inherently confusing (especially the ones that claim to be user friendly).

I have neglected this site in favour of my deviant art account for several months.

Having streamlined its purpose (just photography and no geek), things will hopefully rattle along more smoothly.

The enthusiasm!

The comfort zone of doing things you think you understand is a hard thing to escape from. On the photography front buildings are great, plants ok and people impossible.

This weekend I stayed at my grandparents house in the village of Blewbury. Blewbury is a famous little quaint village in Oxfordshire. Kenneth Grahame lived there for a while and the village sits by the Ridge Way. Aside for the power station at nearby Didcot, the place is beautiful.

Once a year there is a national open garden festival. Well it is a nice excuse to wander sleepy pathways and thatched roofs, a take photos of more horticulture.

As you can see round one is definitely of the Bumblebee variety. I’m working through the RAW image files and will get more up tomorrow…

Leafy Symmetry

Just got back and am very sadly back to work. Following a 3 year break from the Whitby Goth festival I went with Marina and stayed with friends and had great fun.

Whitby is a famous place historically. It features prominently in Bram Stokers Dracula, saw a synod in 664 AD and is the place where Captain Cook’s ship the Bark Endeavour was launched. Picturesque with an awesome ruined abbey it makes a great place for a subculture riven with vanity.

Below are some photos… If you happen to be anyone in them and are not happy, email me and I will remove them.

I could blather on about fashion trends for ever and it is always fun looking at the latest styles and comparing them to the past. A few years ago at Whitby, the whole Cybergoth thing kicked off and loads of people sported plastic dreads and an endless array of over the top goggles which provided less protection that a £2 pair of glasses from a petrol station but looked like something the Terminator would be intimidated by. Now Cyber has settled down to become part of the general background goth radiation. In its place has sprung the Steampunk. Steampunk is a parody on the word cyberpunk and most importantly, both were pioneered by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling (I’m certain others are in there too but i’m just not esoteric enough to know, so sorry). Think of a Victorian world which developed Babbage’s Analytical Difference Engine and brought about information processing a century (thereabouts) early. However everything is mechanical with cogs, gears and punched cards in place of transistors and silicon. Steampunk embraces this style and is basically Victorian with extra brass nobs. The Anime film Steamboy offers a nice insight into this type of world for those wanting an easy explanation.

Whitby 2009 saw Steampunk as the next cybergoth fad. Huge groups of people all had the same goggles covered in brass cogs, remontoires and fiddly bits. They looked great and someone is making a fortune. Once again though, it is fun to stare at the victims of the trend (even though I quite fancied a pair myself).

A good friend of mine enjoys film making in a deliberately B movie fashion. Frequently using only a handheld basic digital camera and IMovie with all pretensions thrown down the loo. He makes some very funny material which has that tongue in cheek humour which make films like Evil Dead so great and paradoxically so satisfying (just much much shorter).

A few Saturdays ago we wandered off to an old WW2 airfield here:-

RAF Broadwell

Carterton ROC Post

And spent the morning doing a 5 minute short film about me being murdered for not paying two assailants an owed debt of £1.50p. Throughout I wore a burlap sack over my head and was screamed at and hit with crow bar. We had great fun! Especially when cars drove past and concerned faces peered from windows.

A YouTube link will appear in due course but whilst we were getting ready I took some deliberately high ISO shots of Mark, Darren and Alex wandering off up the old airfield surface. I was indulging my love for the post apocalyptic feel here ~ Welcome to the time of the after ~ . I will be working on more deliberate high ISO’s in due course which I adore. For now, it was good to take a photo which is technically lazy and requiring no skill whatsoever yet which said everything I could possibly want.