Back in the mists of time, my favourite way to spend a day, was wandering around London. I found this in Bloomsbury, an area of central London near the British Museum. There are lots of small offices connected with the media and adertising – and I saw this card by the entrace to one of them. Looking at it, I’m wondering whether it fell deiberately or by mistake!
After what has felt like age, it has finally rained. In the UK we have had several weeks of hot weather, so this has felt very welcome.
I found this feather on some park land I like to walk on every morning – I’m trying to decide what sort of bird it came from – probably a seagull. It is amazing to see how oils on the feather repel the water, so that it forms little spheres (which act like mini-magnifiers). One of the beauties of the natural world, is how the closer you look, the more you can see.
As a picturesque city, popular with tourists, Bath has a number of small museums. The Holbourne Museum is probably the prettiest of all of them. A few years ago it had a major renovation and now boasts a very attractive cafe with views of Sydney Gardens and the canal. They regularly host medium sized exhibitions on mix of themes. Here as you can see – on gnomes – I should have gone in and had a look.
There was a time, when I used to travel by plane quite a bit, mostly short haul within South-East Asia. Most of the life to be seen was outside the window- hence my hundreds of views from above photos, but sometimes funny moments happened on the plane. My neighbour and I never really did meet. Might have been a character.
I like pictures which pose questions- “Why did they throw away two almost unsmoked cigars?”. Perhaps they were getting into a car?
Background info – Sanlitun is a very smart part of Beijing, where there a lots of designer shops and a number of countries’ embassies are based. Every day, armies of gardeners groom the neighbourhood trees and bushes and everything looks unnaturally neat and tidy. You will note that the cigars are the only things in the ashtray!
What do you think?
Happy New Year!
My first post of 2020 – is a sign for a bodybuilding club in Ho Chi Minh City!
I like the strong use of colour and text – I’m not sure they’ve got the proportions quite right, although the varying skin tones are quite impressive. I love a good hand-painted sign.
This is another ‘details’ picture.
I found it outside an office building in Bloomsbury, London. I suppose most of my interest is narrative- “Was it thrown or was it lost?”. Part of me wants to write a short story about it.
Most of my photos come from long walks. I suppose my camera is a dog substitute, encouraging me out the door in the morning.
While I sometimes enjoy taking pictures of people, more often, I take pictures of details I notice. Here, the tarmac round the access hatch has sunk and cracked, which to me looks a little like an eye and eyebrow.
Technical bits. I took this with a Rolleiflex on FujiFilm Provia 100. Slide film in 120 looks particularly jewel-like.
I didn’t really travel anywhere until I was in my thirties and even now (many years later), the list of places I would like to go is pretty long.
Anyway, once upon a time, I visited Helsinki over a number of months, lazing in the long, warm summer evenings and when winter came, shivering in the bitter wind that blew in from the Baltic. Helsinki is quite walkable, with clean, wide streets and friendly locals.
Technical Details
This picture was one of those things you just catch with the corner of your eye as you walk along. I was using a Nikkormat and 50mm lens with some colour negative film (Kodak Ektapress 400 I believe), which I have changed to black and white – ‘cos I don’t think colour adds to it.
One of the things I love about photography, is how it encourages you to look around you for interesting details. I saw this in a Kroger’s car park near where I lived (very handy). I’ve tweaked the contrast a bit to make it clearer – but to me it looks like dogs face in the oil leaks.
For the technically minded, I was using a Canonette compact camera and some colour print film.
