Nikonmania - excuse for photography - the immortal capon - 1,000,000 candles!

Snow's forecast for Eastern England today. We've already had hailsones. I hope it does snow. I've got a lend of Brendadada's Nikon F-601, and heavy snow would give me a good excuse to get out with the camera.

"A good excuse", forsooth! Herself bought me that book Jarrovians for Christmas. (Any local readers can get a copy at the Baltic, it seems). The back-story is, Vince Rea's a local artist (he did the Jarrow Marchers' sculptures at the Metro station and outside Morrisons); he was formerly the director of the town's Bede Gallery, and whilst that gallery was being refurbished in 1978, he made a photographic study of the people of Jarrow.

Most of the photos are indoors, a lot of them in pubs. There's no technical information in the book, which is a pity. But I'd say most of the photos were taken on very fast black and white film without a flash. My main criticism would be that there's too much depth of field on most of them, but it is a documentary record so it could be argued that the backgrounds are important. I like most of the photos a lot, but it did occur to me that very few would be saved in the DMU group on Flickr. So perhaps my liking them is subjective. The fact is, Rea's managed to get in these situations with a camera and take these photos. That's the clever part about this sort of photography. One needs technical competence, but anyone can get that if they read their camera's manual carefully. One also needs social skills.

The three of us didn't venture out yesterday. Same today, possible photo-opportunities apart. There's an awful lot of capon left. So that's capon curry today, and soup tomorrow.

My Mam's bought me a 1 million candle power torch. I can't think what earthly use it'll be... but 1 million candles!

Comments

  1. ApprenticeThu Dec 29, 12:05:00 pm GMT

    Everybody's liking of everything is objective, of course. The fact that 10 random strangers might or might not like your photo is um, random. As you know, getting a picture in the Folio of the Safe isn't saying anything about the quality of the photo, nothing whatsoever.

    I'm surprised at you!

    See you tomorrow. I could pick you up if you like?

    ReplyDelete

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