Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed and Something Blue

No Weddings were harmed in the making of this blog.

So, another day another blog!

Until 1858, all British passports were written in French.
In 1940s Britain, children’s TV was shown from 5 to 6 pm, then transmission stopped for an hour to encourage them to go to bed.

Oh, how the world has changed.

I bet you didn’t expect that as an opening to this blog. It has no bearing on the rest of the blog but who doesn’t like a fact or two and hopefully it was just a bit different.

I can promise this time round you will find something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue. We have a theme, not sure where this is going yet but if you follow along with me, we will find out together.

I did say that the opening had no bearing on the blog, however you can’t deny the link between Children’s TV and this first image.

Something Old

Can I just say this category is very easy to fulfil as we have so many images you haven’t yet seen covering several years. I did also want to reflect a sense of history if possible and that childlike enthusiasm we all had, hence this first picture. 

Who could forget Mr Toad a mischievousness, impulsive creature prone to become obsessed and get into trouble. Created by novelist Kenneth Grahame and appearing in “The Wind in the Willows” published in 1908. Is there not a little bit of Mr Toad in all of us?

These next images are old and old (see what I am doing it’s just like years and years, quick Eurovision quip, go Olly, or well-done Olly or commiserations Olly all dependent on when I finish the blog – got to cover all bases). A point in history captured 2016. Now at this juncture I could easily say things like, yes jumped in the Tardis for this one or went through the Stargate or put on a headset and a cybernetic me appeared in the past – without the headset Terminator with the headset The Peripheral (shame they cancelled it). As you know I am far too grown up to do such childish things so I will just continue.

Who could forget Greensted Church the oldest wooden church in the world, mentioned in the Christmas Blog this is an artistic version.

Now after that historical journey that I hope you enjoyed, just a few more images that were taken some time ago now. The first image from Portland taken in 2015 and the two lima pictures taken in 2014.
​So long ago now but seems like yesterday.

Something New

I have been playing with a program called Sweet Home 3D. It is actually a room planner, but I thought hang on, a 3d Gallery would in theory be just a room, right? So, I tried creating a 3d Gallery. It has a video and image capture facility, again I thought a walkthrough Gallery video. Well after some very frustrating days trying to get my head around how to do what I wanted I finally came up with something I thought was ok. Now to create an image and a video, this is where it didn’t quite go to plan. The image came out ok considering I started with just a blank piece of virtual paper. 

However, to render this with the lights on and good enough to see the images on the wall took over an hour. Not so bad as it run in the background while I got on with other stuff. To create the video to the same best settings would take in excess of 409 hours, that’s 17 days and the total just kept going up (yes, I did try it) so I gave up cursing that I had wasted all that time. Some days later I found that with the settings set at basic, which just does a daylight version, it would render in a few hours so I did it. It only renders at maximum 25fps so with basic settings it was just ok. I was still pleased I had managed it and you can view it here on the YouTube videos tab.

Then on a visit to my sons, I saw a PlayStation game, hence why the video is only on the website via YouTube.
Yes, that is the sound of very loud sobbing you can hear.

Moving on, many tissues and rude expletives later.

It wouldn’t be right not to show some “hot off the press” images taken in the last week or so.

Hiding in Plain Sight B&W

Hide n Sheep

Beauty and the Beast

VivoToon

Something Borrowed

I will start this off with little smidgens of advice that I have gleaned and remembered, which now days is no mean feat I can tell ya, from the tinternet telebox thingy.
 
Firstly, don’t be so hard on yourself, if you enjoyed the process of creating and like the end result yourself then that is all that really matters. It is very easy to be too critical of our work especially when comparing it to others, but if you like it that’s enough. Many dream of being rich or famous or both but statistically speaking we all can’t do that can we, so enjoy what you do.

That really applies to everything in life not just photography.

Secondly, like a famous sports brand says “Just do it” even if you don’t think your image is perfect just show it to people, on social media, in person or in print etc. Chances are someone will love it and most people won’t even notice the thing that you have been worrying about. I personally am guilty of this, I am far too critical of my own work.

Thirdly, experiment, try doing different things like street photography if you don’t do it, or try to create a walkthrough gallery by yourself. It may not all turn out fantastic but without getting things wrong we can’t learn to get things right. You don’t fail at something, you are just experimenting with a view to learning.

Thirdly + one, this is similar to the above but not the same. Do something that is out of your comfort zone, this could be asking someone to pose for a portrait, or try painting one of your photographs or if someone asks if you can do whatever. Don’t be to quick to say you can’t, think it over, it may be out of your comfort zone but is it really out of your skill set? Again, if you can do it, you will gain confidence and we could all do with a confidence boost now and then.
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Lastly, not advice as such, but how do you think about your photography? Do you look back at old photographs, you know, the place you were born, where you live now, things that happened in the past, whatever you class as the past? Well, if you do someone had to take and document that image for you to see it now. So, now I like to think that I am taking images for people to see in the future, now isn’t that a bit Sci Fi? See you never know when I will get a reference in. It may be complete rubbish and vanity on my part but I think it has changed the way I take images, some images I would not have taken prior to hearing this way of thinking. I will from now on.

As with the first image above, that we took in Pompeii, part of the image was borrowed for the resulting image below it. 

Now these two images above were created using ornaments borrowed from The Range. No, I don’t mean I stuck them under my coat and walked out of the building, I just took some mobile phone pics of the ornaments. You may have seen these before but I hope you will forgive me for using them again. 

Something Blue

No great epiphany here or even some suggestive mumblings. The final images just have a lot of blue in them, thus fulfilling my final obligation to provide the aforesaid something blue. 

Finally, I hope you enjoyed all of the information within, if not I hope you enjoyed the images presented for your delectation and if you didn’t why on earth are you still here???? 

All joking aside, thank you very much, stay safe, see you soon and be lucky. 

TTFN