A Bootiful morning appeared out of nowhere the t’other day, so I dug my head outta the books and did a runner up the coast with Mr Nikon. I had an idea of gettin my self over to that there Orford Castle and flingin meself about, was thunkin panoramic. Now one of the things I like about old Orford castle is that its built from a light coloured stone that catches the Sun/Moonlight and really glows. Sunsets and sunrises make it almost luminous, its a sight to behold . . . . and its quite near a pub. What with the creaky bones and the unique “fall over a lot” aspect of my photographic style a medicinal pint of ale comes in handy every now and then.
So I get myself out there and its a truly glorious morning. I start off stumbling about and gettin in some handheld shots and only fell over twice. At this point I realise I’m a shooting with the ISO settings still at 1000 from the previous night. Doh! AnyHoo long story short once processed the images shot at high ISO’s were really interesting, lots of filmy type grain and all blowy and spooky. So I played around with the brightness bringing it right down in the shadows and midtones, which turned the sky almost black and made the castle really glow against it. Really pleased with the results. Tried one of the images with a subtle blue tone which adds to eerie effect. We like eerie
Not been able to do as much Blog wise as had I wanted of late. Far too busy busy busy.  Here be an image for you to critique. Found a friendly horse by the name of Magic up in that that Norfolk place. He was a very friendly and photogenic beastie. There’s lots a goin on it’s a very busy image with ducks and gulls all over the shop. If you look hard enough you will probably find Wally, or Waldo or what ever the stripey jerseyed buffoon is called, If you do let me know and I shall clone stamp him to death 🙂
I’m a big fan of ole H.P . .  Thats Lovecraft not the sauce. . . . .  Well thats not actually true as I am a huge fan of the sauce as well. A sossige sammich just aint the same without some H.P. IMHO.  Now there seems to be  two camps in the sauce war, (Yes there is a sauce war) those whom prefer Brown sauce (H.P.) or those whom prefer Tomato, or those who say brown for sossige and red for bacon.                                                                                                                        I however am not one of these, I take the rebel libertarian stance and cover my sammiches, chip,s puddings in all manner of saucy sacrilege. mayo on chips! Yay! Go for it!  A big box of meat and chips from the Kebab house smothered in Burger and chilli sauce, and then shaken like a flamenco maracas to ensure a proper level of coating of every morsel, Get in! Rules are there to be broken   (If you’ve seen my photographical efforts you will already know this ) Hot sauce with bacon, and I’m sorry to say Salad cream on every thing, those squeezy bottles just make you WANNA!
Ahem! I digress.
Yes, H.P. Lovecraft, I’m a big fan. Love the mental imagery of the New England fishing villages, “A Shadow over Innsmouth” the dark eerie moody horror that he conveys. When someone asks who is my biggest inspiration photographically I won’t peel of a list of famous photographers, i’ll just say “Lovecraft!”
So I was up that Norfolk place the other day and I thought I’d give ole Happisburgh a look before it all totally falls in the sea. Twas a grim stormy day and the rain was a leakin in all over the shop, just right for what I wanted, What do you lovely people reckon? LoveCrafty ?
There are some loverly splotches of rain on the lens, which I left on for effect. Ive deliberately under exposed and gone for a low angle to give the impression of distance and then given them a good old smack around the chops with the vignette fairy.
Ladies in pants on a clergyman I hear you gasp . . . . On an Abbott no less!  . . .  In fact an Abbot FV433 105mm Self Propelled Gun. Now thats not something you see everyday, well if it is I’m in the wrong job!
Took a blunder down that Essex place t’other day to go and visit St Peters on the wall. Now contrary to popular belief, Essex actually consists of more than Thurrock and its dire Ikea store, and that mind numbing bollox “The only way is Essex”  Reality Tv show, which is of the highest order of bum gravy. The countryside in the surrounds of St peters is properly chocolate box, that is if you don’t mind biting in to one of the chocolates and finding an old magnox reactor as a centre, saying that I prefer them to the praline ones. And to be fair as magnox reactors go, the one at Bradwell isn’t too ugly, I’ve seen worse. . . .  But then after a few pints I kinda find any nuclear reactor kinda funky, them beer goggles have a lot to answer for!  Ho Hum! I digress. . . .  The countryside around that part of Essex is fabulously old England with wonderfully quaint olde world villages and hamlets. In fact I am now planning an ale trip to Maldon, the home of several excellent breweries :o)
So myself and my buddy Andriy the Russky and his dog Tamm the unsociable arrived at the the little car park at the top of the track that leads to the chapel, and blunder off in a suitably jaunty fashion. Halfway down the track I noticed that there were two WWII pillboxes either side of of us in the fields. Result! Double Whammey! For those unaware, I have a little photographic project on the go called “killer views” where I hunt out nice warry looking pillboxes and bunkers and photograph them from the outside and then from within through the embrasures (Firing ports) to obtain the afore mentioned “Killer Views”.
So Orft I jolly well hobbled to the nearest one to poke it with sticks
Picture taken of me snoutin out the bunker, By Andriy Korol . . The Russky! on his phone.
It looked pretty funky up close, the embrasures were a bit overgrown so I swore at the brambles and nettles and gave em a good beating until they lay down giving a clear field of fire.
I then attempted access. Much swearing and cursing, they may have heard me in Kent! Some fecker had half filled the entrance with rubble. I have arthritis and suffer from terminal curmudgeonlyness, the ale takes the edge off but there is no cure. so any strenuous activity such as standing or sitting with out the aid of a cuppa tea brings the worst out in me, so having to crawl through bleedin rubble, well you can imagine. But I eventually got inside and added some more images to the collection. Grumpy, biffed and scraped, covered in burrs and nettle stings . . . Â But Triumphant! Huzzah! No one quite understands me . . . .
With another pillbox “bagged ” we then set off to st peters. Its a stark looking block of old stone full of foreboding and history, It had been standing for 0ver 330 years when The battle of Maldon took place in 991 and Brithnoth let his sense of fair play get the better of him and he lost to them thar pesky Vikings. It was very bright and getting the shot I wanted involved lots of grumpyness and swearing carefully placed filters, but overall I was pleased with the results.
Even though it was a lovely day with blue skies, and eric the little white cloud, the scene still portrays a sense of the the eerie, which is what I was after. So Results all around. I got the images of St peters that I came for, and bonus images for my killer view project. I shall return though as I think that the place would be even better with dark stormy skies, and this would please me greatly.
Tam the unsociable rests after a hard mornings weeing on things
It was as we were making our way back to the car that I received the text, ” Would you be interested in photographing ladies in their pants?” Â Intrigued I pursued the text, After further enquiries I found out that Tanks would be involved as well . . . . Ladies in pants and tanks! A good day out in anyones books. The shoot would be for a company that makes boxer shorts specifically for women. I agreed and eventually I undertook the shoot and had a great time, but thats for a future blog. However, I shall leave you with a taster :o)
HeyHo! Back to the blog. I have been an Uber busy bunny of late, with exams for boring business related stuff and hI’ve not been able to get as much of that old photomatography malarky in as I would have liked. So sat here this morn, all the admin and boring stuff completed but any plans for gittin out and about with Mr Nikon foiled by lots of wet stuff, it must be rain as the drought has been lifted . . . . I say lifted, more floated, due to the new rainy season that seems to have inserted its self between spring and autumn. HoHum! So I have delved back into the archives and spent some time processing, and I’ve had loads of fun messing about with portraiture this morning.
Got stuck into some un edited RAWs from a shoot that I previously posted about, Orthochromatic SteamPunkery and Wobbling in the Wind . Slightly harsher processing boot works well I think. That was a great fun shoot, must get some more of that in. Ive got some ideas bubbling around, just need to get organised. Here’s one to be getting on with, my friends being odd again, bless em!  Back soon :oD
I got some nice early morning shots of Maggi Hamblings sculpture on Aldeburgh beach t’other morning. It catches the morning light something lovely and goes through a whole range of metallic shades as it reflects the light. Supposedly a “controversial” sculpture it has built up a following of some pretty determined vandals, Vandalised 13 times so far, Personally I think it’s an asset to the location. Being a lover of the old sea food I’d love to see a real scallop that size. That’d give that bloke on  Man Vs Food a run for his money eh!
Thought I’d post a quick update on the previous post   Sunrises, Fishing Boats, Pillboxes and Onions .  Ive converted the shots from the pillboxes to mono and cropped them so there isn’t so much of blank darK concrete wall.  Objections on a postcard 😀
Well its been droughting so hard around here its been difficult to get out and blunder about and do any of that there photomatography malarky, whole rivers of that there drought have been upending the Royal county of Walesshire and turning caravan sites into marinas dontcha know! And over here in the desert lands of the East its been droughting so hard that parts of Essex have actually floated off towards that there Holland place . . That’ll learn em! Â Never seen such a drought!
So imagine my . . . less grumpiness t’other day when they said that the sun might show up for a couple of days, that constitutes a summer over here and we have several short summers every year. Ive been wanting to get out and experiment with different f-stops, timings, filters, blah blah blah and try some techniques wot I read about in some shiny magazine . . . Photography magazine before anyone says anything! And this was the gap in the drought that I had been waiting for.
So orft I blundered the next day to Aldeburgh to catch the sunrise on the beach. I found a good vantage point and set up me kit (It was supposed to be more about the experimentation than the view this particular morning) and waited for the sun to turn up. And then just as the first fiery glow of the sun hit the horizon I noticed a better spot further on up the beach. So a mad panic and dash ensued. I headed on up the beach clutching bag and fully extended tripod making more noise than a shingle extracting machine wots suddenly decided to become a shingle smashing machine . . but with added tourettes! Â I get to the spot just as the sun is a quarter of the way up and sort meself out and start taking them that pesky photos. Sorted.
Spent about half an hour blatting away until the sun got too bright and then my mind/stomach started to demand fried sustenance. Now it was only 5am and in that neck of the woods there ain’t a greasy spoon open until 6ish so my only option was to head on back home and start throwing stuff around the kitchen. So I packed up hoofed it back up the Aldeburgh road. Where I spotted this pillbox.
Now Ive seen this little baby many a time and its on my “To Do” list for my project “Killer Views”. Â And on this particular morning in the golden early morning light it was lookin particularly sexy . . . . Just described a 70 odd year old bit of concrete as sexy . . . Â Note to self “Seek medical attention!” Â so I threw the car into a ditch and had a go. The above shot taken from the roadside. Now thats not grass, or wheat growing all around it, them’s onions them is. Lots more surface area to retain water they have. I hadn’t packed my water proof trousers or me gaiters. By the time I got to the damn thing to get some shots from inside it my feet were a squelching around inside me boots, oh and I smelt of onions. Â But d’know from the results I think it was worth it.
These are pretty much untouched, I think some cropping maybe called for so as to bring more of the outside in to view, and I haven’t begun to convert to mono yet as massively busy with lots of other really boring stuff. But am pleased with the results so far 🙂
So I stuffed it into the wylde woods cat on the old blog. Can be viewed biggerer on the website, funnily enough in the wylde woods set. Cheers ears 🙂
EveryDay Paranoid Visions 