bikes and things

It’s taken me a while to get round to posting this since seeing the film McCullin at the ICA as I feel it’s taken some time to digest. The film is based around an interview with the photographer Don McCullin and interspersed with his images from various conflict zones from around the world as well as the occasional video footage. His editor at The Times also comments on a great deal of his work. It’s by no means an easy film to watch but the power and shocking nature of the imagery as well as his descriptions needs to be seen.

I love photography, I love being in my darkroom, but even my darkroom is a haunted place.

His piercing eyes never waver throughout the film and there’s a level of intensity within him that is hard to describe. He often questions himself and his role in the events that took place as well as discussing the “sheer madness of it all”. The horrific suffering is hard to watch without flinching in places.

The toll which it has taken on him as an individual is clear to see and this quote seems to sum up his issues with his chosen career.

I have been manipulated, and I have in turn manipulated others, by recording their response to suffering and misery. So there is guilt in every direction: guilt because I don’t practice religion, guilt because I was able to walk away, while this man was dying of starvation or being murdered by another man with a gun. And I am tired of guilt, tired of saying to myself: “I didn’t kill that man on that photograph, I didn’t starve that child.” That’s why I want to photograph landscapes and flowers. I am sentencing myself to peace.

The trailer is below and also Mark Kermode’s review which is far more eloquent than my description. I’d highly recommend watching it or buying the DVD.

A few weekends back we had a weekend away to visit Bexhill, walk around, eat chips, admire dogs on the beach etc and then went to Eastbourne to stay in a supposedly “Boutique” hotel for the night. I’ve only just got round to start processing my shots from the X100. I seem to be taking more photos than I have time to edit right now but here’s a few of my favourites so far.

Having a camera with me at all times I usually end up taking lots of photos of my friends enjoying the events I take part in, with few decent photos of me enjoying the same events. So if you’ll excuse this ever so slightly narcissistic post I found a couple of cracking shots taken by friends I usually capture.

Firstly a superb shot at the top of Holmbury Hill.

Then a shot of me using said camera I often hide behind whilst down in Brighton for a wonderful day out with Jim and Finn, taking yet more photos.

And finally one more shot of me riding in the snow a few weeks ago.

That’s enough for now I think.

Yes I know it’s been all over the internet all last week, but just look at it. You couldn’t imagine how long you’d have to wait to capture something like this.

I recently had the pleasure of watching the fantastic Bill Cunningham New York documentary with Emma. As the name implies it’s about a man called Bill Cunningham, as I’m not being entirely versed in the fashion world I hadn’t heard of him before. The first time I’d heard him mentioned was in the aftermath of hurricane Sandy where he was still out shooting photos on his bike whilst the whole city was shut down.

He’s a fashion photographer who has been taking shots on the New York street since 1978 according to his wikipedia entry. He’s now well into his eighties and is still shooting each and every day on his trusty bike. His work predates much of the current fashion imagery we’ve come to expect.

He has seemingly devoted his life to the art of photography and fashion and yet not sought any real financial gain or stardom. His quotes and insight, especially on money, are inspirational in themselves.

If you don’t take money, they can’t tell you what to do, kid. That’s the key to the whole thing.

And yet more genius.

Money is the cheapest thing. Freedom is the most expensive thing.

Those quotes on their own don’t mean much outside of the context of the film, which is inspirational in so many ways and I’d recommend watching to anyone. It’s hard to describe but you get the sense of such a decent human being enjoying everything he does in the world without worrying about anything insignificant. I can’t resist one more quote on his attitude to work.

I don’t work, I only know how to have fun everyday.

Watch the trailer and then go and buy the DVD. It’s utterly brilliant!

I’ve almost entirely stopped using Instagram these days. It’s been relegated to the second page of apps for now and whenever I do glance at it there does seem to be a lot less images in my feed.

However I am still using it for my scaffold obsession. Maybe I’ll only post scaffolds on there in future. Posting less seems to have resulted in more likes bizarrely enough, maybe less is more and all that.

Here’s a few of my recent shots that I’ve been particularly pleased with. As my project at work starts on site next week I’d imagine the opportunities will infinitely grow from now on. Maybe I’ll do another post on why I actually like scaffolding sometime.

The fabulous blog about cycling riding bikes turned one year old on Tuesday. As is befitting of a birthday a party was held at Look Mum No Hands, situated neatly on the hipster highway from East to West.

I went along with a few friends and also managed to meet a few others I hadn’t seen for a while. I also managed to meet a few people I’ve been chatting with on Twitter but not met IRL (In Real Life) before. Yes the abbreviation is kind of ironic. Anyway, the beard seemed to help people recognise me which was good – that icon Meg drew for me is still working out well.

James was there doing his raffle which unfortunately I didn’t win anything from. There was a great turn out and the place was throbbing by the time I got there at 6.45. I had also offered to do some pictures so took my camera. I also brought a flash but didn’t like the look of the shots so went up to 2000 ISO and for the most part shot wide open at ƒ1.8. The problem always is trying to get enough light in for a decent shutter speed and having such a narrow depth of field. Anyway they came out ok and I’m pleased with a few of the ones below. Cycle Love ran a few of the colour ones on their site but I preferred the black and white ones.

Looking forward to the next party!

Pretty much spot on*.

By Louis Hellman.

*I do prefer to have people in my shots though.

Our Brighton correspondent, Finn Hopson, has taken a break from long exposure photos of the pier and captured a couple of corkers of Brighton in the snow.

You can see the rest of his excellent work on Flickr.

I’ve saved up a fair few of those funny light sensitive things in little metal canisters this last year and finally got round to posting them out to Genie Imaging*. One of them was just blank which I had expected, but still annoying. Fortunately the rest came back ok on a CD. It was at that moment I realised that both of my computers don’t have CD drives any more. Ahh well the office PC still does.

*Their website is awful but their processing is great.

I’m really pleased with them and that probably has nothing to do with me. The quality in the film is just sublime. It’s also amazing to see events that happened so long ago recorded like this. In fact one of the films was from my 30th which was three years ago. I’m gradually uploading them to Flickr but I’ve added a few of my favourites (so far) below. These are a mixture of two cameras – the Nikon F801 with a 50mm prime and the Lomo LC-A. Film stock was either Ilford HP5 400 for the B+W or Kodak Portra VC 160 for the colour.

One thing I was slightly surprised about was how much I liked the black and white shots. I’ve almost entirely stopped doing any digital black and white work as it never seems to fit. I always ending up thinking it looks better in colour when editing in Lightroom.

And of course my favourite shot of all…