bikes and things

Whilst I’m a massive fan of Instagram I do feel a bit weird when I see it being used for photojournalism. For instance the other day I saw that a journalist I follow on Twitter was using it to show images of an EDL demonstration he was covering. I feel it’s completely the wrong medium for something like that but there’s also a wider issue of recording historical events with what is essentially a crappy square photo with a filter on at poor resolution.

This is neatly summed up in a blog post by photographer Kenneth Jarecke noting on the lack of quality images during the recent storm in the US.

Link via Dave Morris.

I know it’s not big or clever to race your fellow commuters but two things do give me a sense of smugness little smile on the way home most evenings.

The first being the traffic lights coming from Covent Garden onto Waterloo Bridge. Each evening I wait, let the pedestrians go and then gently catch every single person who ran the red. No racing, just keeping a nice pace.

The second has to be the lovely smooth tarmac along Kennington Road. It’s nice to get into a nice smooth rhythm along there on the fixed and keep spinning. Not too fast but just enough to cruise along at a decent pace. There always seems to be someone beside or just behind me who wants to race, head nodding, bike creaking, d-lock rattling and a gentle pant. The smoother you pedal the more enjoyable it becomes as you gently pull away. I’m quite happy not racing but it’s still good to win, as well as making it look like you haven’t made any effort.

There’s a new cycling blog in town and it’s not run by cycling vigilantes or nut jobs moaning about the state of two wheeled travel. This one has an overtly positive stance for those of us who enjoy cycling around for whatever reason but don’t enjoy the crap blogs that normally go with it. It also brings great photography along with it which makes me like it even more.

There’s been a couple of great articles already such as the With Associates studio interview as well as the recent interview with Lawrence.

We want to change the way our readers think about cycling in London, whether that means finding a positive slant on biking in the rain, challenging the way that we think about urban transport, or refuting common wisdom about, say, helmets or traffic lights.

Cycle Love is about the stuff that makes cycling great, and celebrating the diversity of cycle culture — bikes *and* people.

It feels like it’s a site for people who cycle but aren’t, or don’t necessarily want to be labelled as, cyclists. Maybe that’s putting words in their mouth, but I think the only way cycling is going to get better is when you don’t have to be a cyclist to do it and we embrace it as the best form of transport for the city.

You also should buy a T-shirt from them.

Busy day of drinking, eating and socialising yesterday which was pretty tough. Firstly a trip to the new Hawksmoor restaurant on Air Street with Emma for a 50% off soft launch lunch. The food, cocktails and service were all superb and set in an incredible art deco style dining room, and of course the company was rather good too.

The off down to the Southbank and Concrete to catch up with my sister and her friends who were in town for the day. We quickly exited the Southbank due to everything being utterly rammed as usual so headed to the Kings Arms. Nice to not be at work and just relaxing.

Nice to get a rare shot of weequizzie sans hands in front of face.

And lovely to capture my charming sister too after a few glasses of wine. Maybe it’s time for a beard trim too.

A while back now but only just getting round to editing some of the shots I took including this cracking view from the B&B we stayed in. A touch of a grad filter added in Lightroom to bring out the detail in the sky but otherwise pretty much as shot.

Some great cartoons related to cycling over at cyclingcartoons.com Two of my favourites below, the bikes in the shed one is particularly brilliant.

Images © Dave Walker

I’ve done this ride a few times, start at the Design Museum and pick up the Thames Path all the way to Greenwich and beyond. Once I even ended up at the Woolwich Ferry and cycled back along the North side. This time it was only to past Greenwich and back but still good to get out after a prolonged period of working late to get my project out to tender.

I also wanted to re-engage with my camera after just using it for paid work I thought I’d do some for pleasure. Just for me and see what I could find, a kind of a mini project in a day. Taking the tripod and camera on my bike way fairly hard work but well worth the effort to document some of the spaces along the South side of the Thames. Unfortunately I didn’t make very fast progress on my bike as I kept on seeing things to take pictures of.

The context of the ride is slightly strange – going from the wealthy areas surrounding the Design Museum through some rougher looking estates, past light and heavy industry, gravel pits, vents from tunnels, new cheap looking housing schemes and a few tourist attractions in between. There were reminders of industry past throughout as well as the looming presence of Canary Wharf and newer developments.

I couldn’t have picked a nicer day, misty at first but brighter later with some surreal Autumn light towards the end of the day. Some of the images were a bit off due to the swing on the lens being engaged when I grabbed it out of my bag but I’m pleased with the selection I uploaded to Flickr late last night.

One of the nicest things was getting out on my bike and being totally relaxed. I didn’t rush but cycled at my own pace, looking around and taking it all in. I also met a few interesting characters along the way including an Indian couple over here to see the sights who were fascinated by the camera and also my bike. A few of my favourite images are below. I might do this as a regular thing and just pick a different route each time and see what I come across. Maybe a lighter tripod next time though.

And to top it all off I got the Thames Clipper back from Greenwich seeing all the same sights from a completely different viewpoint. A superb day out.

My heart has always been in mountain biking, even though I own a road bike. Given the preference I’d rather ride a trail and get muddy than zoom around on the roads. This video is about as close as anything has got to tempt me otherwise though with its stunning scenery and sense of exposure.

I’ve just pre-ordered what looks to be an amazing book on the UK hand built cycle industry which I found via It’s nice that*. Entitled Made in England it looks like a fascinating read as well as being full of some great photography.

Images © It’s nice that

I became interested in this kind of frame building when I had a trip to Witcomb cycles to interview them with Vaughan for living South Magazine. I was shooting some pics for the article at the time (my photography has improved since).

I’ve no idea why I used to add these stupid black borders to images in 2008.

Witcomb were interesting in that they had been building hand made steel frames for three generations in Deptford. They discussed the decline of frame building in the UK as well as the fact that historically most independent shops would have built their own frames – including the megacorp that is Evans! Alas Witcomb are no more after some terrible miss management from a new ‘business partner’ which was well documented on lfgss.com a few years back.

So what is left now is a series of independent frame builders such as Robin Mather, Dave Yates as well as newer entrants to the market such Feather Cycles. It’s good to see that the there’s a seemingly growing market for these brands and this book records the work of this highly personal and hands on craft. Dave Yeates also runs a well subscribed frame building course which I’m very tempted to sign up to. Considering there’s a two year wait it’s probably worth signing up now.

Images © It’s nice that

If you pre-order the book on their site you get a signed copy and a poster of your choice with it when it’s released, presumably in a few weeks. I went for the Reynolds one.

Having searched around for this post I also found a great section on the Rapha site with a series of videos and blog posts. It’s a shame they list the US first rather than the UK but never mind. Here’s Robin Mather talking about his work in Bristol.

* Most of the things on here seem to come via It’s nice that or With Associates these days so you’ll have to excuse the fanboyism please.

Emma and I have recently discovered the joys of the South London Gallery which is 5 mins cycle from us. They do a fantastic breakfast and the coffee is top notch. They’re housed in a beautifully refurbished and extended building by 6a Architects. They have a superb bookshop and the staff are all seem to be super friendly and helpful.

We recently went and saw the “Pursuit of perfection: The politics of sport“, the most interesting bit was this installation by Aleksandra Mir named Triumph. It consisted of 2529 trophies bathed in glorious sunlight in this amazing space. Some of the trophies were completely bonkers and so over the top. Others consisted of ridiculous figurines doing all sorts of sports. The nicest thing was that when I asked to take a picture there was no problem. It kind of threw me a bit at first but was great to be able to record the space without resorting to secret snapshots with the phone.

The space in which it was presented was superb and my eye was quickly drawn to the chunky original door ironmongery on the door at the end of the room.

Hard to get a sense of scale from this but it was massive and still worked perfectly well. So many nice little features to discover in this place. Will probably be there again next weekend drinking coffee and enjoying the atmosphere.