Thursday has to be my favourite night. It’s almost Friday and The Gowlett holds it’s weekly 7″ singles night. All you have to do is turn up with four 7″ records of your choice and add your name to the board for a slot. Then eat amazing pizza and drink beer til your hearts content and dance, scream, or shout at whoever is playing. Awesome.
However we also have a record player at home and lots of records. So we continued on until the early hours of the morning. Not so hot the next day but great fun. Few pics below. Still sorting out a load of shots that I haven’t been able to process due to my laptop accident.
So in times of austerity it’s obviously good to make do and mend. It’s not just good money sense it’s also good to re-use and reduce landfill. My friend Shannon is very keen on the idea and has devoted a entire blog to the idea of “up-cycling” – quite a nice pun in this context but anyway. Whilst browsing lfgss.com the other day someone requested an old pair of SPD shoes that they could use to convert their trainers into SPD shoes. I was so taken with the idea I decided to offer my old ones which I’ve just replaced for the winter. The uppers were removed with a stanley knife by me before being chucked in a jiffy bag down to Brighton. All I asked for in return was a few photos.
Looks like a lot of hard work went into removing the rubber from the base of the soles but a pretty good result in the end I think.
Recently I’ve been using the Olympus a lot more for snaps recently. So there’s a fair few shots that have now come back from Genie Imaging which I need to upload to Flickr. Here’s a few from the first batch.
I love the quality you get with film. In this instance it’s Kodak Portra VC 160. Lovely stuff!
I met my good friend Simon the other day for a drink after work. We talked about Architecture and who’s doing what these days – we went to Portsmouth together. He also has an interest in Photography and asked me what I thought the best way to improve his skills was. I suggested that he do a little project such like my 365 in 2009. Obviously that’s quite a commitment so we went for 50 days of Black and White photos using only a 50mm f1.8 lens. I think reducing the options available will definitely help.
Took a few test shots this morning with the D700 and the Nikkor 50mm f1.8 AF-D. Pretty pleased with them, which is good really considering the cost of the camera. Will do something a bit more serious with them shortly hopefully. Feels a lot heavier in the hand than the D300.
I’ve finally got round to processing some pics from their wedding which was a few weekends ago now. Seem to think black and white suits weddings really so here goes. Going to get a few printed tomorrow to send to them.
On Weds I nipped down to Clerkenwell after work to catch a lecture by the ever knowledgeable Robert Elwall. I’ve previously posted about him as he runs RIBA Pix, of which I am lucky enough to be able to contribute to. I’ve been working my way through his book “Building with light” and a lot of the lecture was familiar from that.
The main topic of the lecture was to do with the way in the Architectural Review represented and almost pushed modernism with dynamic images and innovative graphics for a period of around 30 years. The lecture also discussed the changes in technology in terms of printing as well as photographic processes. The photographers Dell & Wainwright featured heavily in the lecture, they worked for the Architectural Review as staff photographers for 16 years! Ultimately it ended with a number of photographers almost turning against the movement and representing the projects in a less than favourable light. The move to 35mm and faster films allowed a more documentary style which was used against it. Hard to summarise but a great experience to see such in depth knowledge of the Architecture and representation of it at the time. Also good to do a bit of networking after.
And so as not to finish on a negative note Robert finished on his favourite image from the era.
So, it’s time for another upgrade on the camera front. If I knew what I know now I never would have bought the D300 last August, I would have saved a bit more and gone straight for the D700. The D300 is an incredible camera for sure but I really need to have a properly wide shift lens and that means going full frame. The 24mm PC-E is about a 36mm lens on the DX sensor of the D300 but properly wide at 24mm on the D700. That makes a massive difference when trying to do any kind of internal shoot. Recently I’ve been hiring the D700. I’m pretty sure it’s the right thing to do. Hopefully when the latest invoices get paid and I’ve sold the D300 on eBay I’ll have enough to get it.
All I have to do then is save some more to get the shift lens to avoid hiring that any more!
