Lister Blackstone No 1 Digger (Take 2)

click photo to enlarge

Sometimes, in the rush and routine of photography, I ignore my own advice. I've long known that it is best to look at and think about a photograph for a while before coming to an opinion about its merits. That's something I've advocated before on this blog. However, when I took my photographs of the old potato harvester that I posted yesterday, due to a dearth of acceptable fresh photographs, I didn't take this elementary step, and posted what I thought at the time was the best of my images. I got it wrong.

Not by a big margin, but wrong nonetheless. Moreover, I was wrong for a second reason that goes beyond making myself more familiar with the shots. Elsewhere in this blog I've proclaimed the virtues of different aspect ratios. I was a long-time user of Four Thirds cameras with their 4:3 aspect ratio. My current Canon camera outputs images at 3:2. The compact camera I use, a Panasonic LX3, offers both of those plus 16:9 and 1:1. After thirty years using a 35mm film SLR (3:2) I found the change to 4:3 interesting but not problematic. Moreover, after a while I found that I preferred it. I still do, though I find 3:2 is perfectly acceptable. The aspect ratios of 16:9 and 1:1 have their attractions for the right subject and composition. So, when I'd spent more time with my collection of shots of the potato harvester, I decided that, perhaps, one of the others was compositionally better than the one I posted. And, when I'd placed a 4:3 selection outline over the image to improve the composition further, I wondered how, after all these years, I could still make such an elementary error.

The answer to that question, I think, lies in photoblogging. Overall this blog has been something that has improved my photography considerably, giving me a focus, urgency and a widened range that has resulted in a keener eye and better shots. But a downside is that periodically my relatively high frequency of posting results in a dearth of shots and a posting date that is too close to the date I took the photograph. Hence, sometimes I haven't reflected sufficiently on the shot, quality control slips, and I post a photograph that, with hindsight, I could have bettered. So, today I post what I think is the better photograph as well as a detail showing the maker's name. Of course, that's only my point of view: yours may differ.

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 50mm
 F No: f11
Shutter Speed: 1/40 sec
ISO: 125
Exposure Compensation:  0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Lister Blackstone No 1 Digger

click photo to enlarge

Yesterday the Sinclair Spectrum home computer celebrated the thirtieth anniversary of its appearance on the market in the UK. I owned one of these machines and enjoyed the affordable introduction to computing that it provided. I can't remember precisely how long I used the Spectrum before I replaced it with a newer and more capable computer, but it can only have been a matter of a few years, such is the lifespan of this kind of technology-based hardware.

I was recently looking at a few pieces of rather older technology associated with vegetable growing, simple machines and tools owned by someone we know, which have had a much longer life than the Spectrum and have been used every year since they were first acquired. The photograph above shows one of them, the Lister Blackstone No 1 Digger, an implement used for harvesting potatoes. I'm no authority on such things, but from what I can gather, it must date from shortly after the takeover of the Stamford-based farm implement maker, Blackstone* & Co, by R.A.Lister & Company of Dursley, Gloucestershire, in 1936. Consequently it is about 75 years old. This particular example was the version designed to be pulled by a horse: a model for fitting to a tractor was also offered. However, the Digger shown above has a blacksmith-made bracket that allows it to be pulled by a small Ferguson tractor, something that happens annually when the potatoes are harvested from the smallholding where it resides.

As we discussed the machine I expressed reservations about it being pulled along a tarmac road to the place where it would be used - those notched lugs on the steel wheels would make for a slow, noisy and potentially damaging journey. However, I was informed that the manufacturer supplied steel rims that fitted round the wheels, locating in each notch on the lugs. One of the pleasures of quite a lot of older technology is the way that simplicity of design and durability of construction combine to create something with a life that can be measured in decades rather than a few short years. I took my photograph of the venerable machine at rest behind an old shed alongside other equipment and cast-off remnants that gave a suitably time-worn backdrop.

 * The name "Blackstone" rang a bell for me, and I remembered a blog entry of an engine nameplate that I posted some years ago. It is the same company.

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 73mm
 F No: f11
Shutter Speed: 1/60 sec
ISO: 200
Exposure Compensation:  0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On