Vaulting, Southwell Minster

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The chapter house at Southwell Minster in Nottinghamshire, like most such buildings, is polygonal, in this instance octagonal. A few are rectangular. What makes this particular chapter house differ from other polygonal examples is the lack of a column rising up from the centre of the floor to the centre of the vaulting above. Looking at the pattern of ribs that spring from the walls between the windows and the complexity of the ribs and bosses, one can imagine that a central column would have made the building of the roof over this beautiful space considerably easier. However, that ease would have been bought at the expense of the clarity of the view that the members of the chapter would have had of each other as they sat on the seating built into the walls: they would always have to lean to see the person opposite them!

Most photographers with an interest in architecture gravitate to Southwell's chapter house for the beauty of the naturalistic carving of the capitals of the columns. These represent identifiable leaves and plants, and were executed in the Decorated style around the year 1290. Every time I visit the Minster I photograph them. However, since I hadn't photographed the vaulting before that was what I concentrated on during my last visit.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Photo Title: Chapter House Vaulting, Southwell Minster, Nottinghamshire
Camera: Olympus E-M10
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 9mm (18mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/60 sec
ISO:000
Exposure Compensation: -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Fourteenth century door, Southwell

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In medieval Gothic architecture an arch that is convex below and convex above and sweeps up to a sharp, tapered point is very characteristic of the fourteenth century. Such a form became fashionable at that time and appeared in window tracery, tomb canopies, blind tracery, door surrounds, wooden doors and much else. It is called the "ogee" arch and such an arch is described as "ogival". Another term used to describe this "S" shaped moulding is "cyma recta".

We visited Southwell Minster in Nottinghamshire recently. It is a relatively small major church, cathedral-like, and is mainly of the twelfth century (Norman period) and thirteenth century (Early English period). As we entered the building through the north porch I stopped to admire the wooden doors through which we were about to pass. They were so clearly fourteenth century, very sculptural, and so well lit that I had to photograph them. The sinuous moulding that decorated the surface had ogee forms at the top and bottom of each cell indicating its date. However, that pattern, very like a net pulled taut, also suggested the fourteenth century. It too has a specific name: architectural historians call it reticulated (meaning net-like) tracery. Within each shape I could make out the worn forms of quatrefoils, four-leafed shapes also much used in Gothic architecture.

It was clear that the door had survived because of the shelter from the weather that the large, vaulted porch provided. However, the wear of everyday use over a period of seven hundred years was evident in the worn mouldings, splits, knocks and gouges. Sometimes on such doors the metal-work is also original, frequently worn very thin through long use. Many of the large headed nails looked as though they dated from the time of the door's construction. But, the door handle, though rusted and marked, hadn't the wear of centuries and it is probably a Victorian replacement.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Olympus E-M10
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 12mm (24mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/15 sec
ISO:2000
Exposure Compensation: -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Incidental photographs

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Some of my best images I think of as "incidental photographs". That is to say, they came about when I was engaged in other business. In other words, I hadn't gone out with the express intention of taking photographs, I had other things in mind, but I had a camera with me "just in case". If I'm visiting my family in another part of the country I carry one. Shopping in town or city, one is with me. When I take the car for its service a camera is in my pocket. If I ... well you get the picture. And so do I!! It's an often repeated truism that the best camera is the one you have with you and, by and large, I've learnt my lesson on that score.

I've done this for more years than I care to remember, and my "go everywhere and anywhere" camera has always been a reasonable quality, small, pocketable device. It's currently a Sony RX100. Prior to that it was a Panasonic Lumix LX3. I had the Sony with me recently when we popped into Spalding for some shopping and I took a photograph of the Sessions House, a stone-built, castle-like, court building of 1842 by Charles Kirk senior, as the low sun illuminated the leaves of a nearby tree. I also had it when we visited Southwell in Nottinghamshire one evening and we came upon the Minster, a Norman and later church of cathedral size, floodlit in its leafy precinct. Of course there is the odd occasion when I forget to carry it, and it's then that opportunities for a photograph are seen and lost. And, like the fisherman who loses the big fish, the lost photograph takes on ever more impressive qualities the more you think about what might have been. Neither of these photographs are ever going to feature in my top ten or even top one hundred photographs. But both have qualities that I like and that, I think, make them good enough to post on the blog.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen
Photo 1
Camera: Sony RX100
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 13.6mm (37mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f2
Shutter Speed: 1/8 sec
ISO: 2000
Exposure Compensation: 0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Revisiting the OM1

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Today's photograph was taken on 11th May 1986 during a visit I made to Southwell Minster, Nottinghamshire. It shows one of the remarkable carved capitals in the Chapter House, a part of the Minster built in the late 1200s as the Early English style of Gothic architecture was turning towards the Decorated.

The carved stonework of the Chapter House is some of the best to be found in Britain. It includes ten "green men", many label stop heads, a vaulted roof (the only example that isn't supported by a central pier), and numerous delicate capitals on slender columns. These beautifully sculpted pieces depict recognisable plants including the maple, oak, hawthorn, buttercup, potentilla, vine, ivy and hops. It's hard to imagine how the carvers went about creating such intricacy, and how the details have managed to survive relatively unscathed to the present day. The architectural historian, Nikolaus Pevsner, notes that the creators achieved a synthesis of nature and style, not merely copying the leaves, but depicting them in a way that doesn't deny the stone of which they are made. The result is very moving.

I include this photograph as an example of the output of my Olympus OM1n with the Zuiko 50mm 1.8 lens. I'd been using it for over 10 years when I took this shot. The image is also a testament to the durability of an image shot on Fujichrome transparency film. The colour and clarity are, as far as I can see, just as good today as when I made the original exposure. I hope that the digital files I now create will be in as good shape twenty two years hence. In theory they should be, but changes in file formats and operating systems, as well as the fallibility of storage devices leads me to think I could be disappointed. The slide was scanned using a negative and transparency holder on a new flatbed scanner that came my way at Christmas. The quality produced in what is essentially a light-box add-on to a fairly standard and inexpensive scanner has amazed me. It's at least as good, perhaps better than I can achieve with a dedicated film scanner that I bought six or so years ago, and has the advantage of copying multiple images in one pass. I intend to compare it with a digital enlargement of a slide photographed with the E510 using the 35mm macro lens. If the results are acceptable I'll post that shot too.

One of my more recent images of Southwell Minster can be seen here.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus OM1n
Mode: Manual
Focal Length: 50mm
F No: f4
Shutter Speed: 1/60
ISO: 100
Film: Fujichrome
Exposure Compensation: 0 EV
Image Stabilisation: N/A

Minsters and monstrous packaging

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As I sat at my desk and processed this photograph of Southwell Minster, Nottingham- shire, I was surrounded by a pile of debris that made me despair. It was there because the other day I ordered a 4GB compact flash card online, and expected to receive just that. How naive I am!

The card came in the small, useful, protective, plastic case that will be familiar to anyone who uses these devices. That's what I expected. However, I also received:
- a small padded, zipped, nylon case with a keyring, packaged in a cellophane bag;
- a mini-CD with data recovery software (inside its own sleeve);
- a 24-page User Guide, in multiple languages with warranty details;
- three further pieces of card and paper that advertised the manufacturer's range of memory cards, urged me to buy Capture One Pro image processing software, and told me how to responsibly dispose of the card;
- a strong, sealed, moulded clear plastic package holding most of the above;
- a colourful box (with hidden security tag) holding everything.

Why the manufacturer thinks I need two containers for one card I really don't know. The sole effect of the recovery software was to make me wonder about the reliability of the product and the value of its lifetime guarantee! As for the card enclosures, whilst the warranty information is doubtless a legal requirement, the rest of it was of no use whatsoever: and a User Guide for a memory card is laughably pointless. The plastic package was of the sort penetrable only by a small nuclear device (or a very strong pair of scissors), and yes, once again I got scratched by the sharp edges as I fought my way into it. As I looked at the glossy box that contained all of the above I idly wondered how many memory cards it would hold. So I measured it. The answer is about 95! If they were in the small, useful cases it would still hold 32! Am I alone in thinking that the packaging a product has should have a teeny bit of correlation to the size of the object it holds? I imagine the producer of this device has an environmental policy that it proudly trumpets to shareholders and any member of the public that asks about such a thing. But it's not worth the paper it's written on if it sells its products in such an environmentally unsustainable way.

I gave another glance at the pile of rubbish on my desk as I processed my photograph and noticed on the box, under the name and logo, the company's slogan - "Store your world in ours". I reflected that therein lies the problem. There aren't multiple worlds, there's only one, and it's a world that we all share. The danger in being driven solely by your own view of the world, whether as a company or as an individual, is that you follow your own selfish interest, lose any sense of the absurd, forget the duty we owe to each other and the planet, and neglect the steps that are necessary to sustain us. Oh, and supply compact flash cards in a ludicrous amount of packaging!

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 14mm (28mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/1000
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -1.7 EV
Image Stabilisation: Off