10th anniversary of PhotoReflect

click photo to enlarge
It was 10 years ago today - 23rd December 2005 - that I embarked on this blog. I needed a diversion from work, some self-made entertainment, a focus for my photographs, and a place to reflect on photography and other things of interest, importance and inconsequentiality. I thought it might last for a year, maybe two, but I had no idea it would still be going ten years and 2,107 posts later.

As I've said elsewhere here, I like to dabble, to try something and once I've satisfied my interest, to try something else. However, the blog has proved to be more than a dabble; it has kept going. Like many undertakings it has had its ups and downs. There have been periods, though not many, where I've stopped for a while. The most notable was when we moved house. There have also been, for me, lows where my photographic output has waned, and not been as good as I wanted. But, a few better shots, often inspired by the need to "keep feeding the blog", have usually lifted me and re-kindled my enthusiasm.

Earlier this year it was my plan to reach the ten year mark and stop. I intended to draw a line under the blog and try something else. Now I don't think I'll do that. But, the blog is likely to change. I need to reduce the amount of time I devote to it, so I imagine the posts will vary in length. The photographs will probably be presented without their "frames", and I may do one or two more tweaks. Comments are unlikely to re-appear because they take too much time. I deal with most of the emails I get, but apologies if my replies are somewhat perfunctory. So, as things stand at the moment, the blog continues. Not, however, not for the Christmas period. I'm abandoning it in favour of my family, and therefore I wish a Merry Christmas and a prosperous new year to all visitors, whether regular or sporadic.

Today's photograph is, like the first post I made, a reflected self-portrait, though this time seasonal. I used an old Four Thirds f3.5 35mm Macro lens with a Four Thirds to Micro-Four Thirds Adapter. It produced a result that reminds me to keep using my newly acquired fish-eye lens!

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Olympus E-M10
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 35mm (75mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f3.5
Shutter Speed: 1/100 sec
ISO:5000
Exposure Compensation: -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

More gallery reflections

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I recently read that the film, "Ben Hur", is being re-made. There's an old joke about the 1959 version, starring Charlton Heston, wherein someone who is asked what they thought of the film replied, "Liked him, hated her."!

I was reminded of this  witticism (though in reverse) on a recent  visit to a Lisbon gallery dedicated to two painters, the Hungarian Arpad Siznes (1897-1985 and his wife, the Portuguese Maria Helena Viera da Silva (1908-1992). I very much enjoyed the latter's work, especially the abstract city landscapes, but really could not find much that I liked in her husband's work.

The gallery itself has been made from an existing building that faces a square near a section of the large aqueduct (Aqueduto das Aguas Livres) that traverses this area of Lisbon. Its interior is painted white  (see previous post) with the exposed roof timbers and the tiled floor adding natural and muted colour. However, its origins in a pre-existing building mean that it has multiple levels, stairs, walls, lifts and corridors. Walking through the main exhibitions I came upon this glass wall and photographed my framed reflection. When processing the shot it occurred to me that a high key treatment might work with the essentially white details, so I converted it to black and white and then made the necessary adjustments.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Olympus E-M10
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 67mm (13mm - 26mm equiv.)
F No: f5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/20 sec
ISO:6400
Exposure Compensation: 0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Dragon Rapides and selfies

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A visit to the Imperial War Museum site at Duxford, Cambridgeshire, gave me the opportunity to photograph, once again, the De Havilland Dragon Rapide. The aircraft shown is one of two that gives pleasure flights from the airfield. I've always had a soft spot for the design of this aircraft. It manages to combine elegance with seeming fragility, yet still remains airworthy more than seventy years after its manufacture. In fact, this particular aircraft was built as a trainer for the RAF in whose service it was designated the DH89A Dominie. The military markings allude to its origins.

I took the photograph with a lens with a maximum zoom of 210mm (35mm equivalent) - too short for this kind of shot. However, the camera's 24 megapixel sensor can be cropped and still produce a very detailed image, hence the shot above. When I zoomed in on the computer I noticed that one of the passengers appeared to be taking a "selfie", with hand outstretched and cameraphone pointing at the owner. I've taken a few selfies in my time. However, they have been with dedicated cameras not phones and employed a tripod, self-timer or my portrait in a reflective surface. I have yet to photograph myself with outstretched arm clutching a phone because the resultant image is usually poor. Moreover, I have no sympathy with the motivation for such shots which appears to be egocentricity - "look where I was/what I was doing/who I was with". Almost all my photography involves looking away from myself saying "look at this".

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Nikon D5300
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 140mm (210mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f6.3
Shutter Speed: 1/800 sec
ISO:100
Exposure Compensation: -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Loose end photography

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I'm an impatient patient. During my recent bout of illness I found myself unable to settle to any task, frustrated by this, and willing my body to recover. But, of course, these things have to take their course, and no amount of imagining or fortitude or stubbornness will return a person to health until the body is ready. However, I do find that when I'm well enough to get out and about my mind is engaged by matters other than my unwellness and this is all to the good - hence yesterday's photograph - and today's.

The image above came about, as some of mine do, when I was standing about at a loose end. My wife was visiting a couple of shops on Stamford's main shopping street and I'd elected to wander about in the vicinity looking for a few shots. But, I saw not a one. As I waited - for longer than I thought would be the case - I saw an advertisement in an optician's window for "free retinal photography"; a check on the health of the eye as part of the usual optical measurement. I positioned myself so that I was reflected in the window and took several shots making use of my own reflection, the eye in the advert, and passersby. I produced a couple of shots I like. This is one of them. I may post the other if my supply of new images doesn't increase fairly soon.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Nikon D5300
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 130mm (195mm - 35mm equiv.) - cropped to 4:3 ratio
F No: f8
Shutter Speed: 1/200 sec
ISO:140
Exposure Compensation: -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Self-portraits and Mr Turner

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The other evening we went to see Mike Leigh's, "Mr Turner", a film about the great English painter, J. M. W. Turner. It was exquisitely shot, beautifully acted and an interesting take on the artist's life. For me it only suffered by a little too much direct connecting between the artists later, great "impressionistic" works and their sources of inspiration. I do recognise, however, that anyone coming to the film with no knowledge of Turner would value this direct explication.

As we went up to the gallery where our seats were I took a couple of self-portrait photographs in the glazed stairwell windows. This was the best of the bunch with the market place beyond, illuminated bank signs on the right, and a passer-by at bottom right balancing my silhouette on the left. Anyone who has looked at my many self-portraits (for example here, here or here) on this site will know that, with one exception, they can all best be described as "obscured", since they are designed to hide or suggest rather than reveal.

After we'd seen the film mentioned, my wife read me an extract from Wikipedia about Turner's first sale of a work (a seascape, "Staffa, Fingal's Cave", unseen by the buyer) to an American, one James Lenox of New York City. The person who bought it from Turner on behalf of Lenox reported to the artist that the new owner was "greatly disappointed" by what he described as the painting's "indistinctness". Turner is reputed to have replied, "You should tell Mr Lenox that indistinctness is my forte". I think henceforth that will be my reply to those who find my self-portraits unrevealing!

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Sony RX100
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 12.8mm (34mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f2.8 Shutter
Speed: 1/40
ISO: 640
Exposure Compensation:  0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Self-portrait with pink chair

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Walking along a street in Greenwich, London, recently I came upon a shop with goods spilling out on to the pavement in front of its window. It was the sort of shop that sells a wide range of eye-catching items for the home at relatively low prices.

Two items caught my eye. The first was the eye-wateringly pink (and gold) chair. I tried to imagined the rest of the room in which that might stand but immediately gave up under the influence of the waves of nausea that it provoked. Then I saw the glitzy mirror and immediately knew that the owner was trying to sell a collection of items that would complement each other in the room that my mind's eye briefly conjured up.

As I stared at the mirror, transfixed by the glass pimples that bordered it, I saw myself, headless, and decided it was time - in fact, well past the time - for another obscured, reflected, self-portrait. So, positioning myself to create a composition with depth, confusion and anonymity, I pressed the shutter.

© Tony Boughen

Camera: Nikon D5300
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 27mm (40mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f8
Shutter Speed: 1/125 sec
ISO:100
Exposure Compensation: -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

The organist and the photographer

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This is, I think, the third photograph that I've posted showing a church organist. There's something about a dark church, with the silhouette of the musician at the console in a pool of light, that appeals to me. The first, taken at St Wulfram's in Grantham made much of the rather fine, highly ornate, organ case. The second was taken, as I recall, in Holbeach church and was more a study in concentration. It also resulted in a flurry of hits on the blog by people (presumably) looking to book an organist for their wedding. Today's comes from Ledbury church in Herefordshire, and here I took the opportunity to include myself in the shot, reflected in the mirror that the organist uses to take a cue from the officiating vicar.

As I processed the photograph I noticed a couple of copies of "Hymns Old & New". These can often be seen on church organs. As a youngster I was aware of "Hymns Ancient and Modern" and I've always assumed that the current book is an updated version of this old classic. However, I'm told that's not the case; the book "Common Praise" seems to attempt that task. Moreover, as I read a little more about "Hymns Old & New" I discovered that it is a tome that appears to be either loved or reviled. Critics accuse it of re-casting old favourites in different keys, and generally  pitching them for lower voices. "Hark the Herald Angels Sing" is, apparently, in F rather than the usual G (gasp!). They also see the hymns as being subject to "politically correctness" citing the fact that "Onward Christian Soldiers" has become "Onward Christian Pilgrims"! I don't have a view on all of this but in reading the scathing comments about this collection of hymns, and the equally passionate defence of the modernised versions of old favourites, I was reminded that there's often nothing like religion for irreligious argument, vituperation and rancour.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Sony RX100
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 14.8mm (40mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f2.8
Shutter Speed: 1/40
ISO: 800
Exposure Compensation:  0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Fractured self-portrait

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Though I've run this blog for eight years and posted with a frequency that I never imagined I could sustain I don't think I've ever been a particularly good blogger. By that I mean I've never offered readers much in the way of information about the minutiae of my existence. A few impersonal  or semi-personal facts here and there are about as far as it goes. I've always been free and easy with my opinions but the daily details of my life, my family and my activities have been largely absent, and where mentioned at all, have invariably been very generalised. The fact is, though I'm reasonably gregarious, I'm a fairly private person. Moreover, I'm only willing to include my nearest and dearest in this blog on the same terms that I present myself. So, my wife is never (well hardly ever) photographed close-up and my offspring and their families, where they do feature, are also distant figures., included for compositional reasons only. My family snaps remain private.

That reticence to place the details of my life on the public stage in part accounts for my dislike of social media. It also explains the lamentable way (in blogging terms) in which I flip-flop between blog comments and blog silence. I recognise that the online dialogues that ensue from blogs, news reports, other websites, even social media I suppose, can have value for those who take part in them. In fact, for a few years, I was a regular contributor of images and comments to a couple of photographic forums, an activity that I both enjoyed and learnt from. However, there's also a part of me that agrees with a recent opinion I saw suggesting that online commenters include just enough of "the mad and the sad" to make the whole exercise off-putting for the average person. Any photographer who has frequented the dpreview discussion forums will recognise there is something in that notion, as will anyone who has scanned readers' comments at the end of articles in online newspapers or even on the BBC website.

It will come as something of a surprise then, at least to more recent readers of this blog, that I post self-portraits with reasonable regularity. However, like today's example, these are often obscured in some way, perhaps by reflection, distortion or using some other such contrivance. The photograph above shows me with my compact camera reflected in an artwork that comprises blocks of mirrored glass. I liked the way that it placed parts of me - head, shoes, trousers, umbrella, in unconnected places. What I wasn't so keen on is the way it revealed me indulging in two photographic fauxs pas that I have been known to bang on about in a deprecating way - photographing single-handed and not using the wrist loop of the camera!

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Sony RX100
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 10.4mm (28mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f6.3
Shutter Speed: 1/25
ISO: 3200
Exposure Compensation:  -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

A conversation with myself

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How much should a blogger reveal about themselves? The answer to that question will vary from person to person: some will be happy to be more expansive than others. I always think of myself as a private person, and though I'm fairly free with my opinions in this blog (which blogger isn't!), any details that I include about my personal life tend to be brief and fairly innocuous or non-specific. I deliberately don't speak in any depth about my immediate or extended family. Nor do I write too much about the village community of which I'm a part.

With an outlook like that I do, of course, eschew the likes of Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and all of the other social media sites that are so popular today. The idea of documenting the details of my life, important or inconsequential, minute-by-minute and day-by-day is quite alien to me for reasons of time and inclination. The plain truth is I find it difficult enough to respond to comments on this blog, so I really don't know how I'd manage communicating with pseudo-friends through Twitter!

People sometimes ask me why I blog. There are a few reasons that I've mentioned before, largely centred around the idea of a window for my photography and a means of improving it. That usually leads to the next question: "Why do you accompany your photographs with a 'reflection'"? The original thinking was to differentiate my efforts from those of others and to give me a regular intellectual challenge quite different from those I faced in my day job then (and face now in retirement). But as the years have passed I've sometimes come to think of this blog as a conversation with myself: the putting into print of the thoughts that buzz around my head, thoughts which, in the ordinary course of events, would go unheard unless I shared them with friends and family. The fact that quite a lot of people visit PhotoReflect on a daily basis to read them and look at my photographs still surprises me. The fact that relatively few comment doesn't! I appreciate that is down to me being a fairly ineffective blogger - for years I've taken none of the recommended steps to "build my readership". Moreover, I'm not the loquacious type, so the chatty conversations that some bloggers and readers value don't often occur here. But I'm O.K. with that because I'd find it hard to give the blog more attention than it currently gets.

Today's photograph is one of my rare, openly manipulated shots. I took a photograph of myself reflected in the mirror of a lift that opened alongside me when I was photographing the numbers I recently posted in the triptych. The resulting image was symmetrical with strong perspective and me just to the side of the vanishing point. I found myself wishing for a stronger convergence of lines in the photograph and so I added them in the form of "light rays".

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Lumix LX3
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 7.9mm (37mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f2.4
Shutter Speed: 1/100
ISO: 250
Exposure Compensation: -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

The poor man's fish-eye lens

click photo to enlarge

Skimming through this year's PhotoReflect images it occurred to me that I haven't posted any reflected self-portraits recently. So, in a bid to catch up with my self-imposed task, I took one recently in St James, the church at Castle Acre, Norfolk.

It shows yours truly reflected in the base of a large candle holder that was placed on the octagonal steps on which the font can also be found at the west end of the building. Behind me can be seen the Victorian tiled floor, the wooden pews, the nave arcades of the C14 and C15 and the distant chancel arch and east window. In recent years candle holders of this sort have become quite a common sight. They usually involve a tall, turned, wooden column (this one has a brass base) with a big, brass cup at the top in which is placed a very large white or cream candle. Often these have symbols or writing on them, usually in red.

Over the years I've seen a number of fashions and ideas circulate around churches. Many have set up play areas for young children at the back. I've seen small lending libraries too, as well as kitchens, small "cafe" areas and exhibitions about the history of the building and parish. At the east end of the church many congregations have brought the altar forward from under the eastmost chancel window to a point slightly west of the chancel arch: a development that meets the needs of the smaller congregations of today as well as the desire to make the people feel more a part of the service. The large candles have become an item of church furnishing that has grown in popularity. They are often near the font, perhaps having a symbolic connection with the entry into membership of the church that baptism confers.

I've shot reflected self-portraits in the ball at the base of ancient church chandeliers and achieved a similar "fish-eye" effect to that which the candle holder has given. In fact, I quite like this spherical distortion. However, I've never been able to justify buying a fish-eye lens. They are fairly expensive, and I have the feeling that it is a lens whose single effect would soon pall and it would quickly be put in a cupboard or sold. On the whole I'm happy enough using the "poor man's fisheye lens" when the right curved surface presents itself.

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 40mm
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/40
ISO: 3200
Exposure Compensation:  -0.33
Image Stabilisation: On

Reflected in the mirror

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Walking in the rain along a London street near St Pancras railway station the other day we came upon a shop selling picture frames and mirrors of all descriptions. It was one of those businesses that can thrive on a large scale only in a city. Passing its sequence of rather grubby and rain flecked windows we saw mirrors of various kinds, including the "sunburst" designs that were fashionable from the 1950s through to the 1970s, and which have re-appeared in recent years. Then we saw this rather odd looking mirror, of a shape that reminded me of a traditional English garden gate minus the diagonal bracing piece. As we studied it I saw the reflections, and the potential for a photograph, so I took out the LX3 and snapped this shot.

Earlier in the day we'd been to the Museum of London and seen the "London Street Photography" exhibition. That kind of image isn't part of my usual repertoire, but I do admire good examples of the genre, and thought we'd take advantage of this free show. The fact that we were there on the day after it opened meant that it was quite crowded, and visitors were being allowed in only as others left. However, we arrived reasonably early, so it wasn't the inconvenience that it would have been later. But, I did buy a copy of the accompanying book to study the images at home at my leisure.

As I processed the photograph above I wondered if the exhibition influenced my photography during the rest of the day because I took quite a few shots that include people in the street.

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Lumix LX3
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 12.8mm (60mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f2.8
Shutter Speed: 1/125
ISO: 200
Exposure Compensation: -0.66 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Snapshots

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snap-shot, n.
Also snap shot, snapshot
1.a. A quick or hurried shot taken without deliberate aim, esp.one at a rising bird or quickly moving animal.
2.a. An instantaneous photograph, esp. one taken with a hand camera. Also transf. and fig.
 from The Oxford English Dictionary

If I extracted the first part of definition 1.a. and added it to the second part of definition 2.a. I would have a description of the word "snapshot" that more accurately describes how I took today's photograph - "A quick or hurried shot taken without deliberate aim...with a hand camera."

We'd gone into an art gallery and museum as a respite from the weather and to see some paintings, and we were ascending the building in the lift (elevator). My mind was clearly elsewhere because I didn't notice the wonderful reflections that the mirror walls of the lift were producing until it stopped and my wife had started to move towards the door that was about to open. At that instant I raised the camera to my eye and took this "snapshot". Everything is wrong about it. The aperture is F8 (unnecessary), the speed 1second (not hand-holdable), the ISO 3200 (it needn't have been) and it is blurred. Moreover, I look like I've got an enormous stomach (it's bigger than it was but not THAT big) due to my bulky gloves in my fleece pockets. And my hat is rammed down over my head in its warm but silly "outdoor" position. My wife also looks heftier than her sylph-like dimensions warrant because of the position of her cold-weather, thick red coat. Incidentally, recent photographs might suggest that she possesses only a red coat. The fact is she has three different red coats (and a few of other hues), the red colour not being entirely unconnected with the fact that a splash of red can often be just what a photograph calls for!

Those criticisms notwithstanding, and despite the fact that the shot isn't sharp, I quite like it. So I've posted it as the latest in my intermittent series of self-portraits.

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 17mm
F No: f8
Shutter Speed: 1.0
ISO: 3200
Exposure Compensation: -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Self-portrait and artists' voices

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I recently lamented the reluctance of some artists and photographers to talk about the how and why of image making. When I wrote those words I must have been suffering from amnesia. Either that or I'd forgotten what I'd written in an earlier post about some explanatory texts that accompanied a group of art works that I'd been to see. They combined verbosity, pretentiousness and opaqueness in a way that almost made this viewer overlook any good qualities that the pieces exhibited.

I suppose what I really want is artists to write something intelligible and intelligent about why they do what they do, and why they do it in the way that they do. However, I'm fast coming to the conclusion that only a few are capable of this seemingly straightforward task, and so in retrospect, it's probably better that the majority say nothing. There is, after all, a lot to be said for letting the artwork speak for itself and for the viewer to come to a determination about it uninfluenced by the artist's utterances.

Today's photograph is a self-portrait in an installation by Machiko Agano at an exhibition that I visited recently at The Hub in Sleaford, Lincolnshire.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Lumix LX3
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 5.1mm (24mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f2
Shutter Speed: 1/30
ISO: 125
Exposure Compensation: -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Looking down, or is it up?

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Parishes with medieval churches have to make considerable efforts to maintain their old buildings. The religious fervour and wealth that produced these marvellous old buildings is not there to the same extent today. As congregations dwindle, so too does the size of the steady income that they donate to the church. Individual benfactors, often through wills and bequests, do leave money to churches, and a small number of parishes still have land and property that provide regular funds. But, on the whole, the situation is a difficult one.

Very large parish churches such as St Botolph in Boston - a member of the Greater Churches Group - have particular problems because they do not have the prestige and drawing power of cathedrals, yet in some cases are bigger and more costly to maintain than those more celebrated structures.

As I do the rounds of churches and cathedrals, gathering my photographs, enjoying the art, craft, history and culture that they offer the visitor, I often make a contribution. Sometimes it's a small donation in a wall-box, frequently I buy the brochure that details the history of the church, and now and again we buy a tea-towel, a book, or - where it's available - have a cup of tea and a snack to go with it. Such offerings and purchases are never going to be the mainstay of a fund-raising drive, but they're given in the hope that, added to the small amounts from other sources, they combine to make a more significant and useful total.

Today's photograph was taken as we warmed up with a cuppa in Boston's famous church. I say warmed up, but in truth the hot tea didn't have much impact on how we felt. As is sometimes the case with old churches, the temperature in the building felt as low - and maybe lower - than that outside. I usually call this the "cave effect" of churches because, like caves, these cavernous buildings seem to maintain a temperature that varies much less than one experiences outside. Which is fine in summer: churches are a welcome relief from the heat of the day. But in winter? Well, let's just say that if steaming hot soup was offered with the cup of tea they could make a killing!

Today's photograph is taken with the camera pointing into the slightly inclined mirror that enables visitors to admire the tower vaulting without getting a cricked neck.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Lumix LX3
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 5.1mm (24mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f2
Shutter Speed: 1/100
ISO: 80
Exposure Compensation: -1.00 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

The poor man's Photoshop No.2

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Four years ago* I posted a piece entitled "The poor man's Photoshop". That particular post has always been one that receives a lot of hits, with the visitor invariably arriving through a search engine query. However, most of the people who alight on my page that describes a shot of a book cover taken through "Flemish" frosted glass quickly move on. They've clearly been looking for a cheap or no-cost alternative to Photoshop, the heavyweight photo-processing software of choice of enthusiast and professional photographers. Some stay and look at the image and read the text on my page, but mostly they don't. I suppose I ought to add to the page a link to GIMPshop, a version of GIMP (Gnu Image Manipulation Program) that has been modified by the addition of a Photoshop-like interface. Or perhaps anyone searching for a cheap digital image editing program would benefit from knowing about Gizmo's Freeware, and particularly his page describing and linking to a selection of such programmes - Best Free Digital Image Editor. However, it's not my practice to amend an entry after I've posted it, so today I'm doing the next best thing by giving this post the same title (except designating it number 2), and featuring those useful sources. I hope this proves helpful to someone.

In fact, the subject of today's photograph warrants the title I've given it anyway. It shows me with the LX3 reflected in the textured glass of a door. Outside it is raining, and the door is giving a distorted reflection of not only me, but also the door and room behind. I liked the indistinct nature of this image and the way the colours of my clothes made the feather-like designs in the glass appear as though they formed part of my shape. It certainly has something of the feel of the sort of Photoshoppery that I don't indulge in but that many like, though in this instance there has been no computer manipulation at all.

* The opening sentence of this piece brought me up with a start. Have I really been posting images and rambling on for so long? It's maybe time for a change.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Lumix LX3
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 5.1mm (24mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f2
Shutter Speed: 1/30
ISO: 400
Exposure Compensation: -0.66EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Self-portrait in overrider

click photo to enlarge
Today's post is the latest of my reflected self-portraits - a bit of photographic fun. It was taken at the recent Bicker Steam Threshing weekend, and features the overrider of a 1967 Rover P5 Coupe, a tank of a car, that was the limousine of choice for government ministers and captains of industry in the "Swinging Sixties". This particular model was being shown alongside several other vintage and veteran cars.

As usual, I'm hidden behind the camera and lens, but my wife features quite well in the image. In fact we both feature twice because there's also a reflection in the bumper at the bottom of the image. Interestingly, in the top reflection my wife has the elongated proportions reminiscent of a supermodel or a clothes designer's drawing, whilst in the lower one the distortion makes her appear to be of a size more akin to one of the Munchkins in the "Wizard of Oz". Happily, in reality, she is perfectly proportioned!

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 40mm (80mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f6.3
Shutter Speed: 1/500
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.7 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Self-portrait in Green Bricks

click photo to enlarge
"If red houses are made out of red bricks, blue houses are made out of blue bricks, and yellow houses are made out of yellow bricks, what are green houses made out of?
from "1001 Jokes for Kids"
(answer below*)

Many Victorians had the feeling that they were living in an age, the like of which, the world hadn't seen before. It was a technological age, an age of new industries, burgeoning cities, mass transport, migration, population growth, exploration and change. Architects were asked to rise to the challenge of designing buildings that had never been needed before. What should a railway station look like? Or a hospital? Or how about an urban school, a museum, or a cotton mill? And with these new buildings came new construction techniques and new materials. Cast iron, steel, fire-proof floors, large areas of glazing, terracotta mouldings, and glazed bricks were all employed to create the new structures.

I came across some fine Victorian glazed brickwork yesterday when I was in Kingston upon Hull, a city and port on the north bank of the River Humber in eastern England. I lived there for several years so I know it reasonably well. As I walked around the marina that has been formed out of the former Humber Dock I passed what I remember as the "Humber Dock Tavern" but is now called "Green Bricks". This changing of pubs' names to suit the fashion of the day is not something of which I approve: old names carry part of the history of an area and shouldn't be expunged on a whim. The best I can say about this example is that the new title at least has a certain logic to it. The Victorians liked to use glazed bricks to face pubs, and green was especially popular, though burgundy, red, blue, yellow and a few other colours can be found in most big cities. Here the elevation also has tiled panels with swags and arabesques, as well as crude capitals on glazed "columns." One of the virtues of glazed bricks is they last remarkably well, providing a smart, easily cleaned, low-maintenance finish that still looks good over a hundred years later: they should be used more today. I've seen a few examples from the late twentieth century - here's some Southwark flats - , and I've posted another image of a pub (now a hotel) with a tiled facade that I saw in Windsor.

My reason for snapping this pub elevation was not only the glazed bricks, but the reflection of the sunlit marina in the window. It was, I thought, another opportunity to add to my ongoing theme of reflected self-portraits!

*Answer: "Glass!"
That joke is only funny if you know that in the UK glasshouses, that is to say the glass horticultural buildings used for growing tomatoes, lettuces, cucumbers, etc., are more commonly known as greenhouses. And, even if you do know that it still isn't very funny!

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 22mm (44mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/125 seconds
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Self-portrait in brass nameplate

click photo to enlarge
My first post in PhotoReflect, on 23rd December 2005, was entitled "Photography and Reflections", and featured a distorted self-portrait in the curved steel of the top of a cafetiere. Since that time I have posted several more reflected self-portraits. In fact it has become something of a recurring theme that I revisit from time to time. A couple of weeks ago, passing through the Norfolk town of Holt, I took the latest in the series. None of my reflected self-portraits have been particularly revealing, and this one certainly isn't!

Next to the door of a building was an old brass plate of the sort that certain professional people - doctors, dentists, lawyers, etc - used to advertise themselves. Today a piece of silk-lustre aluminium or engraved stainless steel is more common. However, fifty years and more ago brass was the metal of choice. It was harder to maintain than the modern plates, required regular polishing, usually turned green in places, but it did add a certain rich lustre to any facade where one was fixed. And, more importantly, it bolstered the image of those whom it advertised, and made their fee, which might seem exorbitant, look as though it was worth it!

This particular example advertises the firm of solicitors (lawyers) whose offices were (and perhaps still are) in the building. Other functions that also took place here are also listed on the plate. Its convex surface has had the effect of elongating me as I took my photograph, swathed in a fleece hat and a jacket because of the cold edge on the wind.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 19mm (38mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/125
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: 0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Reflecting on the Olympics

click photo to enlarge

The other day someone asked me if I'd been watching the Olympics. I hadn't. I still haven't. I don't devote a lot of time to watching sport on television, but when I do it tends to be team games that interest me. The Olympics include these, but it also has many "sports" that were never intended to be watched by a large audience. And many are so technical it isn't apparent to the lay-person who won or why they won! Even athletic events like the 100m aren't, in my opinion, spectator sports. The camera and commentators spend far more time on the periods before and after that race than they do on it, action replays notwithstanding, and all to see someone complete a course a fraction of a second faster than someone else. It's lost on me!

I watch football (soccer) reasonably regularly on TV, and I often enjoy what I see. It occurred to me the other day that soccer gets the appellation, "the beautiful game", for good reasons. Firstly it is a game of almost continuous action, with few pauses, and those usually quite brief. Secondly, you can deduce most of the rules of the game simply by watching it. And thirdly, at the end of the game it's very obvious which is the winning team, or if it's a drawn match. These seem to me quite important attributes for any spectator sport. The Olympics consists of too many "sports" where these three qualities are absent.

The two variations of the French game, boules, namely petanque and boule lyonnaise, are not on the Olympic menu, though in 1900 it was, apparently, a demonstration sport. However, I think that if ice dance, BMX, handball, synchronized swimming and weight lifting qualify as Olympic sports, boules can claim a place. It is a game of simple rules, is easy to watch, easy to play, requires no specialist playing surface, and uses inexpensive equipment. An uninformed bystander can easily see who has won a game. And, it is a game that can be played by people of all ages, even the elderly. So let's start a campaign to include boules in the 2012 London Olympics. Vive la France and the entente cordiale!

Today's photograph is one of my reflected self-portraits. A new set of boules seemed the perfect opportunity for another in the ongoing series.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 35mm macro (70mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f6.3
Shutter Speed: 1/80
ISO: 200
Exposure Compensation: 0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Looking down a homonym

click photo to enlarge

Did you know that innuendo is the Italian word for suppository? Or that there are some that are wise and there are others that are otherwise? And maybe you've never considered that while two wrongs don't make a right, three rights do make a left?

A significant part of English humour is based on the peculiarities of our language. I was thinking about this the other day as, with a group of friends and relations, I looked down a well (see photo). It was the fashion a while ago for young people to use the phrase "well good" to describe something they particularly liked. To my older ears this is an awkward construct, but it came to mind when I was deciding a title for this image. But then I thought, no, the photograph's OK but it's not a "well good well shot"!

Then, with the word "well" in mind I got to thinking about homonyms and the like. And, after a little research I found that my understanding of what constitutes a homonym wasn't quite right. What's worse, after a lot of research I discovered that many are similarly confused, and that the internet can't be trusted to shine a light on the matter. So, in the interests of clarity here is what I discovered, courtesy of the Oxford English Dictionary:

Homophones - different spelling, same pronunciation, different meaning (e.g. here, hear)
Homonyms - same spelling, same pronunciation, different meaning (e.g. well, well)
Heteronyms - same spelling, different pronunciation, different meaning (e.g. refuse, refuse)

Please try and remember this - there will be a written test next week :-)

photograph & text (c) Tony Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 42mm (84mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f6.3
Shutter Speed: 1/10
ISO: 400
Exposure Compensation: 0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On