Landscape

Camí de Ronda

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A short post with some images from a gentle hike along part of the Camí de Ronda from Tossa de Mar and back through the inland forest track. Tossa de Mar was once a small fishing village, but of course now like pretty much everywhere on the Costa Brava it has become intensely focussed on mass tourism. Fortunately, this was late day in September and despite the amazingly clear skies and 30c temperatures there were remarkably few people. This was a walking trip so we did not stop in the […]

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Landscape

Eight

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A set of eight images from the eighth month of the year, shot while on vacation in northern Italy. As always, fragments of life seem to make the most interesting images. As usual, there are always the shrines: And bizarrely, I found a number of different houses with Disney characters outside. I am not sure why Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is so popular with mountain communities. I also tried some artsy fragments of scenes, with mixed success. There should probably be a lifetime quota for shots of aging […]

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Landscape

Don’t go Chasing

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Don’t go Chasing A set of images taken on a weekend hiking trip to Bielsa, in the Parque Nacional de Ordesa. The park is part of the Pirineos, with typical glacial features. We were extremely lucky to have arrived to good weather following a week of heavy rain and storms, so that the rivers were very active for this time of year. We had time for three hikes. The first around los Lllanos de Larri, the area to the west of Monte Perdido and Revilla. The area is quite busy […]

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Culture

Bootstraps

Walking the Dog, Barcelona.
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It has been almost two years since the last post. COVID took a pretty heavy toll on going out to take street photographs, and it has been difficult to summon up enthusiasm to post new content. This post is an attempt to bootstrap the blog-writing process again. The intervening time has seen many changes. Aside from the pandemic, there is the continuing fall out from Brexit with its catastrophic economic, social and political effects, the war in Ukraine which impacts and threatens everyone, and the continuous unfolding disaster that is […]

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Black and White

Five Landscapes

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Five monochrome landscape images, taken in the Italian alps. These were shot using a Leica Q2 Monochrom and various colour-contrast and polarising filters. The Q2M is a monochrome-only compact camera with a fixed 28mm lens which was bought to replace an ageing Ricoh GR for travel where carrying film is no longer practical. The Q2M has the advantage of a built-in EVF, and shooting with the monochrome sensor is essentially the same process as for shooting with black and white film, only without the chemicals. Compositionally, I found the Q2M […]

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Black and White

Sofia

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The first post for 2021, with some images taken on a recent work trip to Bulgaria. Street and social-documentary photography has been badly curtailed by the COVID-19 pandemic. Here in Barcelona there are heavy restrictions on all forms of movement, with both a curfew and limitations how far it is possible to move. Added to this is the expectation of social distancing, which makes conventional street photography with a wide-angle lens and close proximity with people problematic. Street photography is invariably something that feels risky, but with a highly contagious […]

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Black and White

35mm

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Spain’s massive COVID spike not withstanding, it is now at least possible, if not necessarily advisable, to go out and photograph on the streets again. These are some of the images from the initial attempts to resume the Barcelona Dark project. In fact, getting back to photographing at night again is proving somewhat challenging. Having moved home more or less during the worst of the pandemic earlier this year, the surrounding area is different and needs a different approach to photography. I also feel like I have lost a lot […]

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Black and White

C330

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A set of test images shot on a Mamiya C330 TLR with HP5+ film. These are from a few rolls taken to test out the camera and 80mm lens, in anticipation of a longer term project, for which I wanted a higher resolution camera that could conceivably be used without a tripod and which was not prohibitively expensive. The C-series TLRs with leaf shutter lenses and lack of a flappy mirror are a good candidate for this, and more versatile than TLRs such as the Rolleiflex thanks to the ability […]

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Black and White

Dark

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A set of test images shot at night in Italy, to gauge whether or not a digital camera would be a reasonable replacement for film in the Barcelona Dark series. The bottom line is probably not. It is very hard to emulate the “glow” around lights that get with film (caused by back-scattering of light from the film base). Shooting with a diffusion filter gets someway towards the look of film, but the fall-off with distance from the light is never quite right – although it is a nice effect […]

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Black and White

Signs of Life

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A short photo essay on the easing of lock-down and the (quasi) return to normal life, albeit somewhat cautiously. These images were shot on a short and cautious trip to Italy, with some hiking in the mountains both in Italy and neighbouring Switzerland. It is clear that the COVID19 situation is going to persist for some time to come, not least because there is still widespread confusion and/or refusal to take simple preventative measures against infection. Surprisingly, the flights and public transport were perhaps the lowest risk in the trip, […]

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Black and White

Quarantined

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Barcelona, and indeed all of Spain, is now shut down thanks to the COVID-19 emergency. It is now illegal for people to go out of their homes other than for essential purposes such as food or medical supplies, and the police are actively enforcing the measures and fining or arresting violators.

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Black and White

First shots with the Leica M-A

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This is a short look the Leica M-A film camera, from the perspective of someone used to shooting the technically much more advanced M7. The M7 has been my main film camera for more than five years now. What started as an experiment to reduce the size and weight of camera equipment has ultimately led a growing reliance on Leica M series rangefinders for most of my photography. A key advantage being the ability to keep the same lenses and basic shooting experience in both digital and 35mm film media.

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Photography

The Choice

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It is election day in the UK, as the country is asked to choose new MPs and a new government. Democracy functions by providing people with a choice of candidates and policies, backed by clear and accurate information about the options that are available. But this general election presents us with two deeply flawed party leaders and a standard of campaigning that the phrase “post truth politics” does not even begin to describe.

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