WHAT YOU COULD HAVE WON

New Blog

2012-01-25T20:16:00.000Z

I've started a new blog that will be linked to my website. You can see it here....

http://finnhopson.wordpress.com/

I'll be back on this one from time to time but I think it's probably going to close fairly soon.

Man on a stick

2012-01-13T12:12:00.001Z

Having a halfway decent camera on my phone now means that I can take halfway usable photos a lot more often. In fact I'm taking loads all the time now, so without really meaning to, I have started another photo-a-day kind of thing that can run alongside my slightly tedious and long winded film efforts. I'll post them up here as and when I get a chance. Heres one from the 2nd January.

This guy spent a little while clambering up onto the pillar and was then directing his girlfriend to take shots of him up there looking cool and staring at the pier. I just though he looked cold, and so did she.

366

2012-01-12T09:45:00.001Z

Over Christmas I have totally re-organised our flat and moved a lot of my camera gear, computers and clutter over to a new office. In doing so I came across a box containing two Pentax ME Super 35mm film cameras and loads of random lenses, filters, extenders and flashes that I bought on eBay years ago for almost nothing. I also found a box with ten rolls of unused film, which is just enough to take one shot a day for the rest of the year. I won't see the first results until sometime in February, but its good to have to be so careful about trying to get each individual shot right first time, and very strange not to be able to see any results straights away. I'll post a link to the first batch in February. They might be utterly rubbish, but I'm hoping I'll see some improvement over the year.

Changes

2012-01-07T13:30:00.001Z

I'm making some changes to where I put things on the interweb. From now on, this blog will be a place for me to post photos from my phone. I have it with me all the time and now that the camera is a decent quality, I'm getting some photos that I quite like. It'll be an odd selection of stuff, and quite often with a bit of instagram filtering chucked in too. Might be fun, might be rubbish.

My website finnhopson.com will be where I upload photos that I hope people may actually want to buy. It won't be updated as much, but will have what I consider to be some of my best work. My Flickr photostream will be more frequently updated, mostly with any recent and interesting (hopefully) landscape work. I will also be starting a new blog soon, which will have the results of my photo-a-day project for 2012, which will all be shot on my old Pentax film camera. Details to follow...

2012-01-02T21:17:00.000Z

I spent some of Christmas down in Lyme Regis and took the opportunity to try and catch a good sunrise from the Cobb. It took three days but I was rewarded with an amazing one on Christmas eve, the result from the real camera is here.

Out and About

2011-11-21T22:56:00.001Z

Now that sunset is earlier than tiny daughter's dinner/bedtime shenanigans I can finally get out and about with my camera in some interesting light again. Feeling thoroughly inspired by long exposure shots so have been creating/imitating them up and down the seafront, and what else is there to do during a four minute exposure than take shots of your own camera at work. Results can be seen in my Flickr photostream and some will be available as prints from my website soon.

The Glamour of Commuting

2011-11-17T12:44:00.001Z

This week I had the joyous experience of winter commuting to London. Leaving and returning to Brighton in the dark and spending far too long lurking on cold, windy platforms. Sometimes its just grubby and rubbish, sometimes you see something cool. One of each..

Autumn

2011-10-30T11:09:00.001Z

Autumn colours in Dulwich Park. Have finally got a camera on my phone thats worth using occasionally.

Some Favourites

2011-08-22T22:03:00.006+01:00

22nd August

2011-08-22T11:52:00.002+01:00

Another hastily grabbed sunset from the balcony.

Favourite pic of the day

2011-08-16T23:40:00.003+01:00

Have been re-editing a bunch of pictures for my website and rediscovering some old favourites. Heres one from 2006 of the jetty at a friends summer place near Turku.

Buy my stuff

2011-08-16T01:44:00.002+01:00

Finally, I have managed to make it possible to buy prints of my photos on my website. Now please go there at once and have a look. I'm off to bed.

Rays

2011-07-21T21:46:00.002+01:00

Sunset the other night was fun. Stuck inside so could only get the traditional BHASVIC shot. This shot from the pier is the one I should have gone and got.

A Different Kind of Strike

2011-06-28T16:53:00.002+01:00

Much as I support the teachers strike, lightning strikes are way cooler. First attempt at lightning photography, very happy with managing to grab these two.

Lens Flaaaaaaare

2011-04-25T23:55:00.003+01:00

Took some fairly mediocre pictures of Bluebells in Stanmer today, but did get some interesting flarey action going.

Switchbacks DH

2011-04-24T21:02:00.006+01:00

I went to Spain, I rode down some hills. Repeatedly. It was very, very good. If you like riding bikes down hills, you should go there immediately.

Updates

2011-01-25T10:35:00.002Z

Finally got round to rejigging FinnHopson.com so it goes to my Zenfolio galleries. Slowly updating them with some new stuff and some behind the scenes stuff from various shoots in the last few years.

www.finnhopson.com

More snow

2010-12-17T19:20:00.002Z

This is shaping up to be the best Winter of my life. My birthday again tomorrow, and it might snow again. That's twice in two years, which has never happened before. Here's the view from the flat after a short but dramatic blizzard just before sunset tonight.

And the rest

2010-12-15T23:42:00.004Z

Snow on the seafront at dawn

2010-12-15T00:04:00.002Z

The day before the thaw

2010-12-14T01:47:00.001Z

Snow Days

2010-12-11T22:33:00.000Z

More soon, but in the meantime I might print this.

Lahndon

2010-11-16T22:18:00.002Z

Stuck working in London for a few weeks, but at least the views are good (if I get up and leave my airless, dark, edit hole and go to a window).

Stormy Afternoon

2010-10-23T21:20:00.003+01:00

Amazing storms swinging past Brighton all afternoon today. Stitched this together from a few shots.

Mud, mud, glorious mud

2010-10-03T17:01:00.003+01:00

First properly muddy ride since sometime in the spring today. Luckily I managed to avoid most of it.

Five Hours

2010-09-25T00:12:00.004+01:00

Five Hours on Friday from Urchinboy on Vimeo.

You may have noticed that I take rather a lot of pictures of the view from my flat. Today I took just over 3000. Here they are all strung together. This was from about 2pm til sunset just before 7pm. Hopefully this also goes some way to explaining why I love that view so much.

Moody one tonight

2010-09-20T21:17:00.002+01:00

Lots of low clouds and big piles of Orange.

Just a quick one

2010-08-29T23:48:00.003+01:00

Of tonights sunset over Chanctonbury Ring. Very yellow on the horizon tonight, what does that mean for tomorrow? Sun has moved round to a more photogenic location at sunset but will be away most of next week so not much chance of catching it again. Hoping for a more dramatic cloudy version tomorrow.

To Worthing... and beyond!

2010-08-27T23:21:00.002+01:00

Tonight was the first time in ages that we've had a view of anything further away than the other side of the street. Really nice sunset and views all the way out to the Isle of Wight again. Welcome back Worthing.

Chicksands

2010-08-23T23:06:00.004+01:00

Finally got round to visiting Chicksands bike park this weekend. Best days riding in months and managed to avoid completely destroying my bike or my face. Also experienced the joy of having a photographer perched around the trails flashing lots of stroby things in my face and capturing my slight mediocrity for posterity. Very good to see some pics of myself for once though. Here's a couple.

Back

2010-08-11T23:04:00.002+01:00

Been on a little roadtrip round the country and despite crappy weather, managed to take a few pics along the way. Will post some up soon and the better landscape ones will be in an updated 'Lakes' section on my Zenfolio site soon.

Something New

2010-07-15T23:15:00.004+01:00

Over the last week or so I've been starting to build up some proper photo galleries on a new website. There's a load of shots that have been on here but it's all a bit more organised and theres lots of new stuff too. Still a work in progress but not bad for now. I'll keep blogging new stuff here, but collections of photos will be uploaded on the new site from time to time. Have a look and let me know what you think.

finnhopson.zenfolio.com

I'm not going to explain these any more

2010-07-05T22:09:00.003+01:00

I think you already know what it is and where it is.

Le Weekend

2010-07-05T14:09:00.003+01:00

Another glorious summer day spent chasing each other down hills on bikes in the woods.

Surrey Hills - July 2010 from Urchinboy on Vimeo.

Ignoring Football

2010-06-27T23:30:00.004+01:00

The hottest day of the year is no time to be stuck in a pub with shouty men drinking beer and shouting at underwhelming millionaires running after a ball. So we spent the afternoon walking up on the cliffs at Seven Sisters and eating ice creams by the river at Cuckmere Haven. Got back, heard the score and felt pretty happy to have missed it all anyway. Also managed to make it up to Devil's Dyke for sunset. Perfect summer Sunday.

Midsummer Geekery

2010-06-21T22:32:00.005+01:00

Meant to go somewhere dramatic to photograph sunset on midsummers day but failed. But with the all singing new supercamera, ISO 3200 at 10pm on midsummers night looks like this. Handheld. Which in a camera-geek way is very impressive. Like the different colour temperatures between inside and out as well. A bit of tungsten with daylight white balance always makes evening shots look good.

Jack and Jill

2010-06-21T00:18:00.004+01:00

We went up the hill, failed to find any pails of water, had no falls, came home and had a cup of tea.

Chanctonbury Ring

2010-06-16T01:57:00.005+01:00

I used to ride my bike over to Chanctonbury when I was younger but I didn't remember quite how cool the views are from up there. Plus you can see all the way back to Brighton and (with the most enormous lens) take a picture of my flat. A very cool place. A fews shots that I've decided take a look at now. At 2am. I am dysfunctioning.

Devil's Dyke - May 2010

2010-06-16T01:34:00.003+01:00

Just a couple from a little while ago. Amazing sunset the night before but camera was at home. This was less impressive by a mile, but if I don't put these up, the whole journey will have been wasted.

May as well add tonight as well...

2010-06-15T01:45:00.003+01:00

The Weather Fish

2010-06-15T00:26:00.002+01:00

Years ago (quite a lot of years ago now, last century in fact), when I was a student at BHASVIC in Brighton, I remember having conversations with friends about the 'weather fish' on top of the tower. It amused us for reasons that I've since forgotten. I now live just down the road and by far the fastest growing section of my photo collection seems to be endless sunsets featuring the weather fish. I feel like I've already posted a huge number of these up, but it can be so varied each night, and most nights that I'm here it's worth a photo or two. Here's a bunch more, taken over the last few weeks as we've swung from hot summer nights to windy winterish crap and back again.

Summer Salsa

2010-06-03T02:02:00.007+01:00

Went down to the seafront again tonight and there was a salsa lesson happening on the bandstand. Apparently it's every Wednesday, but this is the first time I've seen anyone using it properly. Seemed perfect for a warm summery evening by the sea. Stills will be posted somewhere at some point, but have added the video for now. Music by Buena Vista Social Club.

Salsa on the bandstand from Urchinboy on Vimeo.

Evening Stroll

2010-06-01T23:16:00.004+01:00

Took a walk along the seafront tonight, messing about with ridiculous low light/high ISO stuff on my new camera. It can see in the dark. All these taken somewhere between 800 and 1600 ISO. At about 9:30pm. Amazingly tiny amount of noise and huge amounts of detail in the full size shots.

West Wittering 5x5

2010-06-01T16:50:00.004+01:00

5x5 second shots from the beach at West Wittering on Friday. No audio, no particular order, just playing with the new camera.

West Wittering 5x5 from Urchinboy on Vimeo.

Bearing Up

2010-05-28T01:27:00.003+01:00

Making dull bike maintenance more fun (or slightly quicker at least) through the magic medium of timelapse.

Stripping the back end of a Devinci in 19 seconds from Urchinboy on Vimeo.

Two men in dire need of an alternate camera angle

2010-05-05T23:43:00.003+01:00

Footage from a couple of recent rides on classic Stanmer singletrack with Joe and Chris (although Chris was behind me so doesn't feature due to aforementioned lack of angles). Getting the frame mount soon and will almost certainly make a video one day that doesn't just feature my arms. This also demonstrates why the current trend for really wide handlebars doesn't cut it in the woods. 700s or lower is clearly where its at.

Stanmer Park Singletrack from Urchinboy on Vimeo.

Messing about in the woods

2010-04-27T15:23:00.004+01:00

First proper play with the GoPro camera. Attached to my chest or to Ben's head. Ben did a very good job of making sure the back of his head was the only thing he didn't hit on a tree or the ground during the day, despite his best efforts to the contrary.

Rotherfield - April 2010 from Urchinboy on Vimeo.

Couplamoresunsets

2010-04-14T01:32:00.003+01:00

Weather so nice I've almost forgotten the winter. With sunsets to match.

Easter in the Witterings

2010-04-06T00:28:00.008+01:00

Self explanatory really. Lovely couple of days at Nunnington.

Mamma

2010-04-06T00:12:00.003+01:00

Ages and ages ago I was looking at the "Cloud Appreciation Society' website and I saw some amazing pictures of 'Mamma' clouds (a bit like the ones on this blog). I had never seen anything like these, and kind of assumed from a slightly ignorant reading of some comments on one or two of the pictures that perhaps they were a product of some long exposure photography or some other technique. Then I did some reading about 'Mammas', realised they were real and then promptly forgot about them. Until I looked out the window on Saturday and there was a huge bank of them right over Brighton. Cure much photography and a slightly bemused friend wondering why I was so excited. Not as good as some other images around, and I wish I'd been on the seafront and not in the flat, but very happy to have seen these at last.

Weekends by the sea

2010-03-29T00:10:00.005+01:00

A long and tiring bike ride slodging through the mud on the north downs, followed by a day of mooching and wandering about by the sea in the wind and rain in the Witterings. Close to a perfect weekend. Some pics of the beach and some experiments with the Lensbaby, which has been sitting in its pouch for far too long.

How Fast..

2010-03-22T22:54:00.002Z

Steve Romaniuk with a chest mounted GoPro HD Hero cam.

I've never voted Tory but..

2010-03-22T15:58:00.001Z

This has been around for a while, but still makes me laugh.

I don't surf but...

2010-03-22T00:26:00.003Z

...this makes me want to learn.

Shot on RED and 5Dmkii.

Follow Me...

2010-03-11T18:38:00.004Z

I am childishly excited about this. Off to Wales this weekend to pretend I can ride this well.

Follow Me - the Teaser from Anthill Films on Vimeo.

And then take a look at their showreel. I want to work with these people. This is exactly what I want to do with my life.

Anthill Films Demo Reel from Anthill Films on Vimeo.

So far this morning...

2010-03-10T10:18:00.002Z

This has amused me. A trailer for every Oscar winning film ever.

Suomi

2010-02-19T00:15:00.002Z

The snow seemed to be running out in the UK so I headed for somewhere much, much colder. Finland was about -9, the rivers and sea were frozen solid and there was more snow than I could possibly ever need in my life. Here's a couple of shots of the 'beach' at Parainen and the extremely lovely house at Pötyyä.

More Snow?

2010-02-10T23:54:00.004Z

It snowed AGAIN in Brighton today. Not much, just an icy dusting everywhere, but I can't remember it ever snowing this many times in a single winter at any time during my life. No pics as I was in London all day, but here's another one from the beach in December. Off to Finland in a few days for yet more snow.

Lapse

2010-02-04T01:07:00.004Z

Have finally acquired a time lapse thingy for my camera. But instead of playing with it tonight, I had to finish work on my pictures from the Headteachers Conference last week. So here is a very short time-lapse of me looking at pictures of headteachers. All I seem to do is repeatedly look at one screen then the other. Like watching a game of tennis from quite far away. Better stuff to follow one day soon...

Hey Look...

2010-02-01T21:36:00.003Z

It's the Isle of Wight. Very prominent on the horizon at sunset when its all frosty and cold. Seems slightly odd to be able to see it from Brighton, but here's proof that you can. Plus another sunset from last week sometime.

The Shits Parade

2010-01-21T19:58:00.008Z

Whilst waiting for yet another delayed First Capital Connect train to Brighton I compiled my current top five 'Prominent people in the UK who's death will make the world a better place'. So without further ado...

1) Margaret Thatcher. Waited far too long for this one. Although probably good if she could just hold on til after the election. If she popped her clogs before it, the Tories would likely get some sort of horrific sympathy bounce from all the morons out there who fail to see quite how vile she was. Plus after the Tories win the next election (desperately hope someone is holding on to some really good footage of Cameron abusing a pleb somewhere, to be released in the days before the election) we'll all need cheering up a bit so a 'Dead Thatcher' party might be just the ticket.

2) Simon Cowell. No long explanation needed. Just as soon as possible please.

3) Rupert Murdoch. Technically not solely a UK person, but he makes the list by being responsible for so much wrongness in the British media. Terrified by what will happen to the BBC under the tories when Murdoch gets his way, so a quick death in a plane crash along with his clone James would be great. Possibly could put Simon Cowell on the same plane to kill two birds with one stone / two twats with a jet.

4) Whoever is in charge of First Capital Connect. I don't know how this would work, but I'd like them to be 'delayed to death'.

5) Whoever is in charge of First Capital Connect. Just when they thought that being delayed to death was over (resulting in their very very slow death). I'd have them resurrected and do it to them again. Just like I have to go through the same tedious shit every day on their crappy little trains.

A new low...

2009-12-08T00:32:00.002Z

I think I've hit a new career low. It's 12.30am, and I'm waiting for a graphic to render that includes the text 'Basingstoke's premier business location'.

It's fair to say there are many, many, many things I would rather be doing right now.

A-Line

2009-11-04T22:42:00.001Z

Just. How. Fun. Does. This. Look.

Uppity

2009-10-13T18:22:00.004+01:00

During my new and slightly extended daily commute I have loads of time to consider everything that is great about British rail travel. Overpriced season tickets that last seven days instead of five for example (and having spent all five working days in London, why wouldn't you want to visit on both days of your weekend as well?). Today's excitement is all about not having enough seats. Everyone has paid a fortune to be on this train and yet many are standing whilst the little 'first class' section remains largely empty. I've always admired the fact that in the event of a crash it will be these selfless first classers who try to deflect some of the impact away from us plebs by acting as a small but rather fleshy (and they are ALWAYS a bit fleshy) cushion/train sandwich down at the front. However, if it's empty this won't happen, so I have decided to sit down in there for now. The strange uppity folk that inhabit this exclusive area have clearly marked me down as a bit too plebby to be in here. They are having quite pointed conversations about fare dodgers and how they are mortally offended by people who 'chance it' in first class. I am quite enjoying the fact that I've annoyed them. It's making my journey go much quicker. It must have been so much simpler when you could just thrash a peasant in the street and have him put in a workhhouse. Until after the next election at least, they'll have to put up with me.

Face of Doom

2009-10-03T18:58:00.004+01:00

Took yet more photos of yet another sunset view (there's one every day apparently) but when I looked back at these ones, I realised that instead of a sunset, there was in fact a huge scary evil face lurking in the clouds.

2009-09-28T10:28:00.001+01:00

Charlie Brooker's latest thoughts on the cult of Mac (of which I am a fully paid up member). Very funny.

A very Finnish adventure

2009-09-22T21:54:00.003+01:00

Today I did an advert for Intel, which involved pretending to be in Finland. All the extras were Finnish, lots of people were speaking in Finnish (very smug about understanding the counting in Finnish that was involved, and the continued use of the word for 'now!'), and I got to wear my "Suomi' T-Shirt with pride. Best of all there were two people on set who were actually called Finn (including me). The other one was actually a Norwegian. We both agreed it was an excellent name. All in all a MegaFinn kind of day. And the ad should be pretty cool too.

I Love the Argus

2009-09-18T17:25:00.002+01:00

Vile rightwing local paper The Argus never fails to amuse with it's headlines. Always worth a look to see what cutting edge news stories are really affecting the city.

I'm sure he waved at me...

2009-09-18T11:51:00.004+01:00

Was busy bleeding air out of my brakes, covered in Shimano mineral oil and wondering how to hold a syringe, use a spanner and attach a hose to a caliper, when the flat was shaken by a near miss from the Red Arrows. They're in Brighton for the crazy sports thing on Madeira Drive this weekend (either that or they are massive show offs with nothing to do on a Friday). They spent about 20 minutes whizzing about the place, dive bombing Sussex Heights, spewed a fair bit of patriotic coloured smoke around and flew off to wherever they come from. Cool. One of them kept putting in turns right over the flat. Was covered in oil so didn't manage to grab my camera until near the end. Great to watch though. I am still not bored of finally having a view of something from my flat.

Pan or Rama?

2009-09-17T23:55:00.002+01:00

First very quick stab at a panorama of 'The View'. Albeit a limited section of it. Not that great but worth a bash I thought. Full size is 130cm wide so a full panorama of the entire view would be bigger still. Cool. Just need a good sunset.

Spotlights

2009-09-16T22:33:00.002+01:00

I'm not bored of this view yet.

No work is getting done

2009-09-01T19:39:00.002+01:00

This is the view from my desk tonight. I am doing an exceptionally small amount of editing. I've been here a week or so now and I just can't get enough of staring out the window like a moron. I've just watched clouds for about an hour.

Viewings

2009-09-01T17:59:00.002+01:00

The view from my new 'office' this afternoon. Surprisingly enough, just after this it rained. A lot.

British Telecom - Pile of Bastards

2009-09-01T13:12:00.002+01:00

Congratulations to BT, who have regained their rightful place at the top of my hate list. I can't be bothered to go into the details, I just want to express my renewed hatred for this bumbling fuckwitted monopoly of telecoms. They are a bunch of thieving, conniving little bastards. I really want someone to set fire to them all. Moving house is expensive enough without being charged to cancel a service you cannot possibly use anymore, or being charged even more money to install their turd of a service into your home. I wish them all a long winded and unpleasant demise.

Reasons to love Brighton #1

2009-08-26T01:22:00.005+01:00

As of last Friday, I am once again a Brighton resident. This is an exceptionally good thing. And if you're going to live in Brighton, why not find yourself living somewhere that has a view of the sea, the Downs, every sunset of the year, and an awful lot of sky. Not to mention my old sixth form college, the bank where I opened my first ever bank account, the roof of my Mum's old house, Shoreham, Worthing, my friend Jim's house, and (very oblique but it still counts) my junior school. The only view I had in London was a street or a wall. Things have improved. Here's the first of many, many, many of these. The first two sunsets I've watched from the comfort of my living room. Yippee!

Things in the way

2009-08-12T22:06:00.004+01:00

Things I have mostly been doing during my weeks holiday in Dorset...

1) Driving very very slowly behind a 'period coach' from 1952 or some such very long time ago. It was incapable of going more than 10mph up hills. There are lots of hills here, and very few overtaking spots. Nothing has made me feel more like an impatient Londoner than the hour spent behind this thing today. Fortunately I managed to avoid coming across as impatient and irrational by beeping at him to the tune of Rule Britannia. I thought this would jolly things up.

2) Walking up the very delightful 'Golden Cap'. Apparently this cliffy bit of coast near Chideock is the highest point on the South Coast. I was convinced it was Beachy Head, but I was wrong. Although Beachy Head still wins on suicide potential. Falling off Golden Cap would be much more likely to just break you really badly. It was a very good view from up there though. I went twice.

3) Visiting Lyme Regis and marveling at the how people cram themselves together on the tiny bit of (fake) sandy beach at one end. Hemmed in a JCB digging out smelly mud from the harbour at low tide and the clearly undesirable but relatively empty shingle beach. People are weird. People in British seaside resorts on the hot days are the weirdest. And why do so many people now bring tents onto the beach? Weirdos.

Back on Friday to pack up the flat and move to Brighton!

I am very excited...

2009-08-05T01:17:00.003+01:00

...about this

and this

amongst other things.

Lyme Regis

2009-07-13T16:36:00.003+01:00

Was down in Lyme Regis for the weekend. Went out to go fishing, felt quite sick, came back and took photos. I also fired a gun. Pics of that later. Here's the harbour as the weather rolled in.

Rock Hammer

2009-07-13T15:05:00.003+01:00

Supposed to be editing a corporate film today. It feels like I'm deliberately bashing my teeth out one at a time with a small rock hammer like the one from Shawshank Redemption. And for every minute of staring at the screen and not doing any editing, I lose a minutes sleep tonight when I have to finish it in time for a deadline tomorrow. Is it unprofessional to just abandon it?

In one of my many coffee breaks, I'm flicking through some pics from Brighton on New Year's day in 2008. In five or six weeks, I can actually visit this beach in one of my many coffee breaks. This will be a very good thing. One thing I've also noticed recently is how many pictures I take with two people in. I've got loads like this. I should diversify into odd numbers.

BRIGHTON!

2009-07-08T17:05:00.002+01:00

We've given in our notice on our flat in London. One way or another I AM DEFINITELY COMING BACK TO LIVE IN BRIGHTON!

Radio Soulwax

2009-06-18T01:57:00.002+01:00

Went to see 2 Many DJs last weekend. This is uncannily close to what it felt like. Keep clicking.

Earnings

2009-06-12T18:27:00.004+01:00

I am pleased to report that since starting this blog (in 2006), I have earned a massive $21.50 from the Google ads placed on the page. Only another $78.50 (or 12 more years) to go until they send me a cheque, at which point I will be retiring immediately.

Steal my rant

2009-06-12T10:25:00.004+01:00

These two articles from the Guardian poke some interesting holes in the arguments about filesharing. I've always thought it ludicrous to assume that every 'illegal' download is the equivalent of a lost sale for the movie, music or software industry. Now if they concentrated on making better music and better films, I might buy more. I am never going to pay for most of the rubbish that's made, and downloading it for free gives me the chance to realise quite how shit a lot of stuff is, and makes me feel smug that I haven't spent any money on it. But come out with something cool, and I'll buy it even if I've already got a download. Or make it really simple and much cheaper to buy it online and I'll also probably pay money. I buy TV episodes on iTunes, rent films for a couple of quid and buy occasional bits of music. All because it's quicker and easier than going to a shop and paying too much, or hunting out the torrent and watching it crawl along for two days. Blah blah blah. This has already been discussed way too much. Read a bit of Billy Bragg's ideas about it all instead.

Must Stop

2009-06-10T19:42:00.006+01:00

You can tell I've had a slow day. Two more before I stop and eat some food. These are from Whistlers Summit in the general direction of Mt. Edith Cavell (the diagonal strata looking snowy one behind the weird cairn). It's original name was 'The White Ghost', which seems appropriate. The good people in charge of Alberta early last century disagreed with me and named it after an English nurse from the First World War instead. Silly twats.

Maligne

2009-06-10T18:14:00.004+01:00

More Canada. This is Maligne Lake. 14 miles long and frozen for most of the year. You can see tracks of avalanches in the forest on the side. Apparently they comes down the mountain, blast the trees out the way and then shoot straight accross the ice and hit the far side of the lake. Sounds fun.

Mega Crops

2009-06-10T16:44:00.005+01:00

Quite a few photographs I have from Canada haven't worked all that well as I shot them, but with some serious cropping, there's some nice details to pick out. I usually try to keep my single non-panoramic shots as the native 3:2 aspect ratio, but it's always worth messing about with once a shot isn't working like that. I've always really liked the more filmic aspect ratios in video editing and sometimes picking something closer to 2:1 works better for a lot of landscapes. These aren't the best shots, but they have been improved dramatically by messing about with cropping and ratios.

Freight Train in Japser

2009-06-10T14:43:00.002+01:00

Peyto

2009-06-10T13:55:00.004+01:00

The amusingly ludicrous Peyto Lake. It actually is that colour. Something to do with glacial runoff.

Kayak

2009-06-10T12:51:00.003+01:00

Here's a Kayak. Not a canoe. According to Wikipedia

"A kayak differs from a canoe in that the kayak typically has a covered deck (an extension of the hull), a cockpit covered by a water-tight spraydeck, and is propelled by a sitting paddler with a double-bladed (one on each end) paddle (most canoeists use a single bladed paddle). A double-bladed paddle allows for more efficient propulsion (higher stroke rate possible, etc.), but is more difficult to use effectively in a wider craft (canoes tend to be wider than kayaks). The spraydeck (also known as a skirt) is used to seal the gap between the deck and the paddler, making it possible to recover from a capsize without flooding the interior of the hull with water. In some parts of the world kayaks are considered canoes, and open-decked canoes are called "Canadian canoes".

So now we know.

Emerald Lake

2009-06-10T01:29:00.003+01:00

One of the best days of the trip, kayaking on Emerald Lake. EDIT: Apparently this is a 'canoe' not a 'kayak'. I was too busy being chauffeured around a lake to really notice.

Standish

2009-06-10T00:56:00.005+01:00

Still slowly working through shots from Canada last year. Here's a segment of a bigger panorama of the view from Mt Standish straight down towards the Simpson RIver Valley near Mount Assiniboine. These shots were all really rushed and the framing and exposure were a bit off, but I think I'm finally managing to get something out of them.

Just for comparisons sake, I've added a similar crop from the original panorama created straight from the RAW files off the camera. At this point the RAW files have had a few tweaks to try and match the exposure across all the individual images, and this has led to it all looking a bit flat. Between thsi and the final version you can see that all I've done is selectively adjust contrast and saturation to try and make it all a bit more interesting. A bit HDRish perhaps but I prefer it.

Appledore

2009-06-09T00:03:00.003+01:00

No particular point to this except that I can't remember if I ever posted any of these shots from Appledore in Devon. We discovered it by accident but apparently I have some family down there somewhere. Odd. Anyway, yet another sunset.

4k Fun in the Sun

2009-06-04T21:46:00.005+01:00

I've been in Hastings for the last couple of days filming a new comedy pilot. Very fun and very, very hot. Hastings is a deeply weird place, the Normans must have been quite disappointed. It does however have the country's largest beach launched fishing fleet, a strange miniature railway to nowhere, and pretty good skatepark full of feral boys with unbelievable skills on a bike. Brakeless tailwhips galore. They all turned out to be very nice though, and a couple of them might even end up on the finished edit.

This was also my first time on a shoot with the ludicrously amazing RED camera. So now we have a no budget comedy pilot shot on Steven Soderberghs favourite new toy. This is definitely the way forward. Looks lovely in the edit already.

Here's a pic of a BMX almost ending our shoot early by knocking our lead characters head off (not the RED in this shot though, more of that later).

Jobs I Should Have #4864

2009-06-01T17:30:00.004+01:00

Even in all this sunshine (and occasional mental showers), I really don't enjoy living in London all that much. Far too many people and not enough open space. Right now, if I could be doing any job in the world, any where in the world, I would probably pick this guy's job. Hopefully Canada will shortly announce a worldwide appeal for photographers of all abilities to come and be paid to live in Vancouver and take pictures of bikey people all day. At this point I should stare out of my window looking sad, but unfortunately our silly posh neighbours have built a massive extension and the only view is of their wall.

Random Canada shot of the day. View from above Banff.

Something VERY exciting is coming...

2009-05-23T14:08:00.002+01:00

Stare

2009-05-23T00:24:00.001+01:00

Seen a few like this, but I still love the way a rear facing helmet-cam looks. Spooky.

More bikes

2009-05-22T22:26:00.002+01:00

In all the years of biking, I've never really done much bike photography. Mostly because I'd rather be riding, but also because it's really hard to do well. Especially in the woods, where it tends to be very dark. When I first started this blog, I posted a few bike pics, and assumed I would do more and get better. A few years on and I'm pretty sure I can take a better landscape or portrait, but my bike photos still need a LOT of work. I still have a willing photo monkey in the form of Joe though. One day he'll get a good shot out of it (or he'll end up stuck in a tree and I'll get an interesting photo for Fail Blog). Here's a picture of him doing no riding at all.

My Ideal Job

2009-05-14T23:48:00.002+01:00

Mountain biking, filming, editing, motion graphics and a hefty dose of grading.

All combined to make this little film an excellent example of exactly what my ideal job would be. If I could make little promos like this every day, I would be a very happy boy. Although if you're not into biking, this may be one of the least interesting things you will ever watch. It looks nice though so give it a bash on aesthetic grounds at least.

What Helen Mirren Did

2009-05-14T12:32:00.003+01:00

Hey look. The Queen sent champagne to my mum.

So if you have a spare evening this week and you happen to be in Brighton, then get down to The Hive at the Brunswick and see the very fabulous 'What Would Helen Mirren Do'. I am completely unbiased in this recommendation. Even the flyer is VERY well designed.

Do we like this?

2009-05-07T22:40:00.004+01:00

Hunting around photography sites for ideas and inspiration and came across this demo of a flash viewer for photo websites. Can't decide if I like it or if it's just too flashy and a bit of a faff to navigate. Bit different though. Dan Barham's site is really nice though. Great shots and well presented. I want to be a mountain bike photographer (and live in Canada).