Winter sunlight and new buildings beyond Lower Marsh

On the fifth and eighteenth days of this month I was in Lower Marsh, which is just south of Waterloo Station, as I often am. On each of these days, there was bright sunshine, and cloud.

On each day, after I had done my business in Lower Marsh and continued on to Blackfriars Road, and to its two newly constructed edifices: One Blackfriars (the curvey one) and 240 Blackfriars (the “crystaline” one).

The first of these photos, !.1, shows One, and One reflected in 240:

I love a good crane, and 1.2 is rather remarkable, because it shows (a) two construction cranes, (b) these cranes reflected in 240 Blackfriars, and (c) on the surface of that same building and above the reflections of the cranes, the shadows of those same cranes. If you click on nothing else, click on that.

Photo 1.3 tells us where we are, and shows One of that road scraping the sky,

In 2.1, 2.3 and 3.3, we see another joy of winter, trees without leaves.

The final photo of this little set, 3.3, shows the tower of a crane with some of those trees, and is included because the colours are what you would expect with regular lighting.

Ah, but what if the lighting is irregular? What if there is bright sunlight hitting a crane tower, but with dark cloud instead of blue sky behind it? 3.2 is what then happens. Worth another click, I’d say.

And 3.1 shows clouds of a very different sort, again reflected in 240 Blackriars. Also pretty dramatic.

1.1 to 2.1 taken on the fifth. 2.3 to 3.3 on the eighteenth.

What, no photos of photoers? Was I the only one photoing? Could nobody else see the epic dramas of light and dark, construction and reflection, scaffolding and skeletal trees, that I was seeing? Apparently not.

On the fifth, soon after I had taken the first four of the above photos, my fellow photoers had been all over the man with the flaming tuba.

Photography is light. But I guess for most photoers, mere light, bouncing off of dreary things like modern buildings, cranes, trees, scaffolding and the like, is not enough.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

The London skyline ten years ago

Ten years ago yesterday, to be exact about it:

Memo to self: go back to the same spot and take the same photo again, some time soon.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

A brightly lit building in front of a dark sky

Remember a while back, when I showed you this photo:

I took that photo back on January 5th. As soon as I started working on it, I got sidetracked into realising that my camera was not misbehaving after all, i.e. not turning everything yellow. Phew.

But the reason I started work on that photo was that it is an illustration of that special sort of weather that happens when there are both dark clouds, and holes in those clouds, through which light comes ripping through, sometimes lighting up buildings that stand in front of dark clouds. The above blue roof was not the first of such brightly-lit-thing-against-a-dark-background that I saw and photoed that day, and I felt sure that it would not be the last.

And boy was I not wrong? As in: I definitely was not wrong. Because, soon after photoing yesterday’s flaming tuba player, under Blackheath Bridge and its railway station, I climbed up into Blackheath Bridge and its railway station, and through the windows on the downstream side, I found myself staring in amazement at this:

I seldom photo St Paul’s Cathedral. I understand why people admire Ancient Architecture, but I find Modern Architecture more intriguing to think about. But I couldn’t resist that. That is not your usual St Paul’s Cathedral photo. To me it looks not so much like a photo as like a collage, where I have stuck a cut-out of St Paul’s Cathedral onto a dark background, but chose paper that was too light for the Cathedral, to make sure it showed up clearly.

I knew that this effect would not last, and sure enough, it did not:

That being a photo I took of St Paul’s Cathedral less than a minute later.

Here is a cropped version of the special effects photo above, to make the contrast even clearer:

I know, lots of reflections in the glass windows of Blackfriars Station, through which the photos were taken. Guess what. I don’t care. So, the photos were taken through windows? So what. And actually, I think the glass may have increased the contrast, by darkening the sky somewhat bit, but not being able to darken the Cathedral, because it was just too brightly lit by the sun.

Photography is light.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Primrose Hill photoers

Yesterday’s photo, taken at Primrose Hill before Christmas, was very pretty. That lovely light you get when the sun is low, which it always is, which is nice because it’s nice, and nice because it means you can see what’s on people’s screens. Trees uncluttered by leaves. Distant Big Things. Wonderful. Which is why there were so many other photoers in action:

No computer-recognisable faces, but lots of winter clothing, including woolly hats and woolly gloves.

18 photos there, and just two of them (2.1 and 5.1) do not feature smartphones. I chose the photos entirely for artistic impression. It merely turned out that way.

See also 1.3. It looks like she’s holding a giant cock of the unmentionable sort. But, it’s a glove. So (see 4.2): No Bad Vibes.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Pimlico in Kensington

Incoming from GodDaughter2:

Pimlico in Kensington, said the email, photoed near her place of work. She knows the kind of thing I like, doesn’t she?

Are such vans rare and exotic in Kensington? I see them all the time, in and around Pimlico.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

My camera is not turning photos yellow – it’s Windows Photo Viewer that is turning photos yellow

Yes, panic over. The situation seemed very bad, but instead is as described above.

Consider this photo, of the roof of the long snakey shed that looks like it’s for growing tomatoes, where the Euro-trains used to arrive and depart from:

I was viewing that in Windows Photo Viewer, but then I found myself simultaneously viewing that same photo in in my photo-editing software, thus:

Do you see? Of course you do. Windows Photo Viewer, on the left, has introduced, from nowhere, a cream background, and shoved it behind and into the photo. On the right, Photoshop(clone) has ignored this cream under(over)lay, and has restored the pure blue of that Waterloo Station roof and has taken the ominous yellow tinge out of the dark grey sky. The white bits of the roof are back to being white. Put the photo in some different software for viewing my archives, and it is similarly cleansed of yellowness. All was well with the original photo, as it emerged from my camera. Windows Photo Viewer is the problem and the only problem.

So, no panic about my camera. Just a question about Windows Photo Viewer. How do I get that to behave itself? I have worked out how to change the brown at the top and bottom of the photo to any other colour you or I would like. But can I get it to stop with the cream? Can I random-punctuation-marks-in-an-angry-little-line. Suggestions anyone?

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Getting old – BBC Music – Lego Tower Bridge – etc.

One of the problems of getting old is that it becomes gradually harder to do more than one thing in a day. This being why my daily postings here are often rather perfunctory.

This morning, for instance, I had a most enjoyable meeting with a friend, and then, the weather being so good, I went wandering about in Soho. That’s two things there, right away. Now, all I am capable of is rather incoherent rambling about nothing very much.

I did, while meandering about in the south of Oxford Street area, finally manage to track down the latest issue of the BBC Music (by which is meant classical music) magazine, which is getting harder to come by with every year that passes. Another symptom of advancing years being that it gets harder to buy the things that you particularly like, as others who also like that thing die off.

But, good news: the BBC’s preferred best performance of the Beethoven Hammerklavier Sonata was a rather obscure recording by the rather obscure pianist, Peter Serkin, who is the less famous son of the famous pianist Rudolf Serkin. I have so many CDs that I often can’t be sure whether I own some particular CD or not, and so it was with this one. But after some rootling around, I discovered that I do possess this CD. I love it when that happens.

And yes, since you ask, I am influenced by critics. If someone who knows the piece in question very well thinks that this or that performance is very, very good, then I know that I will at least want to hear this performance, even if I don’t end up sharing the critic’s high opinion, which often I do. This recommendation means I will now listen to this CD again.

The other thing I did was take a close look at a camera that I have been tempted by, but will probably not be buying, although it was interesting. This was in a shop called Park Cameras in Rathbone Place.

Inside Park Cameras Rathbone Place I also took this photo, with the camera that I already possess:

Good to encounter a new bridge of interest, even if it is only a miniature Lego version of an old bridge. I have no idea why such a bridge was in Park Cameras Rathbone Place, but I wasn’t complaining.

I get the distinct impression that a golden age of bridge building arrived about thirty or forty years ago, but has now departed. I just picture googled new bridge, and I mostly got bridges I have known about for quite a while.

I digress.

The sky pool is coming

I’ve not yet finished what was going to be today’s posting, so here, to be going on with, is a link to this Londonist list of eleven things to look forward to in London in 2018. From their list, my bronze, silver and gold medalists are:

Bronze: Crossrail.

Silver: The new Spurs stadium.

Gold: The swimming pool in the sky.

Here is what that Gold medalist will, we must all hope, look like:

Says Londonist:

It’s been over two years since it was announced that London was getting a swimming pool in the sky, right next to the new U.S. Embassy, and it’s finally diving onto the London skyline in 2018. The bad news: it’s not for you – unless you are one of the lucky few who could afford to splash out on an apartment in Nine Elms’ Embassy Gardens development (starting price £602,000). The rest of us will have to make do with our local leisure centre.

But I don’t want to live there. What I want to know is: Will I be able to photo other people swimming in the sky pool? I’m guessing it’ll be out of public sight.

Maybe you are thinking: Yes, but that’s a bit pervey. If you are thinking that, I agree. It is. But the best photos often are.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

I like Prince Albert’s backing

Many decades ago, there was a TV show called Juke Box Jury. I liked it best when someone said: “I like the backin’.” Subsequently, upon maturer reflection, I felt that I was quite right to zero in on that dictum, and I still do. So often, with pop music, it is the musical backing, rather than the mere singing, which turns pop inadequacy into something distinctive and entertaining.

Something similar can be said for photography. When a Real Photographer (LINK TO THE OLD BLOG) friend of mine was once upon a time telling me about how to do photoing, he too said: get the background right.

All of which is the preamble to this photo, which I took this afternoon, and the backin’ of which I like a lot:

That is a statue (so far so obvious) of (not so obvious) Prince Albert. When you image google for “Prince Albert statue London”, you get a lot of photos of him in golden splendour, seated inside his Memorial in Hyde Park, but not so many photos of this one. Judging by the other photos I did find of it, here, here (he calls it “the politest statue in London”) and here, this statue has recently been cleaned.

I am surprised at how much I have come to like statues, and public sculpture in general. Three of the photos in this posting of mine, which I linked to from here yesterday evening, are of public sculptures, two of them statues, of Beau Brummell and of Anna Pavlova. I didn’t plan this. It just turned out that way.

Happy New Year, by the way. I’ve had a good 2018, so far.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Southwark Cathedral from the train

This evening I had a party at my home. All the people I invite to my Last Friday of the Month meetings were invited, and almost exactly the same number of people showed up as tend to show up for the meetings. How do they do this?

I am now completely knackered, but it wasn’t the party alone that knackered me; it was … alas, I find that I am too knackered to explain. Maybe, although I promise nothing, later.

So instead, a quota photo, of Southwark Cathedral not being dwarfed by modernity:

Taken out of the train window, on my way to Hither Green.

Spot the Gherkin.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog