I’m in the middle of putting some themed Blurb books together and went for a rummage round the darker recesses of my Lightroom catalogue. Lightroom is a great piece of software and I now tend to do much of my photo editing on it (apart form mono conversions and multi layer work), and it’s a vastly…
Category: Black and White
#291 – Recommendation – Ilford Photolabs
Recently, I’ve been using DS Colour Labs extensively to print out large quantities of monochrome prints, as their prices are excellent, and their quality is very good. But I thought I’d give llford Labs another go after a bit of a disaster a while back. As you might have guessed from the name, Ilford Labs…
#288 – Big Wheel
Ever since The London Eye brought Ferris Wheels back into vogue in the UK, they’ve been popping up all over the place in the UK. Manchester has had one semi-permanently in the Triangle for some years (although not this year), as have other large towns and cities, so I was quite surprised to see one…
#269 – Mechanical Funscape 2
These images are variations on the same theme as the image in the last post. As before, the black and white treatment has brought out the texture of the slightly corroded, painted surfaces of the steelwork. By removing the distraction of colour, the shapes are now far more prominent as are things like the repeating…
#268 – Mechanical Funscape 1
Engineers have turned their attention to all manner of things, developing machines to serve us in many ways – for example, to feed us, transport us, clean us, kill us, and in the photograph above, to frighten the living $&%! out of us. Camelot is Chorley’s own theme park, and about ten minutes from my…
#267 – Brymbo Photographs in Urban Realm Magazine
I correspond every now again with Mark Chalmers who shares an interest in urban exploration, and he recently asked me if he could use some photos from Brymbo Steelworks to illustrate an article he was writing for Urban Realm magazine . The article is a feature on a final year MA architecture project based on…
#266 – Farewell Hans Steeneken
A recent email brought the sad news of the passing of Dutch railway photographer Hans Steeneken. The email was from someone who has now got access to his emails, and he said that he died ‘last June 6th’, but I’ve just checked my emails and my last email from Hans was September 2011, so I presume…
#265 – Book Review – The Industrial Landscape – Bernd and Hilla Becher
Zeche Concordia, Oberhausen (1967), Germany I’ve heard a lot about the industrial photography of Bernd and Hilla Becher over the years, but from the work that I’d seen, I just couldn’t get excited about it. OK, I’ll be the first to admit that this field isn’t exciting in the same way that, say, motorsport photography…
#262 – Prestolite of Leyland
I was quite surprised to stumble across this vast crumbling edifice, less than 10 minutes from my home, as most of the former Leyland Motors plants in Leyland had been cleared. Yet, sat behind rows of houses and a dense row of shrubs was this huge, wartime-era factory, now empty after its last occupants…
#250 – Return To Dinorwic – Australia Level Part 2
Throwing caution to the not inconsiderable wind, I decided to continue wandering along the Australia level, if nothing else to see if there was a less difficult way down. Seeing some buidlings ahead, I wandered over to see what they were. Various bits of scrap littered the grass outside which piqued my curiousity, and inside…
Mechanical Landscapes 