Ace Jet 170

The Bogside

 

 

I spent a day in Derry last week. I've been a few times before but with children, in bad weather, and with no real motivation to do anything in particular. We walked the city walls, got soaking wet…went to the pub and watched the racing, as I remember.

Last week I was flying solo, on a professional assignment and the sun it was a'shining.

I avoided the walls for a while, explored the city's inner workings then hovered at its west side exit, Butcher's Gate. The road beyond leads, in a south-westerly direct, down to the Bogside.

I can't deny that I was a bit nervous about heading down that way.

The Bogside is a sprawling, largely Catholic/Republican enclave, sitting outside the city walls and, you might say, in its shadow – remember I said 'down to the Bogside'. As the name suggests, a long time ago this was not a place you would want to live. And that's why, when us English muscled our way across the island of Ireland around the 1600s, those that we didn't like were pushed down this way, into the quagmire. Even today it's not particularly pretty.

It has a complex history but once you know some of it, you can imagine why resentment was sparked, grew, manifested itself in violence and, in some areas, remains.

So, I was a bit nervous about heading down that way.

We like to think we live in enlightened times and certainly, since I began working in interpretation design, I have found myself more and more considering all sides of a story. It could be said that that is one of the missions of interpretation design – to provoke and to reveal – to give an impartial view of (always) multi-facetted stories; to tell us the things we didn't know and to change our view to a fully informed one.

Living in Northern Ireland, that seems particularly important.

An English man in the Bogside, you can easily imagine, is not a welcome one and my trepidation remained even though I barely skimmed the periphery of the area.

 

Two things I noticed…

One was that the longer I spent down there, the greater the feeling of excitement grew in me. Excitement tinged with fear. It was thrilling and for the first time I felt I was consciously tasting 'Dark Tourism'. I began to see why some people seek out a place with a grim history. In the case of the Bogside, I'm not sure 'history' is quite right, its past is still part of its present.

The other thing I noticed was that once you've walked down from the city walls to see the murals up-close and rising above you, they take on a greater power.

I live in East Belfast. It's largest Loyalist and not so far from us is an area of intense muralisation (that's not really a word but it'll do for now). The murals of East Belfast of very paramilitary. Lots of badges, crests and gun-toting, balaclava-wearing 'soldiers'.

The murals on the Bogside are more creative and conceptual. At least the ones you see on its edges. They tell stories and have social meaning. There's protest and cause in them. They feel like expressions of the subjugated, oppressed and victimised. 

I don't know anyone who suffered or lost people during the troubles, it's very distant from me. But I've learned a fair amount about Irish history and now have some insight into the bigger Irish picture, un-influenced by more direct and contemporary things.

Walking along the Bogside's edge, I felt that there was still reason for dark thoughts to be present in the shadows.

 

Coast Stories

 

 

On Saturday 6 July, 2—10pm, I'll be selling my weird wares at the Seaside Revival Festival in nearby Bangor (Northern Ireland, for readers from other lands). I'm in the throes of creating a special coastal series of ThreadForms, using photos taken from around the coastline over the past 15 or so years (I knew I'd find a use for them!). Threaded lines, typed titles, found materials and original photos meet in 30 x 40cm frames.

#theoldmenoforangefield

 

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For the past five years, during term time, I have found myself walking our dog around Orangefield Park, near to the Grammar school our boys go to. My oldest son – the one that's an actual giant – plays rugby and Saturday morning is more often than not match day. Just like it is throughout the western world no doubt.

I drop him off for pre-match training, give the dog a walk, then take my position pitch-side to shout a bit. It's great and although I don't have a long history of sportsfaning, 'The Rugby' has become a top-notch source of pleasure…and pain, of course. Such is the plight of the sportsfan.

Orangefield Park fills a gap between the school, a densely residential area, a key arterial road and a dodgy estate. Like many parks, it's a meeting place where people meet people they would never normally meet.

My favourite people are the old dudes. The grumpy, friendly, silent, chatty dog-treat packing, dog-walking, old dudes. 

I've watched, from the bushes, the ebb and flow of the old dudes. Sometimes walking solo, sometimes in pairs…occasionally in packs. I do engage with them – usually as our dogs are drawn to each other's odours – not least because I know that one day, I will be one of them.

I've been taking sneaky snaps of them whenever a back or gaze is turned. If you're on IG, you can follow the hashtag above to keep tabs on the park's most worthy patrons.

Threads & Photos

 

 

Prints of Instagrammed images of Northern Ireland's north coast with intersecting thread lines of black and red. I've been working on thread compositions for a few years now. It's an on-going project that's seen long periods of inactivity and short, frenzied bursts of needlework.

I feel that it could be my most original pastime. I'm not sure what the precedent is…Maybe the string pictures of the seventies; precisely spaced tacks on felt-wrapped boards, intertwined with cotton or string to create analogue moiré patterns, as in Barbara Hepworth's Orpheus (Maquette 2) (Version II), from 1956, edition 1959…

Perhaps it's the influence of my wife's craft activities – the presence of cotton thread was a constant in our house before she had her own studio space. Then again, I can see the influence of El Lissitsky's Suprematist work that I used to be obsessed with. Add to that the slightest hint – a mere pinch – of collage (another obsession) and I can begin to see how my brain brought these into existence.

RGM-89 JEGAN

 

Somewhere between The Amazing World of Gumball and Overwatch my youngest son (he's not so young any more) builds Gundam models. Back in my day it was the Spitfire and Chieftain Tank that we assembled from Airfix kits bought from that model shop up on New Street. For Seth, it’s Mecha – equally complex, but shipped over from Japan.

If you lived in Japan, these amazing model kits wouldn’t cost you too much – a few week’s pocket money maybe, depending on which side of the Bullet Train tracks you were born on. We have to stump up for shipping but they are undeniably cool, so money (and time) well spent I say.

Seth's building quite a collection now and is really into the TV show they derive from.

The models take time to construct and (forgive me for sounding predictably parentist) in our age of fast gratification, that's a very pleasing thing to witness.

They're also awesome to photograph.

Hospitaleyes

 

This is, probably, my favourite building on the Belfast skyline; ever since we moved here I've admired it. I may be in the minority but I know I'm not alone. In fact, I'm very grateful to James Greive, who wrote about his fascination for the Belfast City Hospital building a few years ago on Architecture Ireland — not least because his piece fills in some gaps (and, provided the architect's impression below. Hope that's OK James).

The hospital building was the brain-child of 'avant-garde' architect Louis Adair Roche while he worked at Munce and Kennedy who don't seem to be around anymore. Cork-born, Roche's family moved up to the northern territories of the British Empire during the 1940s with LA packing his suitcase and heading over the water to study making buildings and that at University College London…in London. It seems that the hospital was his finest work, although it is also considered by many to be a monstrous carbuncle. I flipping love it.

Surprisingly, to me at least, it was opened in 1986. I've always assumed it was from the seventies. But, speculating wildly, that date might be a clue to explaining how the flip LAR got away with dropping that spaceship into the south western corner of the city.

I've heard stories about other Belfast buildings built during 'The Troubles' (late 1960s to late 1990s): against the backdrop of paramilitary shenanigans, seriously dubious city planning decisions were made. Maybe there were a few backhanders here and there; maybe there was a little 'pressure' applied — a little 'persuasion', you might call it. Who knows; between you and me I get the distinct impression that the laws of the land, during those difficult times, were somewhat more flexible than in other regions of the United Kingdom.

Whatevz. I for one (and I think Mr Greives would agree) am glad that the Rochemeister was granted approval for his design.

 

This gives you an idea of the building in context although you get a much better sense of its prominence from the ground.

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By the way, I didn't take the photos! They're great and I stumbled across them online, on the MDE Installations website. Finding them (the best photos of the building I've seen) is what prompted this post but they weren't credited so I can't say who took them. I use them with gratitude to the photographer and in the hope that whoever it was doesn't mind and won't be round to punch my lights out :-)

 

 

Roche died in 2014.

This is what The Irish Times had to say.

And here's a piece in The Irish News.

Scribbling

I've found myself, in recent times, drawing for a living. Not good drawing really but now that I'm an interpretive designer and what I design has changed, the need to capture ideas quickly has become more pertinent. At first, I was a little reluctant; nervous at my ability; rusty. But needs must and two things surprised me: the first was that I wasn't awful and the second thing was that I enjoyed it.

Over the last eighteen months I've used a pencil to design sculptural lectern panels for an ancient fort, I've scoped out interior spaces for a derelict textiles mill and I've conceived physical interactive installations. With a pencil.

Back in the day, when I worked in England, I art directed an old-school marker visualiser to do this kind of thing. Boy could Jeremy draw. I'd poorly scribble an idea in front of him and he'd go away and perform magic with his markers. It was by far the best way to capture an idea – unhindered by the toil and tyranny of so called 'Mac visuals'.

I don't know how much value is given to the ability to draw these days in the world of graphic design. That's not a rhetorical statement, for all I know it's still prized like it used to be. My view of the world is distorted, what with my field of endeavour, being a bit out of touch and being blessed by working with a number of illustrators that can draw the crap out of me. And then there's the tech. Ever new ways to manipulate and originate an image – all those apps!

This all sprang to mind as I pondered why I'm obsessed with making these images on my phone. They couldn't be easier but I'm often surprised by the results. Mere mirrored images take on forms I was not expecting and with hardly a thought – serendipitous dark bits become alien eyes. Sticky out bits become limbs.

I use Diptic and make them quickly in batches once I stumble across source material. These are made from the annual debris found in our greenhouse. The realism of the original stuff, even after it's been abstracted, retains a foot in the real world and adds to the strangeness.

What's this got to do with drawing? Maybe not much but maybe a bit. Perhaps in the future we'll hark back to these days and lament the demise of Diptic or Brushes or, dare I suggest, Photoshop – because we'll be originating and manipulating images in all sorts of new ways. And it occurred to me that we're just using a tool to make an image. You might choose a pencil, you might choose a stylus. Messing about with a photo and Diptic is a bit like doodling with a pencil. It's fun, uses little brain power and can reap surprising results. It's not unlike what Alan Fletcher used to do, only he used scraps of print.

Dipticstagram

Photoshop it ain't…But I love seeing what you can do with limited resources. In this case my phone, Diptic's pretty rudimentary editing functions and Instagram for some subtle colouration.

Postcards from the Hedge

There I was, minding my own business, searching the outer reaches of the digital realm for post-1922/pre-now images of Dublin's O'Connell Bridge and where should I find myself? Only on John Hinde's really quite marvellous postcard archive, that's where.

Interpretive design is a great field of work for a graphic designer. By it's nature you're more than likely to be delving into the printed past for artefacts, references or relics. There's almost always some moment in the past (or for that matter, the present) that leads you to some interesting image, design or whatchamacallit.

I'm all over Dublin at the moment: either fighting the damned oppressive British or annoying the intolerant Irish; ousting uncooperative tennents or trembling at the might of those inconsiderate and really quite rude Vikings.

And, as I've mentioned before, it's hard not to get distracted by the other stuff you pass or trip over along the way.

There and brack again

Spring. And with it returns more opportunities to scratch around the shoreline for discarded bivalve mollusc casings; washed up from their brackish habitats for macroscopic scrutiny.

The Past

I think (think) that's me at the top. It's definitely my brother and my Gran. It could be a cousin but it makes sense that it's me. My brother again below, parking the van, just after my Dad jumped out, "Park the van son" (Dad couldn't drive).

I have a feeling that's my Gran and Grandad in the Herald coming off the ferry. Have no idea where they were going to or coming from. Partly because I wasn't born when these photos were taken and partly because even if I had been, I'd have been too young to remember.

I doubt you really want to hear any of this…But for the record, below you'll see my Mum, Dad and brother with Dad's Uncle Cyril and Aunty Vi – clearly before I was born again. Cyril and Vi were lovely; I have really warm, if somewhat distant, memories of visiting them in Sherborne St John, near Basingstoke (once I got being born out of the way). There was nothing in Sherborne St John except a Post Office. I think (once I'd got a bit of growing done) I was allowed to buy a Topic from there. The main thing I remember though is Great Aunty Vi; she had this amazing Hampshire accent.

I am very proud of the fact that I introduced her to the beef burger.

Slide and Seek

One of the really nice things I did when I was back at my Mum's, a couple of weeks ago, was to go through her slides. I was looking for photos of Dad – which I found – but I found some other great stuff too. No slide scanner to hand so I, rather crudely, used my digital compact and this Jumbo 22. The results are coming up next.

The inside track

…Like I said, it's all about the inside really.

Field Trip

Last Friday saw me leaving Thought Collective, almost exactly three years after joining. It's been a good three years but the call of the wild has been growing strong within my soul. Friday 17th January 2014 saw me embarking on an eleven month odyssey to independent practice via a temporary position with Interpretive Design experts Tandem Design.

That day also saw me taking a long overdue excursion to see Titanic Belfast – Tandem were heavily involved in the visitor attraction so this was an R&D field trip. I could and probably should gush about it, it's a suitably immersive (pardon the pun) and moving experience, helped somewhat by me seeing it on my own (without the distraction of children).

These photos give nothing away. Although it's a stunning exterior it's the inside, the experience, that's the real star. If you can go, go.

Re-post: Rabbet

[From July 2012]

My dad made this rabbet plane. It's for cutting rebates in wood. Rabbet/Rebate? I can't find any explanation but you have to wonder about that name? A dialectic thing? Or just because it's got that sticky-up bit and reminds you of a rabbit. Well, actually, it doesn't really does it? If it wasn't for the name, you wouldn't think, "looks like a rabbit that does" would you? I've had a dig around but no one on the internet seems to want to talk about it.

I suppose it doesn't matter really. What matters is that this beautiful piece of routed hardwood, with it's decades old construction marks and wear was used to carve grooves and recesses into machined wood. Say for, oh I don't know, perhaps for a glazing bar where it makes provision for the insertion of the pane of glass or to accommodate the edge of a cabinet's back panel or for a casement window jamb or for shiplap planking.

[Much later]

Oh, the word "rabbet" is from the Old French "rabbat" meaning "a recess into a wall".

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We ate a lot of mackeral over the summer. Way back at the end of July Noah and I climbed aboard Quinton Nelson's Motor Boat, The Brothers, and ventured out from Donaghadee Harbour to pit our combined wits against a shoal of the slippery silver blighters. And just like lasts year's more corporate expedition our superior intelect won out bagging twenty nine. Quinton's fish tracking sonar might have played a small part too I guess.

The adventure was recorded on Instagram in more pictorial (and gory) detail. A surprising aspect of the trip though was the spooky mist that discended upon our return to shore, at the time I wrote, "…It made the water inky black and shrouded the few boats moored by the jetty in grey cloud so their colours seemed more vivid than normal". The photos below capture it to a certain extent…and there's a few more on Flickr.

Library Rules

The new library in Birmingham opened in September. It looks pretty good. Loads of photos here. And there's a thing from BBC Radio 4 here featuring the architect. The old one (pictured here) was famously described by Prince Charles as looking more like a place to burn books than read them. I can remember loving that place. It felt special. It felt important. There's talk of tearing it down now but not everyone sees the necessity; there are other people that love that brutal building. A lot of them can be found hanging around here or on Twitter at @keeptheziggurat.

If you're a fan of architectural brutalism show your support.

Normal Services…

…will be resumed shortly.

Firenze Santa Maria Novella

Florence station is curious. It's really shabby but you can tell that once it was spectacular. Designed in 1932 by the Gruppo Toscano, an architects collective, and named after the church opposite, the construction is rightly considered to be a major piece of Italian modernism. There are loads of fantastic, if grubby, original details.

Stage 1: Ferry to Scotland

Three weeks ago we set off. It seems that we just can't go the easy, direct way. So this time it was ferry to Scotland; a long drive to Birmingham; a short hop to EMA; a flight to Pisa; hire car to Barga, north of Lucca.

Back

We've been away. That's why it's been so quiet round these here parts. Italy, via mainland UK and there are LOADS of photos. LOADS of them. So you might just want to pretend I'm still away and come back in another week or so.

The Weed

We were up on the north coast on Sunday, visiting Karen's friend Abigail. She has a place in Cushendall. The beach on Cushendall gets lots of sea debris and with a good few days of amazing weather, the detritus was all dried out. Ready for picking.

To the unfamiliar, most of the flotsam and jetsam looks like the dried stems of bulbous flowers. But of course those heads are seaweed roots, their dehydrated tendrils twisted into alien, slightly creepy, shapes.

There's more to freak you out on Flickr.

Ferry

I don't think I'll ever tire of the ferry. I'm sure I've mentioned it before so I won't bang on about it too much. The newly refurbished, wifi-enabled, still crappy fooded, now even faster ferry is great. And we got a superb day for our crossing; beautiful, bright and absolutely freezing out on deck. One of the best things about this ferry is how much "on deck" there is. Expansious and multi-floored; on a warmer day you can even visit the sun deck. This wasn't one of those days. What you do get outside though is a real sense of scale. Standing under the…er…big thing at the back, you feel dwarfed.

Larging it in the lowlands

Easter Weekend and we found ourselves on a sightseeing bus in Glasgow. It's been a while since I've been to a city I haven't visited before and even though one or two people had rained on the parade we were about to embark on, by dissing Scotlands largest city, we soon came to realise they were wrong and Anne was right: Glasgow's ace!

Lots to see. From the bus, it was largely the large stuff we took it.

Gurnard

You don't want to know what we did at the weekend do you? It's probably only really interesting to us. You might want to switch over to the other channel; there's bound to be something better on.

It was lashing down on Saturday, so we drove down the peninsula to Portaferry; to the Northern Ireland Aquarium, Exploris. We hadn't been for a while and it's in a great location on the edge of Strangford Lough. The boys love the aquarium, although to be honest, it's looking a little tired. They could do a lot more with the place. But it's still a brilliant day out and the aquatic life forms are well cared for and fascinating. 

The gurnards were my favourites. They're a dour fish and kind of loaf about the sea bed, sucking up the plankton or whatever it is they live on, but I like them. They look a lot like me. They're also very obliging and sat very still for me so I could snap some lo-fi portraits.

The gurnards are lovable miseries but the highlight for all of us was the seals. They look after sick seals at Exploris which means it's pretty hit and miss what guests they have staying with them. In fact, I can't remember ever seeing seals in the pool. Right now though they've got three. And they were pretty friendly, giving us some top notch semi-aquatic mammal near-the-glass action. When they're taking it easy, further into the water, they're kind of ghostly.

Instant Byrne

Has everyone seen Instant? The story of Polaroid. Very clever stuff, it's been well covered in the digital domain. The easiest thing to do is sit back and watch the Vimeo here. But you've probably already done that by now. A small detail that stood out as a particularly interesting example of Polaroidism was David Byrne's cover for Talking Head's More Songs About Buildings and Food, for which he snapped relatively small parts of his band mates and layed them out together to reconstruct their image.

Mallet

It's become a new tradition. When I/we visit my parents in England my Dad sends me off to his shed to pilfer anything I might find useful. You may remember last year I described an earlier session. Dad's not able-bodied enough to carpent like he used to. In fact, it's quite clear that his sawing days are over. But we're not a morbid family and practicalism always comes to bear.

Not that I've been able to take just anything. After this last trip it occurred to me that you could chart how precious his tools have been to him using some arrangement of concentric circles. His most prized tools sitting closer to the centre. And with each trip he has granted me greater access to the inner circles.

This time I selected just a few items; items that held memories from the distant past. My Dad's mallet was one of them. I'm pretty sure he made it himself when he was quite a young man. It would be a typical piece for him to have made: robust; durbable; impervious to attack from heavy artillery.

I found it in a cupboard and when I saw it it felt just about as familiar an object as any I have around me every day. Even though I haven't seen it for years, it felt like meeting a friend I'd lost touch with but who "hadn't changed a bit". Well, perhaps a few more lines; a bit of wear and tear.

Dad's never really been a big talker, not on a personal level. He has always been good at talking at the telly, during the news; he says outrageous things. My point is, we've never been "close" but somehow, when I look at Dad's mallet I see him, the real him.

Beachy

Hands up who doesn't love a beach?

Thought so. Everyone loves a beach. Even in inclement weather there's much to entertain you on a beach. Karen is facinated by rock pools and we can spend hours poking around for trapped sea life: hermit crabs, shrimps, the occassional blood sucker, a sea snail here and there. Unidentifiable fish. Once, on the north coast of Ireland, we cornered an enormous jelly fish in a particularly deep and still pool, to study from a safe distance, until we set it free (being careful to avoid contact of course).

I like to comb. For small, pilferable natural phenomena.

We travelled across many miles

We've just come back from our summer holiday. Did I say "holiday"? I should have said "odyssey". To us it was an epic journey of unfeasible length. A journey through lands foreign to us (Scotland, England and Kent). By car, we travelled across many miles. By ferry, we journeyed across a vast expanse of ocean. By car, we travelled across many miles (again). In my Mum's house we had dinner, slept a bit and ate many wine gums. Then by car, we travelled across many miles (again, again). Until finally, FINALLY we reached the next stage of our journey.

And it's at this point our journey became so very strange, the account of it sounds more akin to an extract from a Jules Verne novel than a true report of an actual, real occurance. Get this: We travelled in our car, on a train, through a an enormous tube, under the very bed of the sea. And when we emerged from our subterranian experience, at the distant end of the mega-pipe, we were in…another country. A country known by some as "France".

Finally, FI-NA-LLY! France. Finally, we had reached…the next stage of our journey.

By car, we travelled across "beaucoup de milles".

 

Safe

I'm sure you're on the edge of your seat but I'm afraid that blog post I promised last week - you know, the one about us catching some fish; then cooking some fish; then eating some fish. That one. Well, it's taking a bit longer than expected. So here's a photo of a lifeboat to keep you entertained. Did we need it? You'll just have to wait for the full story to find out.

The Ropes

I feel like I've already shown these but I can't see them anywhere in Ace Jet now so perhaps I'm wrong.

Ropes. And floats.

I was digging through a load of photos to find some to use on a small advertising project. I do have a tendency to take photos with a graphic design application in mind. Not a real, specific one, but I'll compose a shot with space in it, instinctively imagining it being used on a book or brochure cover or something. It's just a habit. I do it without thinking too much. And every now and then, the photos come in useful.

So, let's hope that in the future, someone asks me to design something to do with sea fishing or ropes or harbours so I can use this lot.

Stick. On Rock.

Titanic Again

We went back today, this time with the boys. The weather wasn't so good which meant the building was kind of monochrome. Looking good, whatever the weather.

Lightweight #03

It's time I organised my light meter entires so I've added a new category to bundle them all together. Right. What can I tell you about the Prinzlite?…

Er…

The Prinzlite. What can I tell you?

Er…

Well, nothing. Sorry. But it looks cool doesn't it?

Three Courses of Heiderich

Was just ever so slightly blown away by the work of Matthias Heiderich yesterday. First on butdoesitfloat, which lead me to his website, then Dan from Casual Optimist pointed me towards Heiderich's Flickr sets. So much astonishing work.

Instayear

 

2011 was, without doubt, the Year of the Instagram for me. It launched a few months before the end of 2010 but for me it wasn't until early in '11 that I sampled it's delights. Nearly a year (and over 1200 images) later, it's no surprise to hear, I've flippin' loved it. I even got to write about my love of IG here. My year in Instagrams are mostly on Flickr. There's so many it's hard to narrow it down to just twelve but I've had a go and my top snaps include: my amazing family, a pigeon in flight, an aerial asterisk, a young hedgehog, a horror web and a questionable Twitter phenomena.

Lightweight #02

A recent addition to one of my most pointless collections. I only have a handful of vintage light meters but each is a masterpiece of everyday engineering. I'm not even much of a photographer - What need do I have for a light meter? None. Which is good because full functionality is of no interest to me. No. To qualify for membership of this particular assemblage only the following criteria must be met:

a) It must be a light meter

b) It must be old(ish)

c) It must have swiddly bits

It would be fair to say that (c) is actually the most important characteristic.

WTC

The latest Pentgram Paper is in. World Trade Centre. Now haunting photographs by Judith Turner. Inspiring preface taken from Man on Wire by Philippe Petit.

 

 

Favourite Pebble Style

We've all got one haven't we? For some, it might be the Red Nankin or White Cochin. Others might prefer the classic grey base and white lined Clonmore - the graphic designer's favourite. Then there's the Merkle, Norwegian Mulefoot and the Black. You might lean towards shape rather than colour and tone: The Kidney, the one the Germans call the Ungekochtes Brot or (the schoolboy's choice) the Flat Cap (perfect skim-fodder but if it's the one for you I guess you're not going to lob it back into the briny willy-nilly).

This is mine. The Simmental.

Special Branch

Better get this posted before we're too far into the Spring/Summer for it to be even slightly relevent; once all the leaves are out, that'll be it.

This is something I've been meaning to do for ages. Have come close a couple of times then bailed out thinking it's just too mundane even for Ace Jet. This is one of those things I imagine we all do. I mean, we all love tree tops don't we? Especially when they're leafless and the sky's a bit gloomy. Perhaps you've got a few snaps of them yourself? I keep taking them, then I figure, no one wants to see my tree top photos. Not when they've got their own to look at. So these are really just here for my reference. Feel free to move along swiftly. Sorry for wasting your time.

North did a thing for Dalton Maag once that used leafless tree tops. A type specimen book. That's what made me think, like the clouds, we all like them. For me it's their monochromatic/silhouetteness. Like they're etched and flat. Not all 3D and manychromatic, like what they really are. And then there's the thought that if you could dig them up and turn them upside down they'd look the same. Not just my thought. That's obviously not an original idea; lots of people have thought that. But still, it's interesting isn't it?…Isn't it?

The Thompson/Chase Debacle

If you follow the CR Blog (which you probably do so I don't know why I'm telling you this because you'll have seen it) you'll probably have picked up on the kerfuffle surrounding the promotional campaign that The Chase (with Total Content and Asbury & Asbury) have developed for ace photographer Paul Thompson (who has some astonishing work). As things played out it turned out to be a storm in a teacup with it's rather feeble critics being swiftly and appropriately dispatched with a clip 'round their misguided ears. The campaign is, after all, great. And I think what the criticism shows is how a brave idea whittles out those that get what you do and those that don't. A job well done if you ask me.

Hats off to everyone involved but especially to Paul for running with the concept.

Beachwear

It's the crusty mollusks, that's what I like best. This time last week it was our first trip to the beach this year. The boys rockpooled while I snapped the surfaces.

Polishing

  

Everyone loves Instagram don't they? It's just about one of the best bits of socialmediafun you can have. Bet lots of people have saids lots of stuff about it. Because it's ace. I love it.

If my memory serves me well (which it doesn't, often) it was in the John Carpenter directed, Stephen King film, The Car, that I first heard the term, "you can't polish turd". And, like the stain said substrance might leave (sorry), those words have stuck with me; way beyond any other memory of what was probably a pretty dodgy film. Perhaps it was great. I don't know. I can't remember. I can only remember those words. Four sticky words.

"Christine". Actually, the film was called "Christine" wasn't it? There, I can't even remember the name of the film, Google had to remind me. And I can't find any evidence to connect the film with that oh so useful phrase. But it fits: Mono-friended High School über-nerd restores car wreck only to be miraculously, and diabolically, transformed during the rebuild. The car, it turns out, has a dark heart and all sorts of nastiness follows. Why am I telling you all this?

Can't remember.  

Oh, I know. It's Instagram. It does what the unsupportive remark says can't be done. Because even though the idea of applying an instant filter to an image to make it look better would ordinarily be a fakery step too far really, in the context of a socialmediathing, it just works. And works really well. And takes a pretty dull or ordinary snap and adds an atmospheric, even magical quality. It's magic.

Rubbish Photos #01

We all take loads of photos don't we? Some are quite good. Lots of them are rubbish. I really like the rubbish ones. They're my favourite ones. Clearing the camera of digital debris, I found these from when we had all that snow. They're rubbish. The top one's my favourite. The last one's the rubbishest.

The Night Parrot

Photograph: Shane McInnes/TheWorldsRarestBirds

This image appeared in the Guardian (online) yesterday and for some reason it's kind of haunting me; I can't get it out of my head. The photo won the "Critically Endangered or Extinct in the Wild" category in an international photography competition run in support of the conservation project BirdLife International. The bird itself is a Kakapo, a big flightless parrot and one of the world's rarest of our feathered friends; there's believed to be only 124 alive today. Which is pretty awesome and terribly sad. And I think that's why the image is so haunting. It's also an amazing picture. See more Kakapo here.

Ride

Packed and ready to scarper before The Inspectors could catch up with them, we were attracted to their gaudy lights and slipshod trappings.

  

Bunch

Huddle up lads. And smile at the back please.

Who is Bernard Voïta?

 

Martin from A Sound Awareness dropped me a line recently which made me go digging around his very interesting blog. And I stumbled across these images by Bernard Voïta. A little more poking and prodding elsewhere lead me to conclude that Bernard is a man shrouded in mystery. As Damien Correll on It's Nice That puts it, "The Internet knows very little about Swiss-born Bernard Voita. Trust me, I’ve looked". So if anyone knows anything - absolutely anything - perhaps you could let one of use know.

Brutal

I'm not a student of architecture, in the broad sense. I like buildings, what with their walls and windows and roofs and stuff, as much as anyone (well, anyone who doesn't know much about architecture); have uninformed opinions about this building or that building; like this; don't like that. 

Buildings I really like tend to be brutal concrete blocks. Or, if it looks like it's from a Thunderbirds set, then I'll probably like it. Prince Charles, famously, slagged-off the public library in my home city of Birmingham. One of his monstrous carbuncles…actually what he really said was that it looked like, "…a place for burning books, [rather] than keeping them" (which is a pretty funny crack). But I like it. I suppose if you spend your days fopping around a grandiose pile you're unlikely to be that excited by concrete. 

I, on the other hand, with my more humble background, disagree with his outspoken, architecto-Royalness. I like it. And I like the rear end of the Ulster Museum (pictured here and here) as well.

 

Editions

 

 

GF Smith are selling limited edition prints of photography they've used for their promotional material. John Ross's inky blobs are lovely. And I really like Lee Furnell's Flowers. Not sure about Rankin's stuff though. (If I was Tweeting this I might have added a #whataloadofshite hash tag to that last bit. But I'm not. So I won't.)