Tuesday 17 May 2016

That didn't last long

I should have known I'd get fed up of Twitter pretty quickly. I guess I'm just not interested in what most other people are getting up to or, worse still, letting the world know what I'm doing. If people would make interesting tweets (a handful I've started to follow do) instead of mindlessly retweeting stuff that's just not very interesting, I might have more time for it. On the whole it's bollocks. The list of people I'm following grows shorter by the day and I can see the account going the way of my Facebook account - closed and not missed!

The superficiality of all this following and liking really came home to me yesterday. On Sunday I'd opened a Soundcloud account (just to see how easy it was to use to host sound files) and uploaded a couple of badly recorded tune ideas. I accidentally left one of them open for public listening. Yesterday morning someone had 'liked' it.

Apparently the tune that had been liked was #Electronic, #Trip Hop as decided by the automatic tag generator. Flickr uses something similar to label photographs if you let it. These tags then help the dreaded algorithms suggest simialr stuff for you to 'like'. I don't want to be suggested stuff to listen to or watch. All this automation is in danger of taking away people's ability to think and search for stuff themselves. It's not good for generating ideas, it'll lead to a levelling of the creative curve - in the way  idiots adjust the sliders in Lightroom to take away the shadows and highlights to create a hideous HDR look. Contrast is good - in what you look at and listen too as well as in pictures.

Rant over!

Back in the real world I've been mostly taking advantage of the warm spell and going fishing. No point trying to take photographs in bright sunshine anyway. That said I still keep on thinking about getting the tackle shops project going somewhere. especially as the local newspaper seems to think the one under threat from a supermarket development might be doomed no matter what.


It's something I could get on with most Saturdays when I try not to go fishing and which wouldn't be affected by the weather too much. maybe it'll get somewhere.

Taking a long winded walk to the Post Office the other day I was reminded that photography isn't much about cameras. It's more about looking and thinking. Looking for potential pictures and thinking about how to make them. I'm not too bad at the former, the latter is where I fall down. I'm sure there was a better picture to be made from the event below.


The element of chance also plays a big part in my photography. Taking a wrong turn the other day lead me past another eggs for sale sign. This one had the added bonus of a sign across the road for duck eggs.


Then there is the habit of repeatedly covering the same ground but keeping your eyes open rather than assuming things never change. I'd never seen eggs for sale down the lane I take at least once a week, often more frequently, until yesterday. I'd almost not taken a camera with me as I was off to the supermarket, but I had slipped a compact into a pocket.


Then this afternoon I took a winding route from the feed merchant to the tackle shop, a road I've travelled recently, and passed another roadside egg sale. This time I had put a camera in the car, but made a bad choice of lenses. I might go back to this one.


Whenever I hear people saying they are stuck for things to photograph I can't help but think they must go around with their eyes closed. Maybe that's why sunsets appeal - they're pretty hard to miss. And pretty irresistible. Especially when the fish aren't biting.


Maybe it was the sunset the listener really liked?


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