A Wide(r) Angle
July 2009
Serendipity

You may know the feeling.  You make a plan for a photo project; you prepare your gear and look forward for months to taking the photos. And it doesn't happen.

This is the 250th Anniversary of the birth of Scotland's most famous poet Robbie Burns and his lines: “The best laid schemes o'mice an' men/gang aft agley...." recently rang very true for me.  A few weeks ago on my summer visit to my family in the UK I planned to visit the Farne Islands.  They lie off the north east of England about 100km north of Newcastle and are one of the biggest seabird colonies in Europe.  Thousands of birds compete for space, food and the opportunity to be photographed.  Even if you are not a dedicated twitcher it is an impressive place.  Unfortunately the islands are quite low lying and the sea can often be pretty rough even on a sunny day which can make landing impossible.

And so it turned out.  We arrived in perfect weather but the following morning it all turned to custard (this is the UK in summer remember) and the trip was off.  Maybe the next day?  Nope, the sea was still too rough and remained so for the rest of the week.  But as so often happens in life, when one door closes another opens.  Idly browsing a leaflet in a tourist information office I found a mention of St Abb’s Head.  Situated north of Newcastle and east of Edinburgh this section of the north east coast is heavily indented and formed of steep cliffs up to 80m high cut by numerous gullies with many offshore stacks and reefs.  This is seabird city with hundreds of birds noisily nesting on impossibly narrow ledges high above the churning North Sea, wheeling and soaring in the air then heading a very short distance out to sea before plummeting head long into the water for food before heading back to feed the hungry family.  All under a brilliant blue sky.  This more than made up for the disappointment of missing out on the Farne Islands and if you ever pass this way I thoroughly recommend the diversion.

As we know, inspiration and enjoyment of other photographers’ work pops up unexpectedly.  The Victoria and Albert Museum in London is the world’s largest collection of decorative art and design.  Its photography archive alone contains 500,000 objects!  A casual visit doesn’t even come close to scratching the surface but on display in the time I was there were the images included here: http://www.vam.ac.uk/collections/photography/history/index.html

My favourite exhibit was a selection from “Vector Portraits” taken by a guy called Andrew Bush.  He had the idea of rigging his car up with a camera and then cruise the California freeways at 50-60mph.  He would then draw alongside a car and take the image.  The aim was to explore the private spaces people created inside their cars.  So for example a photo will be captioned “Man finding his way south at 64 mph on Interstate 5 near Wildcat Canyon, California, on a Sunday in 1993” but look more closely and he is reading! Another driver looks like she is dozing and another is having a good sing song.  See the images online at http://www.andrewbush.net/vectors%202-10-08/index.htm

So next time you are on Cobham Drive and you pass a hoodie wearing hoon in a boombox equipped Subaru WRX you know what to do!!!

Geoff