Windows On The World

It’s a story as old as time itself. You wait and you wait for a bunch of scans to drop from your (extremely busy) preferred developer, then 82 arrive at once! An embarrassment of images to play with then, from what will be forever known as 'The FED-less Days', aka fun in the sun with a Baldessa.

And it was fun too. This year's unseasonably hot month of May, when Summer seemed a very real possibility, and interesting, photographable things started appearing all over the place. It was also a time when the grey skies of Spring turned a fetching shade of blue and billowy white. A time for those hitherto unexplored tight apertures and fast shutter speeds, and all the vibrant colours I long suspected were in my film finally started to express themselves.

I seem to have been looking through windows a lot recently. Mostly out of them, occasionally in. Nothing creepy though, I won't be looking through your window anytime soon.

At the risk of stating the obvious, windows have a tendency to frame things, which is something the human mind seems predisposed to. Perhaps it's simply a matter of aesthetics, images just look nicer presented in a well-judged frame. Artists will often use framing as an important part of their overall composition, to the point where an unframed work can often appear unfinished. The physical frame itself can be an attractive thing, at its best a work of art that adds a certain something to the overall image in addition to smoothing off the rougher edges.

Framing can also be an act of visual reduction, imposing an artificial boundary on the subject that restricts the information on view, making it easier for our puny human minds to make sense of what we’re seeing... well it does for me at least.

Of course framing is one of the four primary considerations when taking a photograph, in fact for most of us it's a wholly unavoidable discipline of photography, a more often than not useful, perhaps even essential restriction. So windows and other apertures present us with a secondary opportunity to positively contextualise our image within a frame (within a frame)!

Through cast iron apertures to the interior of an unused warehouse at the former Ordnance Depot, Weedon Bec.

Looking out from the bar of the Malt Shovel in Northampton. I love a bit of stained glass, modern ecclesiastical interpretations and commercial examples like this in particular.

The unfinished Lodge at Lyveden near Oundle (above & right) is a good subject for architectural study on a bright day, though the interior is currently closed for structural repairs.

I spent quite a while photographing this surviving WWII Pill Box and Bunker in an arable field near Market Harborough (below), a striking contrast to the wide horizon and rain-heavy clouds that day. I chose not to investigate the interior, usually a disappointing experience I find, but I managed to get a good shot through the Loopholes of the distant horizon, giving something of the effect of gazing out I guess.

A 'window' of sorts at the boundary of a field, looking toward Lyddington in Rutland. Leaving one field for another, usually via a Stile,  presents an opportunity to pause, look back, and assess progress.

A confusing image into the interior of one of the buildings at the former Ordnance Depot, Weedon Bec, with reflections of the exterior on the glass.

Things They Don't Tell You About Vintage Cameras

Bulky old 'Ever Ready' camera cases with their fashionably thin leather straps are what all film photographers want for their cherished vintage cameras. When it comes to the 'vintage look’ that we all (surely) desire, safe and sturdy UV resistant Nylon straps just won’t cut it. In fact true vintage status can only be achieved with a filthy, worn strip of dried out and heavily cracked tan leather, rusted rivets and buckle, and (ideally) the magic word ‘Leica’ stamped on the strap somewhere. Literally nothing else will do!

It will of course fail! Throwing your prized camera onto the very hardest of hard floors when you least expect it. All part of the authentic vintage camera experience though, a talking point amongst Shutter-Chums© in the way that athletes swap notes on career-threatening sports injuries.

Mine failed of course (right), as I knew it surely would at some point. Lucky for me the camera descended in (horrific) slow motion, bouncing first off my hip, then knee, before clonking with moderate force to the ground. Thankfully it was in it's sturdy Balda branded case and no damage appears to have been done. Phew!

I've strongly disliked this case from the day I bought it. The bottom half of the case is decent enough, flexible leather, a good look, with all the correctly located apertures for this quirky bottom winding camera. But even this fails when it comes to the screw attachment that attaches the case to the tripod mount, a substantial chunk of aluminium that prevents the camera from sitting upright in its case. It's the (thankfully removable) top half that's the truly ugly bit though, albeit it protects the camera and lens from damage heroically. A chonky box of hard plastic and aluminium in the style of a 1940's suitcase, over-engineered and oversized to protect the workings, it not only looks horrible but turns a neat compact camera into the kind of boxy lump I've tried all along to avoid having.

So the plan is to find a diminutive soft leather case that hopefully fits the camera perfectly. This could take some time I admit. But first a new strap because it's bad enough having the camera in a suitcase, I don't want to have to carry it around by hand as well.

This Kinokoo leather job looks the part for my taste, and in fact tastes the part too. A subtle Almond from the leather conditioning cream that's clearly been applied. The eventual plan is to mount the camera itself to the strap (left), but for now it'll just have to make do on the horrible vintage case.