Clisson

Posted on Jun 2, 2023Jun 2, 2023 Posted in Architecture, Café Culture, France, History, Landscape Photography, street photography, Travel photographyTagged bridge, Castle, chateau, church, Clisson, color, colour, colour photography, countryside, day out, eglise, France, French, french countryside, fuji, fuji x weekly, fuji x100f, Fujifilm, Fujifilm X Series, fujifilmx100f, historical, History, Ian James Myers, Ian Myers, ijm photography, ijmphotography, live in France, Loire Atlantique, Market, Market town, nature, park, Photo editing, photo reportage, photo shoot, photo walk, photographe, photographer, photography, rural, street photography, Street phtoography, streetphotography, summer, townLeave a comment

Have you ever come across the articles named “The 10 Prettiest Villages in France,” “The 10 Prettiest Villages in Yorkshire,” “The 10 Prettiest Villages in Northumberland,” or “Some Other Dream Spot in This Beautiful World?” No? The one closest to us, is about 15 kilometres away and not in the south of France, which I believe to be completely overrated. Like most contenders for this type of little town, there is a bustling market every Friday morning (which is actually pretty wonderful, if not a touch on the pricier side), a park that hugs the river and lets you unwind while taking in the gentle sound of the water. A castle stands watch over the entire town. Meandering streets wonder up and down hills as do the locals. It is in wine producing country surrounded by vineyards who would be more than happy to flog you some wine…

Yes, it is one of “those” places, Dear Reader, but it is still beautiful. Clisson is also aware of this. Of course, I’m simply jealous because I don’t live there but wish I did.

In this series of photographs, I also chose to maintain the film-like appearance of my digital photography. It appears that summer is rapidly approaching. The days are already warmer and sunnier, but are not yet unbearably hot. And such weather is simply God’s way of encouraging you to go have a refreshing pint!

He went wider

Posted on Oct 7, 2022Oct 7, 2022 Posted in Architecture, France, Nantes PhotographyTagged 12mm, 12mm lens, 2022, 50mm, architechture, Castle, chateau, chateau des ducs de bretagne, colour photography, distortion, fish eye, fish eye lens, France, French, fuji, fuji XT2, fujixt2, historical, History, Ian James Myers, Ian Myers, ijm photography, ijmphotography, lens, Loire Atlantique, miroir d'eau, Nantes, nantes Castle, photo walk, photographe, photographer, Photographic exercise, photography, town, wide angle lensLeave a comment

Dear Reader, you know how in the past I have talked about how some of us love the big massive telephoto lenses? And how others like to go wider? And how we start of with the “nifty fifty” F1.8 and learn on that? That was in the days before digital photography and a world where zoom lenses came to the fore. We had them before in the days of film photography, but my memories are of using these prime lenses, and zooms seemed to be looked down on. I wanted to go wider.

I remember my first proper photography course where I learnt the basics of film photography, going from taking the photo, developing the film, and getting a print as an end result. I remember seeing a photo of a horse taken with a massive head taken with a wide-angled lens and finding it fascinating! When I said the head was massive, the lens deformed our view of this majestic beast and its body seemed smaller than its head, which is something indeed. It was then that I learnt a photograph doesn’t have to represent a visual that is faithful to the subject. We can mess around with reality and show the world completely differently.

So, as I said, I learnt photography with a 50mm lens. These 50mm seem to be closest to how the human eye sees the world. It represents reality. In 2018 I acquired the Fujifilm X100F which has a lens equivalent to a 35mm lens. Slightly wider, but still represents the reality of this world, and is considered “the” street photography lens par excellence. It has a larger angle of view and allows me to get a little more in the frame and I felt the difference with the 50mm straight away. It was still a great lens and very versatile until I tried taking a close-up portrait. All of a sudden, I discovered some distortion in my model. I’m not saying that my model is deformed, well, no more deformed than any of us.

Suddenly watching YouTube, as many of us do apparently, I discovered the 16-35mm F4 lens from Canon for my Canon 6D Mark II. It was a little more than I had ever paid for a lens, but worth every centime of euro and so satisfying. If you care to have a look in the archives of this blog on my Instagram feed, you will discover many photos taken with this lens. My desire to go wider was now a reality. Distortion of reality was now in my hands. I could create interesting images. I discovered the way a very wide-angled lens can transform the world around us. Leading lines exist all over the place, and the wide-angled lens exaggerates each line, leading or not!

But, and this is a big but. You fellas can’t deny… It is possible to go wider. I know. Exciting isn’t it! My mind is now blown! There is a lens, a very special lens, called a fish-eye lens. This type of lens can offer you even more distortion and make the world seem even weirder than it already is! Canon does one. It’s a 15-8mm zoom lens. There are two types of fish-eye lenses. One will give a rectangular view, however distorted, and one will give a round image with a black frame. It’s a wonderful piece of engineering and for over €1000 it can be yours. But for €1000 it can’t be mine simply because I can’t justify spending that much money on camera kit and might even be cause for divorce. Since it is cheaper to keep her, I would have to look elsewhere instead of buying a super duper automatic lens from Canon. So like any self-respecting poor photographer I went onto Amazon and found a manual lens for my Fujifilm XT2 (like the famous X100F except I can change lenses) for 169€ which is slightly cheaper and a slightly more reasonable purchase, and my dear wife didn’t bat an eyelid! Not batting and eyelid is a very desirable reaction!!!

I will go out this afternoon to test this new toy and get back to you with some pictures!

Bourrée ou Macé?

Posted on Nov 1, 2020Nov 1, 2020 Posted in France, History, Landscape Photography, Travel photographyTagged 16-35mm, 16-35mm lens, anjou, architechture, autumn, black and white, Black and White Photography, blog, Canon 6d Mark II, Castle, chapel, chateau, chateau plessis Bourne, chateau plessis mace, day out, France, French, french countryside, Garden, Gardens, historical, History, humour, Ian Myers, ijm photography, ijmphotography, Maine et Loire, middle age, photo reportage, photo shoot, photo walk, photographer, photography, plessis Bourne, plessis mace, tree, Trees3 Comments

To start with, I’d planned on going to one of the Loire Valley castles yesterday, but due to brain fog I thought it better to just go to bed. So I did. This morning there was no sign of fog, outside or in my brain.

I thought I would go to the Chateau de Plessis Bourée as I do like a drink, and bourée means drunk in French. I do have a family reputation as a drinker to keep up. So off I went. It’s a beautiful place and that day it was a very beautiful place, but also a very shut beautiful place. It seems the Plan B will have to do, which is the Chateau de Plessis Macé, which is slightly more sober. Boring…

I’m actually writing this in the car as I wanted to get that drinking joke out of my mind and onto paper, or screen…

All I have to do now is to drive 19km and I’ll be at party pooper castle! It had bloody well be open or I’ll be very upset and have to go straight to the pub. And with all these new restrictions means I have to get a couple in before chucking out time at 10pm. It sounds like English pubs on a Sunday when I was growing up.

Right off I go. Talk to you later Dear Reader.

I have arrived in one piece and I assume that the Plessis Bourée was nursing a hangover after a particularly good night earning its name once again. Macé looks slightly more open, or at worse, less shut. We shall see! The excitement is killing you isn’t it. Seated there on the edge of your seat wondering if I’ll be successful on this trip. It is with trepidation that I shall open the car door. Maybe more with the handle…. poor trepidation.

I decided against taking the guided tour. I did the “visite libre” and handed over my name, phone number etc. in case of Covid contact. Therefore, as the cheap skate that I am, I only visited the outsides. I still managed to get a couple of nice photos and was able to visit the Chapel.

I’ll put up the boring stuff like links etc., addresses, prices when I finish the article later on. For the moment, you’ll have to do with this!

Now for the boring stuff, or maybe even interesting stuff, depending on whether or not you enjoy history. A Plessis is a fort built on a hill surrounded by bushes as a defence, and the word Macé comes the Latin word for Mathew, Mattheus. The original fort was built in the 11th century buy Raynaud the first and was a wooden tower, in the 12^th century the wood was replaced by stone. It always pays to invest in construction. It defended Angers from the Dukes of Brittany. We nicked it during the Hundred Year’s War, as it was pretty much abandoned. It also allowed us a little pied-à-terre from which to nick local natural resources. This is wine country and who doesn’t like a drink eh? We were mercilessly pushed out of France, and the Plessis was taken over by Louis de Beaumont who built the castle that we see today. 1678, the Castle is bought by the Bautrau de Serrant family, and in 1749 by the Walsh family (which doesn’t sound very French to me, just saying). In 1868 the Countess Sophie Walsh de Serrant (OK so maybe they were French after all), took up residence in the Castle and launched a huge construction project in the actual Logis. 1907, the Archives de France director, Charles Victor Langlois (Charles Victor the Englishman, Langlois is the medieval French for Englishman, oh the irony) acquired the Castle. As in most of France during the Second World War, the Germans occupied the Castle, as they did the rest of France. Yes, there’s something Vichy about the French, as Noel Coward once said. 1967 Philippe Langlois-Berthelot gifted the Castle to the Maine et Loire Department, possibly to avoid paying taxes (again, nothing sure, but follow the money…). 1980 the “Commons” builing was renovated as function rooms. You have to make money somehow, and who wouldn’t to have a reception in a beautiful castle? 1987, the artistic director of the Anjou Festival, Jean-Claude Brialy, a French and very butch luvvie, presented the infamous Barber of Seville by Beaumarchais. Skip forward to 2020, the photographer Ian J Myers visited the Castle because the other one he wanted to visit was shut, and he was buggered if he was going to leave the area without taking a couple of photos for posterity and his blog!

You, Dear Reader are now up to date. All that is left for me to do is to edit the photos and present them to you. I had originally planned to visit a few of the Loire Castles but then Lockdown happened, again! I’ll change plans and see what I come up with for future articles!

Off to see the King

Posted on Oct 25, 2020Oct 25, 2020 Posted in Architecture, Black and White Photography, France, HistoryTagged 16-35mm, 16-35mm lens, abbaye royal de fontevraid, Abbey, angevine, anjou, aquitaine, architechture, Architecture, Art, black and white, Black and White Photography, blog, burial, Canon, Canon 6d Mark II, cathedral, cemetery, coeur de lion, eleanor, fontevraud, France, French, french countryside, french revolution, Gardens, historical, History, Ian Myers, ijm photography, ijmphotography, king, Maine et Loire, photo walk, photographer, photography, plantagenat, Richard, Richard the lionheart, robin hood, sculpture, tourism, Travel, Travel photography, vihiersLeave a comment

At work lately we’ve been having four day weeks and it’s wonderful! There are slightly fewer orders coming in but that’s OK. There’s enough to keep everything rolling by. And who doesn’t love having a day off? Those who said not me, are either liars or simply mistaken.

So that Friday I decided that I wanted to stay away from the house and get my booty off somewhere to take photos. But where? While I was edging closer to be a full time professional musician I did a spot of teaching in a place called Vihiers. It’s miles away, but still a nice drive out. I stopped edging towards music, and photography has taken over. One of my pupils talked about the Abbaye de Fontevraud. I looked it up on the Internet and started learning about it.

I’m half English and part of that is being real with the French. They need this. During and before the Hundred Years War, this area of France was English, and our King was their King. Those of you who aren’t English might have heard of Robin Hood, who looked just like Kevin Kostner and had a mate who looked strangely like Morgan Freeman. There was the Evil Prince John who became King when Richard the Lionheart (who looked really badass and you could mistake him for Sean Connery) went off on a Crusade to show just how badass he really was. Their mother was Eleanor of Aquitaine. Eleanor, her Husband Henry Plantagenet, their son Richard (the famous badass), and Isabelle d’Angouleme who was married to John. Her bad… We all make mistakes.

So this is kind of crazy for me who enjoys history and discovers more of the Anjou region which is just down the road from the Vendée. On the way I recognised a place where I used to buy foie gras when we first moved here. I called in on the off chance of being able to make a purchase and take something good home for my family. It’s changed a bit since 15 years ago, and offers different products. I left some money there and felt happy about buying something directly from the producer that was made on site etc. And it tasted really good too.

Sooooo… I turn up in the Village of Fontevraud l’Abbaye and I even managed to find the said Abbaye. 11€ for the entrance ticket, which seemed reasonable.

A bit of history here for those who can’t be bothered to click and have a read. Basically, the abbey was founded 1101 by the itinerant preacher Robert of Arbrissel. It developed and flourished during the Plantagenet era, went downhill after the Plantagenets were no more, however by the Hundred Years War things were going downhill, and during an inspection in 1460, the abbey was found to be barely inhabited. Fast forward to 1457 reforms were introduced by the then abbesse Marie of Bretagne. Louis the XI gave the place his blessing and the place started to really try to get back on its feet again, but without a huge amount of success. In 1491 there came Renée who was from the French Royal family (the Bourbons, french royals and not the rather tasty biscuits or whiskey). I’m not going to translate the whole of the French wikipedia article but you get the gist right? Things got better, and by the time the French decided that Royalty wasn’t for them during the French Revolution, things were OK!

However as the revolutionaries weren’t into Royalty and because of the so called “Enlightenment” philosophies, they weren’t into religion in a big way either. That continues to this very day. I promise not to get political! They basically get rid of the nuns, and by 1804, Napolean, yes him again, decided to make the place a prison, and it remained so until 1963.

When I went there I wanted to feel the Royal side with Richard the Lionheart and feel the medieval legends in the walls. But I’ll risk being contraversial, and say that I felt more the “prison vibe” and it might be because of the less than sunny autumnal weather, but I could feel the buildings being a place of great suffering. Quite ominous in fact.

Since 1975 it was converted from a prison into a Cultural Centre for the Region. You can see a few “colour” photos of the latest art installation which was very impressive.

Would I go back? Possibly, but not in Autumn.