Tag: photographer

Commonwealth War Cemetery, Ranville

Posted on Posted in Black and White Photography, France, History, Normandy, Travel photographyTagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

In my last article I talked about Normandy and the battle to take Pegasus Bridge, and in this article I want to talk about the soldiers that didn’t come back. Ranville is a town, not too far from Pegasus Bridge and the men that fell in that engagement are buried in the Parish Churchyard. Just next to the chuchyard is a Commonwealth War Cemetery.

The cemetery contains predominantly British soldiers killed during the early stages of the Battle of Normandy. A large proportion of those interred were members of the British 6th Airborne Division. These places are always very moving, even more so when one looks at the ages of some of those that died in June 1944. My son is 20 and the same age as so many of those soldiers.

Even when dead they are still on parade in ranks with perfect dressing. They died as soldiers and even in death they remain soldiers. When you look through the photos you will notice certain anomalies. One was a tank crew that was buried together, as a crew. One is a grave of a German Jew who escaped to join the British army, and was given a pseudonym so if he was captured his name wouldn’t betray him, One grave is of a parachutist and his dog who were buried together.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

Extract For the Fallen, Laurence Binyon

Beverley Minster, East Yorkshire

Posted on Posted in Architecture, Travel photography, United Kingdom, YorkshireTagged , , , , , , , , , , 6 Comments

You might just have noticed that I didn’t publish anything last Wednesday. And even if you didn’t not notice, I still didn’t publish anything last Wednesday. I had just had some time off work and had just got back from an amazing visit to Hull to meet up with some old friends that I was at school with, and hadn’t seen since school. The next couple of articles will feature photos from that visit.

Soooooo… We travelled up from the Vendée, to catch the ferry at Zeebrugge, in Belgium. We usually set off quite early but this time it was a bit silly kind of early. No it wasn’t, it was the downright obscene kind of early! That kind of early that you only do when it’s summer and really hot during the day, and you want to drive at least a couple of hundred kilometres without passing out from the heat.

Needless to say, we were “on time.” Not the first in the queue, but not far off. Anyway, the sail over was really good. The food and drink were great and we actually got a good night’s sleep. So fresh eyed and bushy tailed as only fresh eyed and bushy tailed little bunnies can be, we arrived in Hull. Yes Hull is what I consider as home… You can take the boy out of Hull, but not the Hull out of the boy. I still get emotional when I listen to the Housemartins. Which is why, as soon as we got off the boat and had to wait for the hotel room, we went off to Beverley.

There were two places I wanted to visit. The Minster and St Mary’s Church. I’m not forcing religion down your throats, but as I said in the article about the St Nicolas Basilica in Nantes, these buildings were designed by men in which to connect with God, and everything in them leads man to God. Even if you’re not a believer, you can tell that this is no ordinary building. I’m always amazed by the architecture and how the builders managed to construct such edifices and what technology the must have used.

I love the intricacy in the stone work, or in the wood carvings, or the paint on the organ pipes, but what really moves me are the memorials to the dead of the World Wars, and the Colours (battle honours) of the regiments that no longer exist but had men that fought and died together as brothers. In some of these photos you can what remains of these “flags” and how it is so important not to forget those that went before us.

Walkabout in Nantes with the lads from Instagram – Part I

Posted on Posted in Architecture, Nantes Photography, UrbanTagged , , , , , , , , , , , , 3 Comments

Now and again I do some colour photography, especially with the colours you get from the X100F. Everyone goes on about it, but they really are good. A guy on Instagram wanted to get some people together of various photographic levels, some who know little, some who know a lot, some who have loads of gear, and some who have very little. This was the first outing.

We wanted to get into Nantes during Golden Hour, but somebody had the rather silly idea of making it the “morning” Golden Hour. I, of course, was late. The meeting place was Place Royale, where Kate’s favourite fountain its. Emiliano Sala had just disappeared on his flight from Nantes to Cardiff, and people had made a kind of shrine to him.

They all had DSLR’s with lenses and tripods and the whole shebang. Guys together having a competition to see who had the biggest… Camera… What else were you thinking about???? I turned up with my Fujifilm X100F. Yes mine was the smallest (camera) but I’m fine with that, and I own it!!

But I digress. I usually do black and white conversions and seem to have the process slightly sussed out. The colour film simulations are just great on this camera and I get why people wax lyrical about them.

When I got the X100F I wanted to have a digital camera that was the equal of my film cameras. I wanted something that could open up to F2 and go up to F16. I wanted something that looked good and that got the job done. It’s basically a compact camera, with a fixed prime lens, and is sold as the street photography photographer’s camera, or the travel photography photographer’s camera. Of course it it great for this, and just slips in a bag. It’s light and such an understated chic. I love it! There you are. I love my camera.

But back to Nantes who is the real star in this series. In this first part you see us going from the Place Royale, going to bakery for breakfast and a coffee (I always seem to find a place to eat wherever I am…), heading towards the Tour de Bretagne, which is Nantes’ version of the Tour Montparnasse in Paris, going across Cours des 50 Otages, towards the Castle via rue de la Marne, and having a look at some the of the streets branching off, and ending up on the rue du Château.