Brougham Castle...

Committing to an image means doing whatever you can - devoting enough time and energy and patience - to get a picture. If there’s a fence between you and the optimal viewpoint, find a way to get over it. If the light isn’t quite right when you arrive (it seldom is…), be prepared to wait for the light to improve (anything from, say, a few minutes to a few hours). When a picture presents itself, commit to taking the image there and there; promising yourself that you’ll come back another day and get the shot is just another kind of postponement.

I have to be single-minded (not multi-tasking…), which is why I generally photograph on my own. A companion might get bored, just hanging around waiting for the light to change… or I might imagine they are getting bored, which would have the similar effect of taking the edge off my concentration. If I’m thinking about someone else’s welfare (or preoccupied with anything else), my powers of observation may dip by 20%, which might represent the difference between a shot that’s OK and one that really works.

I’m sitting in the Romahome, which is parked up near Brougham Castle, just outside Penrith. The light looked promising a few minutes ago; now I’m not so sure. The sun has disappeared behind a long bank of cloud, and I may not see it again for a while. The sun may appear for a few seconds, through a gap in the clouds. If I’m ready, I get the shot; if I’m not ready, I’ll miss it. This kind of light - that lasts only a few seconds - can often be very special. But the camera needs to be on the tripod, the lens cap must be off and my thumb should be on the infra-red shutter release.

The aperture and shutter speeds need to be set - not for the lighting conditions right now, but for what the lighting conditions will be like, when the sun makes an appearance. That’s not a complex calculation, on a summer’s day. With the ISO set to 100 and an aperture of f11, that leaves the shutter speed as the only variable: 1/125sec for hazy light, 1/160sec for direct light, 1/200sec when it’s bright, 1/250sec when it’s really bright.

I enjoy that combination of being patient… then acting quickly. It keeps me on my toes. And the time spent standing and staring is never time wasted. It slows me down. I stood on the old sandstone bridge over the River Eamont, which used to carry the A66 road. Behind me was the new road bridge, with Bank Holiday traffic crawling along the dual carriageway.

A heron flew upstream, the last swallows dipped and swooped, a pair of yellow wagtails explored the water-margins. A guy stood next to me and took a picture; if he’d waited another ten seconds the castle would have been illuminated, briefly, but by that time the camera was back in its case and he was on his way. A group of teenagers walked accross the bridge, with three llamas. I didn’t ask. An old guy stopped and we chatted about the good old days. He mentioned the Romans too, but was hazy about his facts. We marvelled at the swallows, preparing to fly to sub-Saharan Africa. “It’s the survival of the fittest”, he said. Then we looked at each other, and wondered how the hell we’d survived for so long.

I felt the warmth of the summer sun on my back and watched my shadow on the ground go from pale to dark - the soft edges hardening into sharp definition. The clouds drifted across the sky, and a patch of light moved across the fields, then swept across the facade of the castle.

New Squares, Penrith...

Still in Penrith, enjoying the church bells on a sunny Sunday morning. The little café over the road is open, so I’m having a bacon sarnie and a cup of tea. Not sure what to do with my day, which is a bit of a novelty. I’ve just re-taxed the Romahome online for the first time. It only took two minutes; better than queueing up in the Post Office with a handful of vehicle-related documents. I have pictures to edit, and a few chores that need doing. But maybe I’ll take a stroll around town with my camera, to see what I can see. Maybe I’ll come back with pictures, maybe I won’t…

The pic is of a fairly new shopping area in the town, which, to judge by the number of empty shops - and lack of shoppers - isn't doing very well. It's just far enough out of time to be inconvenient; you can walk around town without ever realising the new shopping area is there. Another white elephant, I think...

Gnats...

I generally know when I’ve taken a decent shot, or series of shots. But the picture isn’t finished until I’ve edited it in Photoshop; it’s only when I examine the image - at 100%, pixel for pixel - that issues become apparent. The pix I took in the North Pennines looked fine, until I realised I’d shot them through a haze of gnats or midges. The only remedy is to clone out every spot and blur - which might take an hour or more for a single shot - or just bin the lot. I’ll leave the decision till tomorrow.

The weather’s against me today. Broken cloud is what I like, but today the breaks in the cloud are few. I popped into the Stag Inn in Dufton, for a pint; it’s a friendly little pub and a welcome sight for Pennine Way walkers, before they tackle Cross Fell (the highest point in the Pennines) and High Cup Nick. I’d love to take pix in a pub like this, but sometimes it’s best to leave the camera alone, enjoy the ambience and not get in the way…

The road to nowhere...

Trainwreck...

The poster for Trainwreck, the film I saw in Penrith last night, featured Amy Schumer (a stand-up comedian until now, rather than an actress) drinking from a bottle in a brown paper bag, and wagging her finger at the audience and anybody else who might be tempted to pass judgement on her promiscuous behaviour. The film starts with a few of her sexual liasons, all determinedly unglamorous, mostly in the wake of heavy drinking sessions. Different guys leave her apartment, night after night; she doesn’t let them stay till morning. Once the deed is done they’re out the door.

Her attempts to get her hulk of a boyfriend to talk dirty to her fall flat; he can think of nothing more appropriate than the kinds of things he might say to his bodybuilding buddies at the gym. One morning she wakes up - disorientated, hungover, alone - in some apartment. She looks out of the window and says “Oh my God, I’m on Staten Island”, which must be a funnier joke for New Yorkers than it was for me. This is supposed to suggest that she’s hit rock bottom, that she’s spiralling out of control… that her ‘trainwreck’ of a life has finally hit the buffers. But it’s not what I would call a trainwreck; she’s just doing what she wants. She might be making a few questionable decisions, but she manages to deal with the consequences. Trainwreck? A few timetable issues, that's all.

Anyway, she meets someone and finds - reluctantly, against her better judgement - that she has feelings for him… and the rest of the movie follows a familiar trajectory. It was funny, though the best jokes came in the first half. Amy Schumer wrote the script, so, basically, she was playing herself, or, rather, the character she’s created for her stand-up act. I’d give the film 6/10: not bad, but it could have been a lot funnier…

Just found that Penrith now has free wifi throughout the town; it seems to be a growing trend. In a few years we won’t go looking for free wifi; it’ll just be there. Had home-made pie and chips - with gravy on top - from the Angel Lane Chippy: scrumptuous.

Sunshine and showers today - my favourite weather forcast - with a breeze to blow the clouds across the sky. The light is changing minute by minute, which makes it worthwhile to stay in one place, set up a shot and wait to see what happens.

Long Meg and her Daughters, a stone circle in the Eden Valley…

Caldbeck...

Been taking pictures around Penrith, and now I’m parked up back in town again. There’s a convenient car-park, free after 6pm, where I can pick up free wifi from a nearby café. For a change, I’m off to see a film: Trainwreck, starring Amy Schumer, which is getting good reviews. I could do with a few laughs.

The village pond - almost a lake - in the village of Caldbeck…

Back in Yorkshire...

Drove back from Wales yesterday, returning to West Yorkshire the most dramatic way: climbing up to the top of Holme Moss and getting that fantastic panorama of the Holme Valley. Kipped in Slaithwaite last night, by the canal; is there any other place name that can be pronounced three different ways? 'Slaith' can rhyme with 'say' or 'sat', and most locals compress all those consonants into 'Slowit'. I'll be in Hebden Bridge this evening, hoping to see a few friendly faces in the Fox and Goose...

Blackberry and apple pie...

Had an enjoyable three days with son and grandson, near Abergavenney, even though the weather was poor. In fact, the Welsh hills had a certain sullen grandeur, when wreathed in cloud, but, with a four-year old to entertain, sunshine might have been better. We picked enough blackberries to make a pie, so last night we had home-made pizzas followed by home-made pie. It took a couple of hours this morning to clean up the kitchen…

Kipping in Leominster tonight. There was quite a storm earlier this evening: thunder, lightning, torrential rain… even a little hail. Tomorrow I’ll be heading back to Yorkshire…

Cottage...

I've enjoyed my couple of days in Brecon. Just a quid to park all day in the car park, so I stayed there. Took some pix and got my writing done... and maybe found both a title for my book and an elegant way of starting and finishing it. Just uploading my latest batch of pix in a pub with fast wifi. The locals are trying to cope with a new landlady, and her 'no effing or jeffing' stipulations. Fun to watch a bunch of middle-aged guys trying to find circumlocutions and desperate euphemisms instead of the profanity they're accustomed to. Time for a shower, and some food shopping, then off to the cottage in the middle of nowhere...

Brecon...

Had breakfast in a cafe (attached to the theatre) next to the canal basin in Brecon, a rather pleasant spot. Mug of tea, free wifi and a relaxing view of the comings and goings on the canal…

Garden and canal: in no harmony whatsoever...

War...

Spent a morning taking pictures in the village of Lacock, but had the misfortune to coincide with a rather bizarre event, called ‘Lacock at War’. A field was full of old military vehicles - there was a charge to get in, so I didn’t bother - and the village itself was awash with people in uniform (World War II vintage… rather than archers or halberdiers). Most of the men looked very comfortable playing at soldiers and carrying weapons, which no doubt play important roles in their active fantasy lives.

Strange to be nostalgic about the Second World War (“the last good time this country ever had”, according to Richard Brautigan, in A Confederate General from Big Sur… though maybe he was thinking about the American Civil War). It was startling to see Allied soldiers fraternising with Nazis (I assume the SS officers were National Trust personnel; maybe they dress like this every day. In fact, I’m sure they do. Jackboots). The locals gave the Nazis a warm welcome. Collaborators!

I was a bit disappointed, frankly. To illustrate a theme like ‘Lacocok at War’, I was hoping that two armies might assemble, one at either end of the village, rifles loaded with real bullets. They could have dashed in and out of Lacock’s medieval streets, or posted snipers in the top windows of Lacock’s half-timbered buildings, until the last man was left standing. The result would have been carnage, of course, with blood flowing through the streets of this picture-postcard National Trust village, but it might have given impressionable youngsters a more realistic idea of what war is actually like.

I was in 'Nam last night. Chippenham... where I found a comfy little pub with good beer. I was served by a raven-haired barmaid, who handed over each pint with a smile and “here you are, my lovely”, which is why I had more beer than I’d planned.  Yes, I know. She says that to everyone. But still…

Crossed the Severn Estuary this morning, on the toll bridge, with the sun glinting off the broad river. In Wales now… so the fun stops here…

Lacock...

Service...

Spent the morning keywording photos, while the Romahome had its service and torrential rain bounced off the roof. Back in Godalming for the rest of the day: as good a place as any to get some writing done, especially while the weather is so vile…

Bought a book from a charity shop - The Bible, a Biography, by Karen Armstrong - and read it from cover to cover. OK, maybe I skipped a few bits towards the end. God it was dull. It told me what I already knew, that the Bible was the work of many hands, incorporating texts from many other ‘desert  religions’, later commentries, dodgy translations, tales from oral traditions finally committed to paper… or papyrus… or parchment.

The story was padded out with tales of splits and schisms… as one group of believers took issue with another group over some arcane point of scripture. Every dissenting sect claimed to know the mind of God and to possess a unique understanding of biblical dogma. I suppose it’s not too hard to convince a bunch of religious fanatics that they are the chosen ones.

The punishment for non-belief and apostasy, in the Abrahamic religions, has traditionally been death. Bibical injunctions have been used to justify appalling acts of violence - from the earliest times to the present - and the author lists every one. She’s an ex-nun, and, having finished the book, I’m still not sure where she stands. My next book is a collection of atheist writings, assembled by Christopher Hitchens, which might be more nourishing fare…

Godalming...

Kipping in Godalming this evening; it seems a very pleasant spot. I’ve booked the Romahome in for a service tomorrow (I’m only five miles from where I bought it), and I’m having a wander along the main street. The Star pub, near the church, has good beer; other pubs have beer gardens and some imaginative swearing. I’ll need some food soon…

Hartley Wintney...

A long weekend with my sister, in the village of Hartley Wintney, in Hampshire. It's good to be in one place for a few days, to 'recharge the batteries' (mine... not the Romahome's) and eat proper food. Just finished editing pix, and, once I've given the vehicle interior a bit of a clean, I'll have to make a start on my writing commitments for the month. Exciting times...

Another day, another stately home: the Vyne...

A great day's cricket...

I’d planned to watch the morning session of Ashes cricket yesterday, from Trent Bridge, having found a congenial pub in Marlborough, with free wifi, where they were showing the cricket on a high-definition TV. But once the Australians had been bowled out for 60, in 18 overs, I knew I wasn’t going anywhere for the rest of the day.

A couple of other guys kept me company, as the Australian wickets fell, including the cricket coach from Marbborough School, who said he’d coached Michael Atherton in years gone by. Hilariously, he criticised the half dozen poor balls that the England bowlers sent down (once a coach, always a coach, I suppose), as Stuart Broad finished his morning’s work with the amazing, unrepeatable figures of 8 for 15.

Other guys came by, to see how England were doing. They needed to be reassured that the Australian collapse wasn’t some joke being played by Sky, and that it really happened. Then England batted, and Joe Root went to his hundred and beyond. Like all good batsmen, he scores his runs quickly while, paradoxically, never looking like he’s in a hurry. He’s still in, no doubt hoping to score so many runs today that England won’t need to bat again.

It was probably the best day’s cricket I’ve ever seen, and having some good company made it almost as good as being at Trent Bridge…

Marlborough Man...

Ended up in Marlborough this evening: a handsome town with a broad main street (like a Wiltshire version of Bedale). As soon as I parked, I met the eye of a guy who gave me a withering look… like I was somebody he knew who owed him money. Thirty seconds later, a woman stopped me and asked “Ian?” “Sorry, no”, I said. “It must be the sunglasses”, she said.

I used to have a doppelganger when I lived in Peterborough. He was called Roger and, to judge from peoples’ astonishment, Roger and I were practically identical… except he seemed to be more popular than me. “Hi Roger”, some guy would say, clapping me on the back, “let me buy you a beer”. A couple of times a week, for about a year, I was mistaken for Roger, usually in one Peterborough pub or another. It was no great privation; I was just curious to meet him. My questions were batted away. “Oh, Roger comes in here a lot” or “I thought he’d be here this evening”, or, more unnervingly, “He was here ten minutes ago”.

With my history of poor mental health, I did start to get rather paranoid. Finally I shaved my beard off. That should do the trick, I thought. Next night, in the pub, some bloke gives me a friendly punch in the ribs. “Hi Rog”, he said, “you’ve shaved your beard off!” I can’t remember how it all ended. Maybe Roger left Peterborough before I did… or maybe Roger and I were one and the same… and my sanity was even more precarious than I imagined…

Great Chalfield Manor

The weather forecast said ‘cloudy all day’… but the sun shone this morning. Just the way I like it too: through broken cloud, which, when pushed along by a steady breeze, as it is today, changes every composition in the space of a few seconds (sometimes just a fraction of a second). With the camera mounted on a tripod, I can lock in my chosen composition… and just see what happens within that rectangular picture area. Something is lit, then falls into shadow as the sun picks out something else. People enter the composition, interact with the property and each other, then make their exit, like actors on a Shakespearean stage. I hold the infra-red shutter release in my hand, with my thumb on the button… so I’m ready whatever may happen. It the scene is slightly theatrical, it’s largely unscripted, or, like some Pinter play, the actors may be told to improvise.

Gardens do seem to have a staged quality of inventive artifice, with nature bent to the houseowner’s will. I’m in the gardens of Great Chalfield Manor, in Wiltshire, where bushes are trimmed into geometric shapes, cut to allow garden paths to go straight through. Other plants are trained to create bowers and tunnels. Flowers are restrained in their beds and borders. Nature has to serve a grand idea and be orderly, malleable, supordinate; Nature must know its place. The saving grace, for me, is that these particular gardens are not too grand; they’re on a human scale, with the formal elements softened by their proximity to a river that flows along the bottom of the garden, with a pair of swans in residence and woodland on the opposite bank.

I took plenty of pix. Three people sit on a bench, surrounded by flowers, so I asked if I could take a few pix. If people are just part of a composition - walking in and out, I don’t generally ask permission. But if the people are the picture’s main subject, I think it’s only politeness. About once a year, someone says “Don’t take my picture”, but most people are fine. I told these three people they looked “perfect”; a little flattery is a useful camera accessory. I gave them my card; if they email me I’ll send them the best pic of the bunch…

Stones...

Spent yesterday morning in Lacock taking pix with and without people. If they notice me at all, passers-by assume I’m waiting for people to vacate my composition… when I’m really just waiting for one person, or two, or three (no more than that) to walk into shot in a visually interesting way.

Later in the day I spent a couple of hours photographing the standing stones at Avebury: an ancient monument held in such high regard by the locals that they built a village inside it. The village pub, the Red Lion, actually boasts about being inside a World Heritage Site! On a sunny Sunday, people were picnicking around the stones, and a guy with dreadlocks was playing a bongo. An hour later he was wandering down the road, looking disorientated.

I’m ambivalent about the ‘power’ of standing stones; my feeling is that all places are sacred or no place is. For a World Heritage Site, Avebury hasn’t been served too well over the years…

The first image...

Busy taking pix while the light is good. A busy day of photography (500 pix?) might be followed by two days of picture editing. I generally take three shots of everything: one ‘correctly’ exposed, according to what I feel at the time, plus one stop either side. This gives me the option, while editing, of picking the best of the three exposures… and deleting the other two. It’s a way of working that would have been rather extravagant in the days of film.

In the history of film there’s no more important place than Lacock, where I kipped last night. William Fox Talbot was the first person to fix an image into a sheet of coated paper (though French historians would disagree, citing Daguerre instead). That first image of 1835 depicted a window of his home, Lacock Abbey, now looked after - as is the whole of Lacock village - by the National Trust…

Angel in the grass...