Something terrible has happened.  It happened on facebook.

In case any of this is sensitive, I've changed some of the names in this story.

I have a friend, we'll call her Sissie Winterton-Smyth. If you're going to create false names, you might as well go all out. She has two brothers, that I know of, whom we'll call Archibald and Sebastian. I have met both of them on a few occasions, but never together, and I confess to getting them confused.

A few weeks ago, I went to take photos of Julia Sutherland doing stand-up comedy. A Winterton-Smyth was also performing and came over to say hello. I correctly guessed it was Sebastian and was very proud of myself. I took photos of him as well, because I'm a good person. remember that as you go on reading this - I'm a good person. at the end sebastian asked me to add him on facebook so I could tag him and send him the pictures, and so I did.

so, the other night i was reading something on my facebook news feed. This is what I remembered reading:

"Archibald Winterton-Smyth has just posed naked in front 3 strangers for [some apparently small amount of foreign currency]". A few of my friends had commented on it, including my friend Melinda (there's no point in hiding her identity; subterfuge is not her strong point) who had offered him more money. This reminded me of a time that my ex-girlfriend sent me a picture of a naked man she had had to draw in art class and I photoshopped my face on to it and sent it back. I could re-use the same joke here! but i was tired and decided to do it the next day.

when I woke up i tried to find the original conversation. However, Archibald wasn't on friends list - only Sebastian was. So it must have been Sebastian - I had gotten them confused as usual. I took one of the pictures I had taken of him and made it look a bit hand-drawn and then pasted it on the naked body. When I tried to find the original thread though, I couldn't. He must have deleted it.

frustrated that my genius had been stymied in this way, i decided to send the picture to melinda.

she said it was a stroke of genius and I should post it on his wall anyway. My resolve strengthened, and bearing in mind that he is a stand-up comedian and probably inured to these things, I posted it on Sebastian's wall, saying i had found it in a charity shop. he replied saying he hoped i hadn't paid too much.

A day or so later, i get a message from Melinda....


IT WAS THE WRONG BROTHER! I must have only seen Archibald's status update because so many of my friends had commented on it.

I can only wonder what Sebastian made of it when I, out of the blue, posted a charcoal drawing of him naked on his page. I mean, if I had posted a picture of myself naked, he may have written it off as clumsy flirtation. but a picture of him - that's bordering on the odd. (In retrospect it could have been worse - i could easily have posted a picture of his brother naked on his wall with no explanation).

to those i have confused or alarmed - I apologise.



Create your own visitor map!

I was walking back from church, where I had been taking some photos of the building for use on their website, also being produced by paddimir industries.

I was walking past the piazza (I should add that this is an optimistically named shopping centre, not an open space), when I spotted my new neighbours approaching.  although my balcony overlooks their bathroom, I only really recognised them because of their overactive pitbull terrier.  I was pondering whether we were on "saying hello" terms.  I had said hello to the guy earlier that day, and he reluctantly responded, but that was within the confines of my estate.  out in the wide world things were even more uncertain.

it seems we were not on saying hello terms, and just as I passed them, bemoaning the fragmentation of society, I heard an ungodly sound from above my left ear.  I turned around to see two white masses about 3 ft away from my head and travelling at some speed.  they had big black feet attached, and that was all i could gather as I ducked to avoid death.

one screaming swan whisked over me so closely i could feel the wings beating.  another veered off to the left.  the one that went straight ahead splashed down on the concrete just in front of the building.  I stood amazed.  it looked a bit shocked itself, and a little drunk.  it began ambling around unsteadily.

so too was the very drunk man, with a very grazed nose, who approached me.
"at's a shame that, int it?"
"aye, I don't what's up with them"
"they thoat this wis watter"
I thought about it for a second, and there was wisdom in his words.  the piazza was built over the river (for some reason) so if you were a swan on holiday flying along the river, you would be a little surprised to suddenly be staring at a big shopping centre and dashing software engineer.

"did ye get a photie uv it?"
I had forgotten about my camera.  I had my wide angled lens and a filter on, but I started taking photos anyway.
"at wid been an amazing photie eh?"
"yeah, but it would have killed me!"
there can be no worse way to go out than to be engulfed in high-speed swan vagina for the sake of a photo

he turned his slurry attention to the swan, who was walking up the stairs towards us.
"err's yer mate oer therr!".  it was true; the other swan was sitting in the middle of the high street stopping traffic, and looking a little traumatised.  a group of ... well the kind of people who hang around paisley cross on a saturday night, were gathering around filming it on their mobiles and trying to feed it chips.

eventually the two swans met up at the bus stop on the side of the road nearest the river, so I left them hoping they would be okay, and not get on the number 20.



Create your own visitor map!

the hotel that I stay in in Barra are interested in selling my Barra calendars in their shops.  However, getting them printed by dA and shipped across the atlantic is a) expensive and b) daft.  does anyone have any experience of doing this kind of thing with UK suppliers?  anyone they could recommend?  even if not for calendars, for prints?

I might well be taking redundancy soon and trying to actually make some money from my photos.



Create your own visitor map!

apologies that i haven't been around much.  I was mysteriously unable to access dA for a couple of weeks.  I think my ISP must have messed something up.  but i'm back now.

I bought a new bike, but couldn't take it on my trip to barra because there wasn't enough space on the train.  nonetheless, for those of you who prefer your photos by the hundreds, here's the slideshow [link]

I will upload some on here when i have worked out which ones are good



Create your own visitor map!

I have had an important part of my photographic equipment stolen - my bike.  I use it to get around to take most of my photos in scotland.  it has useful wee pouches to store my camera in a way i can access it quickly.  I got up yesterday planning to go to bute for my first cycling trip of the year, to find that it had disappeared, along with another old bike of someone elses.  my old mountain bike was still there, but as my pump had also disappeared, i couldn't use it.  so no photos from yesterday and a thoroughly depressing day.  I am not sure if it was actually stolen, or some one took upon themselves to throw it out.  same difference really.  it was an expensive bike, and I am rather annoyed.

also i managed to miss out my verona pictures from my venice link in my last journal entry.  if you're feeling robbed of verona content, they are here: [link]



Create your own visitor map!

I've posted all my photos from Venice (and Padua and Verona), so if you're interested you can see them here: [link]

I will be posting some of them on here, and if you have any recommendations, let me know

ciao!
Patrick



Create your own visitor map!

not for photos this time but... theological comedy.  you can read all about it here: [link]

more venice stuff to come soon!



Create your own visitor map!

[link]



Create your own visitor map!

I'm thinking of buying a "grip" for my canon 400D.  I was going to buy a canon one (and probably still will) but saw one sent from poland which had some cool looking functions (being able to set exposure times up to 100 hours, for example).  it is made buy a company (or a guy!) called Kubisek, and I was wondering if anyone has tried one or heard of this company, and whether they are any good?



Create your own visitor map!

[clearly i wrote this for facebook, but you can have the hand-me-downs ]

"now the gloves don't work they just make things worse..."

I can post nonsense to the internet any time I like, and yet I feel that glove-technology has not progressed in generations.

let us examine where gloves let the world down.

firstly, they get lost. I think this is self-explanatory

as they make their way inevitably down the path to lostness, they cause pocket problems. when one is wearing one's gloves, one naturally needs to access things like buspasses in one's pocket. one cannot access one's pocket, whilst wearing one's gloves, and so must remove one's glove(s) to access said item. now one must put one's gloves in one's pocket while brandishing the buspass. when the time comes to put the buspass back in the pocket, the gloves must be removed. the gloves usually bring a deluge of other things cascading from the pocket. twenty pound notes go fluttering, earphone cables are entangled, and the world is an unhappy place.

now one segment of society are immune from both of these problems: the toddlers. these ubermensch stand a-stride a world unsullied by lost gloves and pocket avalanches. and why? Mittens on a string. a monopoly they have held for too long.

if i had mittens on a string, my mitten would dangle playfully as I delicately remove the buspass. they can't get lost without an act of escapology. people would laugh at a man with mittens on a string, but I say this to you: 15 years ago, everyone with a mobile was universally considered a wanker. these things can change!

The only downside with the string is that you have to take your coat off when you decide to don your gloves. i would prefer two strings, each of which can be attached to the sleeve of one's coat. (all winter coats should have a standard glove-socket).

I call up on you, the glittering lights of in the internet, the flower of facebook, learned people one and all, to make this dream come true



Create your own visitor map!

I'm not sure that this is really thought out well enough to count as a tutorial, but someone asked me how to do star trail photos such as



and I thought I may as well post it here in case it's useful to someone else

you need a tripod, and a camera with a bulb (all SLRs will have a bulb mode, I think, but mine didn't come with an actual remote control thingy which you have to buy separately. mine only cost £15 or so.)

then you need to go somewhere sufficiently dark, on clear night. most of the lights were actually off for most of this photo - someone just turned them on before i stopped the photo.

once you are in place, and your camera is on the tripod point it towards the north pole (assuming you are in the northern hemisphere). you might have to use manual focus because it is so dark. then you simply press the button on the bulb to start the photo. walk away for twenty minutes or so, then come back and press the button again to stop the photo.

in the mean time, the earth has rotated causing the stars to wheel imperceptably across the sky.

i used the maximum aperture in this case, but you might have to use some trial and error there



Create your own visitor map!

I spoiled myself by buying an S+M ND1000 filter (I can't remember the proper name).  This was a month ago, but because I was working really hard for two weeks I never got a chance to use it.  Now I have been sick for two weeks, so I STILL haven't had a chance to use it.  So some misty photos from a while ago are all I have to offer.



Create your own visitor map!

much to my surprise, I won an "abandoned places" contest on dA.  [link]

I am not sure I have actually ever won anything as an individual before.  I was Glasgow University Football Club Third Team Player of the Year in 1997, but being the best player in the third team is a limited achievement

many thanks to those who organised the competition, and particularly to ~justeline who suggested that I enter it in the first place.

I thought this deviation was the best:




Create your own visitor map!

did I mention I had a barra calendar for sale?


click here



Create your own visitor map!

just seeing if the flickr widget thing works



Create your own visitor map!

Hello everyone,

I haven't been posting on here much until recently.  I have been having a rough time emotionally, but I have been taking plenty of photos and posting them on flickr.  it's so much easier to do, but someone less satisfying.

I tend to find it difficult to pick out which of my photos are dA-worthy these days.  which means I either have to post nothing, or post lots.  I have recently swing to posting lots, as you may have noticed

nonetheless, should you feel you are missing out on stuff, here's a synopsis
this year I have been to
Como: [link]
Paris: [link]
Chicago: [link]
and Barra: [link]

I was the photographer at my cousin's wedding in Chicago, which was a stressful process, but she did get me a canon 50mm F1.4 lens, which I love.

my job (as a software engineer) is awful, so I am considering trying to make a living as a baby photographer at some point.  just because babies are more fun than weddings.

I have made a little bit of money from landscape photos over the last year.  Mostly from people who have wanted to use them in brochures and adverts.  I have spent most of those gains on lenses though, so it's hardly profitable   I did sell one dA print though, so I have ordered a Ferrari



Create your own visitor map!

I'll maybe do a proper update soon, but in the meantime, here is a wee tale from my recent visit to Barra:

I was meant to be leaving on the Saturday, but it became clear that there was no ferry on a saturday, so I had to stay another night.

on the saturday, I went cycling. When I got back to the hotel, I was desperately needing a bath. the maid had been in, and the bathroom door was shut, which was unusual. well actually both parts of that sentence were unusual. i tried the bathroom door and it wouldn't open. I stared at it a bit, and wondered if I had forgotten something about opening doors, but it was definitely locked... from the inside.

I checked there wasn't an emaciated chambermaid trapped within, and went down to reception. they sent me back to my room with martin the polish handyman in tow. he went through a similar process to me, and then we returned to reception where he confirmed my story. "well it'll have to be opened martin. break it down if you have to!"

so we went back and tried various forms of brute force. eventually martin settled on a plan i couldn't quite fathom but it involved a hacksaw blade and a lot of elbow grease.

while he spent the next hour sawing, we bonded.

"where you live?"
"paisley, near Glasgow"
"I'm from Poland"
"Yeah, I guessed"
"You guest in Poland? Where you go?"
"No I didn't go, but my mum has been to Katowice"
"Ah you went to... far south Poland"

and so it continued...

eventually, Martin came to my rescue and sawed through the handle and performed some slight of hand, and the door opened.

I had a bath with the door open, just in case, and all seemed well.

the next morning, I had to get obscenely early, walk a couple of miles to the ferry pushing my bike and dragging my suitvase. so i got up and went to the bathroom. Instinctively, I closed the door behind me. A couple of seconds a heard a wee click, and realised I had made a dreadful mistake. painstaking investigations revealed that the door had indeed locked itself, except this time there was no handle, and no obvious way to unlock it.

I could see there was a little square hole in the bit of the mechanism that was left, and that if I could turn it, it would unlock the door. i couldn't do it with my finger, and I tried to fashion a number of rudimentary tools. part of my razor; part of my toothbrush; a tray I smashed into shards. nothing would work. so I was reduced to shouting, like a cross between Penelope Pitstop and a wookie. "HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEELP!". still no-one came. eventually, I shouted DOWN the bath, and someone downstairs heard me. (I had been "upgraded" to a bizarrely african-themed room upstairs, and I think I might have been the only person up there). A woman shouted back "He.... llo?".
"Hello! I'm stuck in my bathroom!".
"are you in room 107?".
"No, I'm upstairs in in 207. Could you let the hotel owners know please?"

and she did. so, soon martin was back peering through the hole in the door at an overly enthusiastic scottish man in his underwear. he had to fit a new doorhandle in order to get me out. by which time i was very late for walking to the ferry.

so the woman who owned the hotel, who was quite perturbed at my ordeal said "You just cycle down, I'll give your case to that young couple that are leaving today, and they'll give you it on the ferry. do you know who i'm talking about?". I thought I did. "the woman has blonde hair, the man looks... a bit younger?". "that's no way to get them to take your case! You must know Holly?" I said I didn't, but I set off anyway.

I got to the ferry in plenty of time, and waited for the couple I had spoken to at breakfast the day before. eventually, they pulled up in the ferry queue in a wee green car. I found this odd, as I had realised they weren't leaving till the next day, but I waved to them, enthusiastically. they waved back... and then sped off. I thought, they must have moved to the correct place in the queue, so I went off to look for them, but they had disappeared completely. as I searched feverishly, the calmac [ferry] guy came up to me and said (alas you will miss out on my island accent here) "can you move your bike on board now sir?". and I said "I'm still waiting for my luggage". "I'll leave you to the end then".

the cars continued to roll on, and no-one appeared with my case. eventually, I decided I was getting on the ferry regardless, and made my way down behind the last car. another ferry guy said to me, "are you missing a case by any chance". "aye, the coach-driver's got it. on ye come."

it turned it out it had been an entirely different couple with a baby called Holly, who had been entrusted with my case, but they hadn't had room for it, so they had given it to a passing bus driver. this seems to be the way of things in remote parts.

so me and my bike and my case were reunited and made it safely to oban. where things all turned to shit again, but that's another story.



Create your own visitor map!

my girlfriend split up with me over New Year and I haven't been in the mood for much photography.  I'm sure I'll be back in due course

Patrick



Create your own visitor map!

I have been back from Spain for a while, but haven't gotten round to posting any on dA yet.  you can see them all on flickr, if you're THAT impatient

[link]

I have submitted a calendar of pictures from island hopping trip and will post a link here once it is approved.  

Patrick



Create your own visitor map!

no sooner am I back from London than I am off to Granada and Seville.  and then back to london.  i will reply etc when I get back

adios amigos!



Create your own visitor map!