How not to photograph fireworks
We were asked to dance at a firework display last night, down on the seafront in Sandown. I don't think I've been to a Bonfire Night firework display since I was... ooh, 9 or 10 years old, when, armed with bags of Bonfire Toffee (which meant black treacle toffee in my house, although to others it's cinder toffee) we headed out to a Field of Mystery. I say Field of Mystery because, chasing down my vague memories the other day, the only conclusion I could come to was that the display had taken place on a recreation ground not far from my parents' current house, where no such rec exists. I asked my parents, who also had a think, and concluded that it had been on a farmer's field not far from their current house, but they had no idea which field, or how on earth any of the audience got in or out.
Anyway, I think this was the year that we had some rockets land in our back garden, landing hard enough to go 6 inches into the earth, which was the first time I realised that What Goes Up Must Come Down, and made me rather nervous of firework displays for the next few years. But these were being launched safely from the far end of the pier, and it seemed a shame to go all the way to Sandown to perform two separate dance spots, and not stay the extra half hour to see the fieryworks.
Unfortunately, once we'd finished Dance Spot No. 2, we were both very thirsty. A burger van had a queue about a million miles long, whereas the adjacent doughnut van - owned by the same business - only had a queue a few hundred thousand miles long. I don't like doughnuts. Pellinor felt that doughnuts would be fairly nice, but not nice enough to queue for. However, the sandwich board beside the doughnut van said "Doughnuts, tea, coffee," so we joined the queue at 7.30 intending to buy tea, plus a bag of doughnuts while we were there. (By the way, I KEEP writing that as doughtnuts. I am tempting to call them doubt-nuts from now on.)
At 7.55, we were still in the queue. Worried that the pier buildings would block our view of the fieryworks, I left Pellinor and went along the seafront to claim a space. The display started exactly on time. When it had finished, there was Pellinor with a bag of doughnuts, having just been served. He had no tea, though. Apparently the sign was a lie, and to get the tea, one had to queue at the burger van instead, rather than join the queue that actually advertised tea. Grr!
Anyway, I thought I'd try to photograph the fiery works, but I failed. I failed utterly.
"I wonder if I can take a photo while wearing gloves?" I thought.
In case you were wondering, the answer was, "no."
On the way home, Pellinor said, "were you using burst mode?" "Um... No," I admitted. "No, I wasn't." Why on earth wasn't I using burst mode? I KEEP on forgetting its existence. I keep forgetting to use it when photographing Morris dancers, too, Morris dancers being creatures who can leap around like an agile kangaroo in real life, hankies whirling around their heads like gossamer, but as soon as you take a picture of them, they are glued solidly to the ground with heavy, dangling arms.
I think the following few pictures might have been moderately okay had I taken them a fraction of a second later or earlier.
And then there were all my attempts to include the sea and the reflections. I wanted go down to the beach to take pictures, but didn't want to leave the esplanade in case Pellinor came looking for me. To be honest, I don't think it would have helped. Also, there were some very annoying teenage girls down there who were shrieking, "Aaaaaargh! FIREWORKS! AAAARRRRGH!" whenever a bang went off.
At this point, I gave up, realising that even if everything worked out, the best I would end up with was an entirely mediocre picture, and it was far more fun just to watch with my eyes. Annoyingly, the person next to me didn't come to this conclusion, and spent the entire display taking non-stop pictures... with a flash. I wonder how her 298 pictures turned out.
I decided to do just a short walk today, since the forecast suggested showers coming in for the afternoon - although in the end, they stayed away. After walking past hordes of football-playing children, a field of radars and a pub, I went through some fields and woods and a dairy farm, down to the sea at Thorness Bay. I liked this scarecrow. Since I could hear distant shooting at this point, I was briefly fooled when I saw it out of the corner of my eye. Although, actually, in this picture he looks more as if he's directing a tank charge than shooting crows.
The dairy cows were blocking my path, leaning against the stile, but moved away politely when I called them "madame" and suggested that they move aside for a moment. They understand polite English so much better than bullocks do.
The Brent Geese have arrived, and were out in force at Thorness Bay. Or not really in force, not compared with Southsea, where they fill the Common in their thousands. Barely a company, really, compared with Southsea's battalions, but still in evidence. Apart from that, though, it still doesn't look very wintery. There were lots of brown leaves on the ground, but the distant woodlands are still mostly green, with only a faint dusting of yellow.
Here is the little harbour where the little stream called "The Luck" (I wonder why; must look it up) joins the Solent. I always think how pretty it is, but I always forget to photograph it.
From here to the long expanse of the Gurnard-Cowes esplanade you can either do a boring inland diversion along roads, or walk across the beach. This works perfectly well at low tide, and it out of the question at high tide. Since the tide seems somewhere in between, I thought I'd try it. It soon became apparent that it was Too High, but I surveyed the expanse of massive boulders than I would have to traverse, and decided to give it a go. It turned out to be a very foolish idea, but by the time I had realised just how foolish it was, I was half way across, and had o'er rocks slipped so far that returning would be as tedious as to go o'er, as Macbeth said. The rocks were large, jagged and very slippery, with big enough crevasses between them that slipping could have led to broken legs, not just mild grazes.
When I made it across to the open beach on the far side, 3 people were coming towards me. "It is very bad?" they asked. "I REALLY don't advise it," I told them, with feeling. "I made it, but I really shouldn't have done it." They looked anxiously down at their light footwear, but decided to go on, anyway. To be honest, they would probably be better off with light footwear than I was in my inflexible boots. I did look back to see if I could see them, but couldn't see them anywhere. I hope they're not dead.
Anyway, from there I walked along the safely paved seafront, up the Steps of Doom, and so to home, in time for a lunch and an epic battle with the washing machine.
Anyway, I think this was the year that we had some rockets land in our back garden, landing hard enough to go 6 inches into the earth, which was the first time I realised that What Goes Up Must Come Down, and made me rather nervous of firework displays for the next few years. But these were being launched safely from the far end of the pier, and it seemed a shame to go all the way to Sandown to perform two separate dance spots, and not stay the extra half hour to see the fieryworks.
Unfortunately, once we'd finished Dance Spot No. 2, we were both very thirsty. A burger van had a queue about a million miles long, whereas the adjacent doughnut van - owned by the same business - only had a queue a few hundred thousand miles long. I don't like doughnuts. Pellinor felt that doughnuts would be fairly nice, but not nice enough to queue for. However, the sandwich board beside the doughnut van said "Doughnuts, tea, coffee," so we joined the queue at 7.30 intending to buy tea, plus a bag of doughnuts while we were there. (By the way, I KEEP writing that as doughtnuts. I am tempting to call them doubt-nuts from now on.)
At 7.55, we were still in the queue. Worried that the pier buildings would block our view of the fieryworks, I left Pellinor and went along the seafront to claim a space. The display started exactly on time. When it had finished, there was Pellinor with a bag of doughnuts, having just been served. He had no tea, though. Apparently the sign was a lie, and to get the tea, one had to queue at the burger van instead, rather than join the queue that actually advertised tea. Grr!
Anyway, I thought I'd try to photograph the fiery works, but I failed. I failed utterly.
"I wonder if I can take a photo while wearing gloves?" I thought.
In case you were wondering, the answer was, "no."
On the way home, Pellinor said, "were you using burst mode?" "Um... No," I admitted. "No, I wasn't." Why on earth wasn't I using burst mode? I KEEP on forgetting its existence. I keep forgetting to use it when photographing Morris dancers, too, Morris dancers being creatures who can leap around like an agile kangaroo in real life, hankies whirling around their heads like gossamer, but as soon as you take a picture of them, they are glued solidly to the ground with heavy, dangling arms.
I think the following few pictures might have been moderately okay had I taken them a fraction of a second later or earlier.
And then there were all my attempts to include the sea and the reflections. I wanted go down to the beach to take pictures, but didn't want to leave the esplanade in case Pellinor came looking for me. To be honest, I don't think it would have helped. Also, there were some very annoying teenage girls down there who were shrieking, "Aaaaaargh! FIREWORKS! AAAARRRRGH!" whenever a bang went off.
At this point, I gave up, realising that even if everything worked out, the best I would end up with was an entirely mediocre picture, and it was far more fun just to watch with my eyes. Annoyingly, the person next to me didn't come to this conclusion, and spent the entire display taking non-stop pictures... with a flash. I wonder how her 298 pictures turned out.
I decided to do just a short walk today, since the forecast suggested showers coming in for the afternoon - although in the end, they stayed away. After walking past hordes of football-playing children, a field of radars and a pub, I went through some fields and woods and a dairy farm, down to the sea at Thorness Bay. I liked this scarecrow. Since I could hear distant shooting at this point, I was briefly fooled when I saw it out of the corner of my eye. Although, actually, in this picture he looks more as if he's directing a tank charge than shooting crows.
The dairy cows were blocking my path, leaning against the stile, but moved away politely when I called them "madame" and suggested that they move aside for a moment. They understand polite English so much better than bullocks do.
The Brent Geese have arrived, and were out in force at Thorness Bay. Or not really in force, not compared with Southsea, where they fill the Common in their thousands. Barely a company, really, compared with Southsea's battalions, but still in evidence. Apart from that, though, it still doesn't look very wintery. There were lots of brown leaves on the ground, but the distant woodlands are still mostly green, with only a faint dusting of yellow.
Here is the little harbour where the little stream called "The Luck" (I wonder why; must look it up) joins the Solent. I always think how pretty it is, but I always forget to photograph it.
From here to the long expanse of the Gurnard-Cowes esplanade you can either do a boring inland diversion along roads, or walk across the beach. This works perfectly well at low tide, and it out of the question at high tide. Since the tide seems somewhere in between, I thought I'd try it. It soon became apparent that it was Too High, but I surveyed the expanse of massive boulders than I would have to traverse, and decided to give it a go. It turned out to be a very foolish idea, but by the time I had realised just how foolish it was, I was half way across, and had o'er rocks slipped so far that returning would be as tedious as to go o'er, as Macbeth said. The rocks were large, jagged and very slippery, with big enough crevasses between them that slipping could have led to broken legs, not just mild grazes.
When I made it across to the open beach on the far side, 3 people were coming towards me. "It is very bad?" they asked. "I REALLY don't advise it," I told them, with feeling. "I made it, but I really shouldn't have done it." They looked anxiously down at their light footwear, but decided to go on, anyway. To be honest, they would probably be better off with light footwear than I was in my inflexible boots. I did look back to see if I could see them, but couldn't see them anywhere. I hope they're not dead.
Anyway, from there I walked along the safely paved seafront, up the Steps of Doom, and so to home, in time for a lunch and an epic battle with the washing machine.