Welcome to Simons Wood published

Welcome to Simons Wood is a photographic project from 2010-2011. As many of you will know it follows on from the previous years project Perambulation and attempts to explore the idea of creating a reality of a place through photography.

This year long project was subject to a number of blog posts and discussions. The idea of reflecting reality was one I explored first with Perambulation, however that while that project proved interesting I didn't feel it truly managed to find any kind of objective reality.

I continue to debate if a true and objective representation of a place is possible. However Welcome to Simons Wood I feel may have come as close as I can with photography alone. Narrow in focus, it shows the same view of the same place over the space of a year. This was controlled through a series of rules that can be found below.

Rules

 1. As from the previous project, there will be no post production editing of the photographs. With the exception of cropping and resizing for the internet.  

2. The camera will be set to scenery mode, and the only setting on it I can change will be the white balance to the appropriate weather conditions (either cloudy or sunny)  

3. I will go out when I should, no matter the weather at the time.  

4. I will go to the same place and take a photo of the same view  

5. I will go out weekly, Saturday at 12pm.  

6. I may change the day (but not the time) if life conspires to make Saturday impossible. The day should be as close to Saturday as I can make it and I should make every effort to do it on a Saturday.  

7. I will attempt to do this for a year.

After the projects completion I always intended to do something with it beyond a record of the images on Flickr. As I have previously discussed I always fancied doing a photobook.

So here I present Welcome to Simons Wood published!

It is paperback, full colour, 109 pages and 18 x 23cm. It has a large page count to allow each of the 53 images to stand entirely on their own. Plus it also does that flipbook thing so you can watch the year change at speed.

If thats enough to tempt you, you can purchase it here.

If not click on the image of the cover to learn more about the book.

I still fancy producing one on Perambulation I'm just unsure how I'm ever going to fit 366 images into a book that won't be huge, while doing justice to the imagery.

Further Perambulating Thoughts (Which might be becoming circular)

About halfway in to my perambulation project I was still considering ways to show this project. Back then I was unsure how it would turn out and struggling to think of unique and innovative ways to show the results. While I like many of the photos a lot there are just as many that I am indifferent to or I don't think are really very good. There are also not in everyone's eyes Fine Art, In fact I would say that in my mind without the context of my postcard work and reasons for undertaking the project in the first place they would not be Fine Art. However this could be said of many things and is in fact a completely different, huge and highly contentious issue.

Back when I started I didn't think I wanted to show the entire project on gallery walls. There are a lot of images to show! I can't even think about the price in framing them all (and I would have to show them all), let alone find a space that could show all 300 odd. Maybe I could just show a few of the better ones but that then impinges on the truth I have created of these works and project and that upsets me.

Obviously I needed some way to be able to show them all. I've considered film or AV and I may indeed do this but with both I control the speed at which people view them. So with uniform speed images I only ever glance at are lingered on more than I would and images I would want to examine more closely are sped over. I could make the decision which images you should look at for longer and since it's my truth of this area I have that right, I just don't want it. Again it's a manipulation of the truth of the place and that truth is distorted enough.

However why not make a book? The viewer chooses how long to look (granted still messing with the truth of the place but at least it's not me this time), there is something nice in owning it on paper, I can write and contextualise the works. There is one stumbling block, keeping costs down. To keep costs down I will have to make the printed images small, maybe even putting four on a page. For some of the images this wouldn't bother me but there are some that I really feel need more size and space. 

Maybe the above arguments are rubbish and I won't be able to avoid imposing my own will on what photos should be viewed differently from the rest. I will also be removing the images from further afield taken because I was on holiday, Strictly looking back on them now I have to say they are not part of this project. Maybe this is also the wrong decision and I should include all images, make a point of the distortions in the “truth” and go on from there.

Frankly until I start designing it I have no idea how it will turn out. I get the feeling that strict date ordering is going to be difficult as a mix of portrait landscape is always hard. Staying within the 80 page limit is also going to be tricky, even with the removals, 4 on a page will use up 75 pages. And I will need a page/half a page for text. I have to say I am still unsure about this, even just by writing this entry I keep finding holes in my decisions, however I'm at the point where none of these questions can be answered by postulating here. Only by starting the work and seeing how it goes will I get more the information I need.

This entries pictures are 7 of MY favourite landscape orientation images from the past year.

Perambulating my thoughts on Perambulation

It has been a couple of weeks since my final photograph for my Perambulation Project and I have been reflecting on a years worth of imagery.

6th October 2010

Looking back through the blog posts I made about this project and the goals I set myself way back in my first post on this project (http://noblueskies.blogspot.com/2009/12/well-since-cardiff-i-have-hardly-gone.html). I have come to a number of conclusions.

1. Doing this as a way to improve my fitness.
   Well yes, I would say that was a success. While I won't be running any marathons I did extend the length of my walks on occasion to over 2 hours (walking from Crowthorne to Wokingham) and while on my recent holiday to Southwold walked almost non stop for many of the days, covering over 6 miles a day, 4 days in a row with no worse symptoms than stiff and achy muscles. You might say that's not much, but for me it is what I wanted and what I expected from 9 months of nothing more than short relaxed walks each day.
   
   
2. Exploring my local area.
   Well I've certainly done that, I know more about the fields and woods and other nature spots and footpaths around my area than I ever did before. I've learnt more about flora and fauna, especially with regards to butterflies and dragonflies so I can identify them for posting to Flickr. I have however left out a huge chunk with regards to the urban and suburban areas, with the simple reason being that nature interested me more and I found more things to photograph.
   
   
3. Creating a truthful representation of a place
   Now that is a tricky one. To answer that question I have to go back to my blog post of (http://noblueskies.blogspot.com/2010/02/truth-is-out-thereunder-bush-or.html). I came to the conclusion that it was impossible to give a entirely truthful representation of a place because the photographs taken and chosen are taken and chosen through the lens of my own personal experiences, knowledge and interests. They can only create my truth of an area or subject. Many of the rules I set myself were useful to maintain a truthful representation but they were still too broad, leaving me a huge range of places to visit and images to capture. I didn't realise that this broadness would harm the initial idea at first, in fact it was really only after I had spent all autumn and winter doing it and started moving to new areas because I was finding it hard and a little boring to make the same few walks every week. I also didn't want to photograph the same things day after day, the change would not be obvious and the photos become monotonous.
   
   
   On one hand I am right with that last statement and on the other I am wrong. I do think that the same image day after day would have been monotonous but as a project trying to show the truth to a place I think it would have been well, more truthful.
   
   I think what I have done is create a representation of a place. I don't think photography can ever give a truthful representation of a place no matter how many rules and restrictions you set yourself. I think the next project as I have outlined below will give a representation of a view, I think it will be more truthful of that view than the Perambulation project was of it's place and it seems right to push the idea in that direction and see what conclusions I make from this experience.

4th October 2010

Other things I've learnt are that it is really difficult to keep these things going and find the time to go for a walk everyday. Especially when I was really busy with the elephant and most recently with my internship. Being busy has led me to have to taken walks outside of my directly local (to my home) area and have taken them nearer to work. I have also often had to shorten them to save time.

22nd October 2010

So what about the future of this and the next project.

Well I would like to create a book with the original series. I need to investigate more and see when it would cost me money to do so. But if it happens I'll let you know. Even with it's flaws in the end the Perambulation Project is still showing MY truth of the place and I do want to share that with people.

21st October 2010

I will also not be entirely giving up with my walks. I will still take them when I feel like and when I have time and I will still be taking my camera with me. One thing I have learnt is that it's really improved my photography skills just doing this project and I want to continue to get better and better. What will happen is that photographs will go up when I have them to show you, it will no longer be regular and I may not mention it. You will need to follow me on Flickr to be sure to see new ones :). I also have a few ideas for further alternative photographic and otherwise projects that will require a few walks of testing before I reveal all.

17th October 2010

Finally, as I was saying, I don't think that the idea of trying to find the truth of a place has entirely run it's course yet, as such I propose a new photographic journey!
But this time with more rules.

1. As before I will not edit the photographs in post production apart to crop and resize them for the internet.
   
2. I will have the camera set to Scenery Mode every time. I will use either cloudy or sunny white balance settings, whichever is appropriate for the weather conditions.
   
3. I will go out no matter the weather.
   
4. I will go to the same place every week and take a photograph of the same view.
   
5. I will go out weekly. I decided to make it weekly as daily seemed just unfeasible from a life point of view, especially with the increased restrictions. I also don't feel that the area I am thinking of using will change too much over the course of a week. There would certainly be things I would miss but that is still true if I went out daily.
   
6. I will go out on Saturdays at 12pm. I can bend this rule only if life conspires to upset me. If so then I must go on a walk as near to Saturday as I can and It must be at 12pm.
   
7. I will attempt to do this for a year

Additionally I may take extra midweek photos, as I can foresee interesting weather and events may occur but not hang around long enough to catch on a Saturday. But they might not end up in the project officially, at best they may act as added extra, appendix or special feature or something.

10th October 2010

Well that's it really, last thing to mention is that the photographs in this entry all come from the last few weeks of Perambulation. Including a very fluky shot of a double rainbow with caught lightning bolt.

Anyone got any questions?

19th October 2010

How I learnt to stop worrying about the state of my writing and love the spring

It has been a while now for me since the onset of Spring and ever since then I have had the elements of a blog run around in my head. Getting those phrases and concepts onto 'paper' has proved difficult however, Only now am I even approaching getting back into the swing of writing which will be evidenced by this and the previous post that need writing now or never at all. I was also heavily curtailed by the elephant, it is hard to write about the onset of Spring when I have barely stepped far beyond the confines of my own road due to pressures to get him finished.

But now I am feeling more verbose and decent length, less constrained walks have become the norm once more so now I am able to write.

Spring has arrived! I noticed recently that the news spent one day arguing about when Spring arrives. The Met office officially starts Spring on the 1^st of March, yet others say the official start is the 20^th, the vernal equinox. Personally this is all bunkum, Spring starts when you first smell it and this year for me that was the 4^th March.


There had been hints of imminent Spring for a few weeks prior to that though. Snowdrops in full bloom, crocuses starting to bloom and the beginnings of daffs. Not to mention the resurgence of the insect eaters and tree creepers adding to the bird song. Most recently the geese have returned to the local pond. But for me the smell is the most potent sign that Spring is here and the Spring smell is unmistakable, one day you go outside and it hits you, subtle but unignorable.


Now Spring is blossoming in full force and since noticing the change in the air many things have happened and only in the last week or so. Only a few days after the 4^th I walked outside to find the previously weak and somewhat watery sun was noticeably brighter, stronger and it was far easier to tell where it was in the sky, even when cloudy, by it's rays striking you. Most recently over the last week I have gone out wearing fewer layers and to begin with regretting the decision to put on my coat. I was caught out twice by the sunshine and the warmth and yet even when it was cloudy and I was expecting a little chill to the air I was still far to warm. So more often than not I have relegated the coat in favour of my University fleece, far easier to take off and tie around you waist if you find you don't need it.

I have even been getting definite hints of summer in the fragrance of the air and heat to the breeze not to mention some fully bloomed and beautiful crocuses on the road side. Last week was quite surprising all told, on Monday I suddenly had to deal with bees again, Tuesday I spotted a butterfly and had a few run ins with some drowsy and silly bumblebees and Wednesday I noticed that the trees are starting to bud and reveal potential leaves.

You know I did so much better with my previous post. I can only hope that editing will clean up this ramble. All i really wanted to do was talk about the Spring and throw in my own opinions of the beginning of Spring. However I will leave with a final note. While I have been enjoying exploring the Spring outside I have also been working on the images taken all autumn and winter. Picking up those images that deserve to be seen but didn't quite make it on the day they were taken. While I have yet to decide if the autumn photos should go up now or later (Autumn being technically unfinished until later in the year) I have sorted out the Winter photos and given them their own set on Flickr.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/noblueskies/sets/72157623657152834/

Any way that is all. Pictures in this entry are from post 4^th March. Enjoy Spring.

The truth is out there........under a bush or something

In December I blogged about my walking trips. Having started them in October I realised that by mid to late January I would have reached 3 months, I have also recently hit 100 photos in my album. Since then I have been meaning to write something about them, a reflection of sorts of the season and time. Unfortunately I have been busy with other things and producing a relatively large number of blog posts recently about the elephant among other things. Knowing my style as I do and the fact I can go on and on and on I didn't want to post too often so this has ended up waiting a while.

After looking back at the previous post I saw that I mentioned a need to show accurately the local area. This has since in my mind become a question of truth, are the images I produce an accurate reflection of my area? And I think the answer is No. But not No because I haven't been doing a good job but No because they can't be. The fact is that one photo a day might give an accurate image of my local area to me but I have the benefit of experiencing each of these days. Not only every sight but smell, sound, feel of the air and going deeper all the overall and varied psychological effects involved with going out, seeing what's there and coming back to look over the images. Some of the images I have taken are in fact visually accentuated versions of what I saw and I can only say that they are not untruthful because they conjure up or maybe show the essence of that walk, that moment not just the image but the feel of the day in all it's senses. Other photos (and this is more often the case) fail to produce the same feelings that I felt at the time.

The fact is the camera works in a completely different way to the eyes and brain. I knew this before but maybe I didn't appreciate it. How many of you have seen an amazing scene, one you feel worthy of capture but when shown on a computer screen it looks dull and uninteresting. Other times what image have to captured on a whim not expecting anything much only to when you look at it again find it is one of the most interesting images you have taken. There are many reasons for this and I'm sure the people out there who make professional observations about it can explain.

Personally I've not done much research on the topic. However for me some of this effect seems to stem from the brain taking what the eye sees and assigning areas of an image importance. But when reproduced on a flat surface it doesn't react the same way. The camera also doesn't cope with extremes as well as the eye/brain and certainly my little compact struggles under certain conditions. Dull and grey day? Well expect your images to be lacklustre, washed out or underexposed (the white cloudy sky confuses the cameras light meter royally) and lacking depth. But nowhere does the camera pick up the fresh clean breeze, sound of birdsong or some of the subtleties of light. Please don't tell me to switch to video, all I'd be adding is some tinny birdsong and I'd lose the clarity of a clean crisp shot.

In fact a dull cloudy day is the worse day to be photographing in for me. If it is light enough macro shots can come out well but other than that very little just pops off the page. Unfortunately after the sunny late autumn days and the sunny and clear snowy days of December/January, late Jan and early Feb seem to have brought a spate of these dull days interspersed with the occasionally sunny one. I have to admit that while I really enjoyed Autumn and most of the winter I am ready to be photographing flowers close up and seeing what spring brings. Rather than taking 90 odd photos around a lake and finally settling on another macro of a fungus.

As to truth. Well it will certainly be 'My Truth'. As I guess it always would be since I am choosing the image everyday and it is bound to be the best and most personally interesting photo I have taken. It's just some days I taken half a dozen upload worthy photographs and other days I struggle to be enthusiastic about the one best of the bunch, mediocre shot that might very well bring down the quality of the whole. So if you ever find yourself looking at my photos and finding there is one or two that you find mind numbingly boring and poorly lit just realise that there is something in it I liked, something that to me said this reflects today's walk, something that might look a hell of a lot better with a little sun but will probably never get posted again with it because I dislike to repeat myself and most of all, the best (in my small view) out of a bloody bad day.

But that's life, that's the weather and that was the point I was making when I started the walks.

Walking

Well since Cardiff I have hardly gone anywhere, certainly no where specifically for photographic purposes. A number of factors have caused this:

1. Winter. It is just not that great weather all the time. When it is sunny, it is beautiful but as I have said before, the light quality isn't the same as summer, people are not out as much, or wearing giant coats and many places are closed.

2. After such an early start and a long and intensive day in Cardiff, I realised after a variety of unpleasant reactions to that days exertions that I just didn't have the fitness for it. Frankly I think my stubbornness and unwillingness to stop and take a decent length break when I am tired was my downfall. It is a testament to my passion that I manage to completely ignore (in fact I would go as far as to say not even notice) that I am pushing myself to far. Well I figured that if I cannot change my mind set then I must bring myself to the point where I can better cope with it.


Most days in most weeks I do no exercise at all. This is not healthy but I've not found many ways to exercise which I am not either scared stiff (ice skating, swimming) or completely bored by (the gym). I am also someone that is naturally skinny and struggles to put weight on.


While I was at University I did Taekwon-do, that was fun and very intensive, a great cardio workout and there was a pride aspect to it. You would be mercilessly mocked if you missed a class without a very very good reason and you were aiming for that next elusive belt. Additionally you would see your class mates all around campus, there was no escape. Also while at University I started Archery, great for arm and back strength, posture and a nice gentle repetitive stroll to locate your arrows. Unfortunately I have never planned to be where I am for any length of time, so as I am in flux I cannot afford to take up either of these, subscription fees being pricey and for a full year. Which knowing my luck I'll get a job in London just as I subscribe.


However as you can guess I am an ardent explorer (at least certainly of the British Isles). I like the certainty of home but I also like to get off the beaten track, poke through woods and hedges and see what's over that next rise. So why not do a little something to improve my fitness levels and do a little exploration. So I started going for walks.

Now at the same time as this was filtering through my head I had been filling in applications for residencies. Now all of these had involved to a certain degree the idea of not only (or not at all) creating work subverting the postcard image. They had at least some relation to the local area of the residency and I was more interested, with the information I had, in thinking about producing a body of work to in fact reflect accurately the local area. The importance of local tourist sites (if they even had any) was not as important and I was becoming more interested in not playing the traditional tourist roles , rather seeing what really is there and reproducing that. After filling in two of these with similar ideas well, it just all kinda fell into place without me even realising at first.


By the time I had realised I had already gone on a few walks and started taking my camera out with me. I am now going on walks everyday (apart from Saturdays). Generally lasting between 30 mins to and hour and a half depending on where I decide to go and how much time is spent taking photos . I am often not in motion for the entire time since if I find an interesting shot I may just be playing with it for a while, trying to perfect focus or light qualities. As to where I walk I don't really follow a strict plan, there is some wonderful national trust woodland within a stones throw from my house and other than a walk up or down the main road it's the only direction to go. It certainly proves to be the more interesting. I also usually end up near or at the local pond, the round trip of the pond is a pleasant 30 min walk, it is beautiful and the pond itself is at my end of the woodland anyway so its kinda hard to avoid. It has ducks and I know in the spring the geese will return to make a violent racket and sit on the island in the middle.

From these trips I have been amassing quite a collection of photographs, some good, some mediocre and some down right fluky. Everyday I post a single photograph to Twitter that I think fits the walk or the atmosphere of where I went. I try to make it a photo that is at least interesting, if not the best photograph I have taken that day. The fact that sometimes the photos I come back with are a little mediocre or dull I am zen with. Sometimes the weather just isn't in my favour. The point of the walks were firstly a way to gain some exercise, secondly to explore and thirdly to create a personal and truthful perspective on the area.


How it will all turn out is yet to be seen as is what, if anything, I will do with it. Either way I am exploring those woods better than I ever did as a child and finding out all sorts of things I never knew.

I imagine I will blog more about this as I see fit. Every trip need not be written about and certainly the walks that have already occurred cannot be since I have only got round to this first draft over a month into it. Plus I don't want an in depth analysis of every walk, the photographs should go a long way towards that. But as important things pop into my head I will endeavour to write them down.

As you will notice my blogging now includes pictures. Just a note to say the photos here are a selection from the walk photos. You can see the whole lot at:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/noblueskies/sets/72157622935946910/