319 WATCH BATTERY

Another moaning write up I am afraid, normally I am a happy person... honestly!

As frequently reported in Amateur photographer and other photographic magazines, it seems photographers are being viewed more and more with suspicion. You can't take photos of your children in the nativity play anymore, just in case you are a closet dodgy person, then of course there are all the reports of the over zealous security guards, not letting you take pictures in shopping centres, fish and chip shops, public buildings, town centres!
It starts to feel more and more like photography is equivalent in crime status to murder!

My frustration was possibly initially raised from the fact that I haven't shot anything properly since October. Today, the weather was perfect, and someone had set me the task of shooting this location and I was champing at the bit to get it in the bag. I got to the location in plenty of time, walked it out, decided the best place to stand, set up in good time, so then I settled down to wait for the conditions to become right.

Alas, just as the light started to become nothing short of perfect, a family walked up to the chapel and stood in a row along the wall staring at me with their arms folded. And there they all stood for 40 minutes, while their kids played on the rocks in front of the church over the water. It became a stand off. I wasn't going anywhere until the light was gone, they weren't going anywhere until I was gone.

I checked behind me to make sure there wasn't something else they were watching: or that I was in some way ruining something for them, but the sun was too high in the sky still for them to be sunset watching, there were no dramatic or rare birds flitting around only a few ducks. I could only come to the conclusion that they were watching me, and I could only assume they were watching me because they had children, I had a camera and they perceived me to be a threat! They weren't talking to one another, just staring at me, but I carried on shooting, I was doing 30 second exposures with the ten stop filter, so the fact the kids were moving around meant they didn't even appear, but the fact the adults were standing still meant I had to delete the majority of the shots I took as they appeared in each.

I was watching, quite amazed, as the kids were clambering over these rocks, completely unobserved by the adults, one came very close to falling in, at the end of the jetty, where I can only presume it was deep, not to mention the fact that there was ice on the edge of the water that it would have been cold, sad they were trying to protect children from a photograph, but not from drowning.
They would have seen I was there before they arrived, so I truly don't understand it.

If that wasn't their problem, and I tried to look for all possible explainations so that I wasn't just being paranoid, then I can only conclude that they purely just did it to intentionally annoy me and ruin the shot which is possibly even worse, but either way, what is it about a camera and tripod which instantly makes people view us with contempt?

Thankfully, one of the kids started screaming and they all eventually cleared off, and I was able to get 3 shots in before the light died. Very frustrating though. They would have enjoyed the location so much more from any other point around the immediate coastline, but leaning up against a church, looking at the view over a mud bank, seemed strange but never mind, each to their own, and I am sure they enjoyed their time there.

Thankfully, so did I: some lovely fresh air, sunlight, a bit of exersize, and some soothing and relaxing water sounds and I felt quite envigorated. And I got a picture I was happy with. Even if I now shall wait to see if I appear on the next episode of Crimewatch.

My next photo write up - I resolve not to moan in!! ;)

(Incidentally, this was once a full size church, but when they built the reservoir and flooded it, it was actually under the water level, so this is half submerged)

may 4, 2010 - the headache that i woke up with on sunday was still lingering a little bit yesterday. sometime between last night and this morning, the pain got nice and comfy in one of my teeth. when i described my symptoms to others, they told me it was most likely my sinuses, but it just kept getting more and more intense and felt like NERVE pain. (and believe me when i tell you that i KNOW nerve pain, people - i've had SINGLES.)

i got in bed at 9:30 and and spent the next three hours tossing and turning and rocking back & forth and pacing around the house and pretty much full out bawling. around 12:30, i gave up on sleep and went out to the living room to watch my DVR'd episode of lost from earlier in the evening. needless to say, WORST MISTAKE EVER. i think i finally passed out sometime after 2:00.