Granny Buttons

Jetskis on the canal? Yeah, whatever.

Can anyone tell me what's going on down at Gas St Basin and Brindleyplace in Central Birmingham?

[Update: I found out - see below. Can anyone get pics?]

BW Midlands have issued an advisory notice for today (Thurs 28th) and tomorrow:

During the next two days scenes for a new film will be shot on location around Gas Street and Brindley Place.

These scenes will involve professionally coordinated and managed stunts on the water, some utilising jet skis.

During the filming of these stunts canal passage will be restricted and customers can anticipate delays of up to 30 minutes.

What are they filming? Can someone nip down and ask a few nosey questions?  Is it the next in some movie franchise?

Jet skis on the canal?  It's just the sort of egregious mistake a Hollywood director would make.

Or perhaps it's deliberate - in other words it's the sort of egregious mistake a character in the movie would make.

I'm interested in the codicil:

British Waterways apologises for any inconvenience caused.

Why bother apologising for something that's not a mistake? Apology in these circumstance is insincere and dishonest.  It's the institutional equivalent of a sullen teenager saying "yeah, yeah, whatever."

You should save the apologies for when you've done something wrong and regret it.

Of course, when we've seen the film we might well regret that it was ever made, and then BW's apologies would be in order.

Update: I've found that it's for a Bollywood film called Tezz, (info on IMDB here), starring Anil Kapoor.  He's huge on the sub-continent, but best know here in the UK for being the villainous questionmaster in Who Wants To Be A Slumdog Milliner.

The film is being directed by Priyadarshan, who is best known for such classics as Bum Bum Bole, Bhool Bhulaiyaa,   Parayanumvayya Parayathirikkanumvayya, Yeh Teraa Ghar Yeh Meraa Ghar, Akkareakkareakkare, Mukunthetta Sumitra Vilikkunnu, and about 60 other hands of Scrabble.

Apparently there are stunts going on at the bridge by the new Cube building, with jumps onto narrowboat roofs as well as jet-skis thumbing their roaring noses at the 4mph limit.  Exciting stuff!

Granny in profile

Deadline week and too much to do, no time for a thoughtful post.

Here's Granny in profile, just to remind you so that you don't forget me, or my boat.

Quick talk-through of the windows:  The front two are in the saloon, the third is the kitchen window, the fourth is the bathroom window (that's why it's etched), the first porthole is the bedroom, the second just lights a cupboard.

Nothing special, but it's home.

Play even mistier for me

It's a good, hard rule: When anyone praises a photograph of their own, you can be pretty sure it has few aesthetic virtues. 

So I'm not expecting any awards or praise for this picture, which I posted a couple of days ago.  But I like it, and it works very well for me when set as my desktop wallpaper.

The pic here is embedded in full high-resolution (10mp), so you can see how it works for you.

I really don't understand why people think a canal photo with blue skies and cotton wool clouds is somehow 'better'.  I love the less-clement sort of weather, as shown here, where there was frost on the ground, fog in the air, and the sun was struggling to get through.

I took the photo at the Google Maps location here, between Rugeley and Wolseley Bridge.  I've centred the map on the tree in the picture.

Here's how it looks as my desktop:

Incidentally, when you look at this photo close up, you can see one effect I've used repeatedly in canal photography.  I rely on ripples to break up a dull water scene.

It's a deliberate effect, too.  I often purposely put the propeller thrust on to create it.

Here, it's understated because it's a small part of the picture, unless you zoom in (below).

But one of my favourite bridge photos relies on the same effect.  I have a feeling those ripples are what makes it successful as a banner image that the IWA has repeatedly used at waterways festivals:

Playing misty for you

It's deadline week coming up at Waterways World.  Deadlines are like the long, lingering shot in Lawrence of Arabia that introduces Omar Sharif's sheikh character: they arrive painfully slowly out of the distant, shimmering, heat, taking forever. 

And then, just as you are mesmerised and wonder if they will ever arrive, here they are!, and like the sheikh they shoot you between the eyes.

My posts will be more infrequent in deadline weeks, or at least more inconsequential or incomplete.  Here's an inconsequential, incomplete post, written on a cold Sunday afternoon:

I love misty, frosty days in winter, and I've been looking for some photographs that could convey to you the feeling and atmosphere of such days. 

I haven't found the perfect picture, but here are some images that hint at that feeling.

They were taken in late winter afternoon, just after Christmas last year.

One difficulty in processing these pictures is how to colour-balance them.  Mist is typically rather blue, but your mind filters out the colour and you never really notice it until you see the results out of the camera. 

And as the day goes on and the mist thins out and the sun starts to burn through, it gets progressively pinker (as above).

I've tinkered with the colour balance in all these pictures - particularly the second one above - but I've tried not to go too far from the blue.  Blue is the colour of cold, and the ground was hard with frost when they were taken. 

One particular joy was capturing the waxing moon as the mist cleared (picture below) at dusk.  Such a scene really needs to be done with a telephoto lens, not the standard one I  had here.  Our minds don't let on, but when we look at a full moon it's really tiny - about the size of a fingernail  held at arm's length - and ought to be larger for best effect. 

Just one more:

[That's enough misty - ed.]

There's a terrific draft in here

Oops!  Sorry, I just realised the post I did on Friday (Wilmcote Bridge) was still in draft.  (Well, it is a double diamond-quality post).

I've just posted it.  I hope you didn't miss me.

Wilmcote Bridge

When Granny moored overnight at Wilmcote in August, I only had a brief time to explore the purlieus and environs before setting off again. 

I particularly wanted to record the bridge, because it's said that this bridge, in 1958, was what jerked the Stratford Canal Society into life, so that it became a credible restoration.  

The story is that the road over the original bridge needed replacing, and the county council applied for legal abandonment of the whole canal to save them the cost of repairing the bridge.  Instead, they planned to flatten the road right across the waterway.

An uprising from waterways lovers successfully defeated the plans, but it's said that victory hinged on a single toll-ticket - from a canoe, of all things - being evidence that the canal was still used.

It's here, too, that Robert Aickman concluded his initial walk from Stratford in the mid-1930s, one that you could say led to the founding of the Inland Waterways Association (long story).

The bridge is little celebrated now, except in dry official waterways histories, but it's an important part of the chronicles of waterways restoration.  Yes, you could argue with force that it was this bridge that led to the turning of the tide of canal restoration.

There's other history here too, better known, albeit less important to us waterway lovers.  Shakespeare's mother, it's said, came from just down the road, and her house is well preserved.  Since it's just a couple of country miles from Stratford, it's inevitably part of the tourist trail. 

I stopped to photograph one of the many cars speeding over the bridge, against the speed limit sign, but what I caught was a surprise: A tourist bus.

Isn't it strange how a red bus can suddenly double in size and visibility when you slap a load of garish vinyls on it?  At the best of times I can't help but either choke or chortle when I see these remarkable things driving round tourist honeypots like Stratford upon Avon.  

What do you suppose Shakespeare thinks?

Boating couple beating the recession

Giving up the rat race to join Newbury's canal community - Newbury Weekly News

There's a heart-warming story in the headline.

But at the bottom there's a thread  unravelling:

Annie and Phil Nicholls were hit hard by the downturn in the economy a few years ago.  Annie, aged 57, lost her well-paid job as a systems analyst, and Phil, an HGV driver, was struggling to pick up full-time work.

Unable to afford a house without saddling themselves with a large mortgage, they hit on the idea of life on the canal and bought themselves a narrowboat.

It's a purchase they have never regretted. Phil said: "This boat has been a godsend, a life-saver. We would have been out on the streets otherwise."

The whole thrust of this story is that how Annie and Phil were 'saved from the recession'.  Living on a narrowboat, said the reporter, was a cheaper, more affordable option.  Life afloat comes in on time and under budget.

To be fair to the couple, who seem very snug on NB Marders, they haven't quite pitched it that way.  But the newspaper has.

Last week I was chatting to a senior member of the British Waterways management.  I asked if - in the newly independent and charitable BW, free from government interference - he'd be championing the right of marinas to offer residential moorings.

(Residential moorings are hard to come by because local authorities won't give planning permission).

I  paraphrase his reply:

"Certainly not!  Living on a boat is a cheaper way of life, and if we make it any easier everyone will want to start doing it.  Councils won't approve residential moorings willy-nilly for the same reason they won't approve caravan parks."

Well, that was the gist.

And in a way he is, sadly, right.  Every time a story appears in the papers like the one in the Newbury Weekly News today, it hammers home the idea that you should live afloat because its cheap.

No you shouldn't!  If you seek to live afloat it should be because you want to belong on the waterways, not because you are running from debt. 

(It's ironic to think that when working boatmen of old left the boats and moved ashore, it was called 'going back to the bank'.)

 

Here's a picture  of the entrance to Calcutt marina. No reason for putting up the picture.  Except it's a nice place to live.

UK waterways blog chart

I don't watch the UK Waterways Ranking Site too much.  (I deny it completely.) 

But today I suddenly spotted on Jim Shead's Waterways Encyclopaedia that his UKWRS badge has slipped from its longstanding top position to No. 2. 

So I checked the chart, and lo!, No. 1 is now taken by the Canal World forums, which stamps all over the rest of us.  Including - at No. 3 - Just Canals, which has long held the second slot after Jim Shead.

I'm sticking with the blog chart.  Not for vanity reasons - no, really - but because it's where my friends are.

But while I'm at it, here's a picture of Just Canal's moderator Bonsai Chris, standing atop his boat Fat Rascal, during Banbury's recent Canal Day.  He's a good bloke, really, and JustCanals deserves to have more visitors.

And you can see from all the badges on his engine room doors that he's a regular supporter of Canal Day.

Some thoughts on photographing Bonfire Night

Anyone can photograph fireworks.  You just point the camera at the sky and click.

What you really need to convey is a sense of occasion.  Not of the display, but of the humans who caused the display, the ones who were there to give it meaning.

I think your most important tool is a tripod.  You need to keep the camera still, and forget the flash.  A couple of years ago I spent an evening at the Battle Bonfire Night in Sussex, where Nov 5th bonfires are huge occasions, taking over whole towns for the night.  A tripod allows you to get longer exposures, and so long as one key part of the scene is sharp, you can get away with a lot.

It's great if you can get names into pictures. Street signs, placards, shop fronts, even if it's just a word or two.  Things like this can give a better sense of place.

Fireworks on their own aren't enough.  I like to see an element of 'spectatorship', of people looking on, of crowds involved.  The easy way to do this is to show them in silhouette.

But while you can show a crowd, like above, it's much more satisfying to go closer up, singling out individuals.

Often I like to photograph people photographing the scene.  It's much easier to show this with modern point-and-shoot digital cameras, which are usually held away from the body, displaying the screens to nosey old me.

Another way to add interest is to wait for the heads to face each other, so that they seem to talk about the scene.  Both these last two points are shown together in the picture above, although it's a disappointing catch in firework terms.   You could probably pose a picture like this with more success than me.

If there are floodlights around, shooting straight into them can give a sense of depth to a crowd.

You can also give a greater sense of grandeur by photographing in vertical format.  This works best with fireworks 'bursting' from the ground, not least because their bright bursting throw the people in the foreground into sharp silhouette.

A £5,000 boat in London on sale for £30,000

Six years ago I wrote the post: Narrowboat for rent near Little Venice, handy for muslims.

It was about a canal boat called Percy, offered for rent at Lisson Grove, close to Regent's Park, and especially the mosque (hence the title of my post).

The post soon became my most popular, perhaps driven by the number of people looking to rent narrowboats.  And the quirky title. And perhaps by the number of people who've used the comments section as a bulletin board - almost 70 at last count. 

For a long time this post was No. 1 in Google for "narrowboat to rent", and it's still No. 1 for "handy for muslims".

Percy is still there at Lisson Grove, but now it's come up for sale instead.  It's declaredly not in good condition, and the photo on the advertisement is said to be five years old. 

The boat itself is described as worth perhaps £5,000 and needing £6,000 of work, but the asking price is £30,000.

Why so much?  Because, as the ad declares:

The mooring is very desirable and as stated, is where the majority of the value is. There is no cheaper way of having a pad in St. Johns Wood / Maida Vale. No need to pay council tax.

A new owner could sell the existing boat and replace with a new boat if desired. The mooring fees are approximately £2,200 pa. License fee is approximately £600 pa. The mooring has been valued at £25,000.

Who owns the mooring, who has title on the value?  Is this too good to be true? 

British Waterways' London boat licensing office told me:

Craft on this site were sold on moorings due to an arrangement with the operator prior to BW.  This is in the process of being phased out but anyone buying a craft on this site would be well advised not to pay over the value of the boat as they will not be able to transfer the mooring in future.

The site is non residential but there seem to be a lot of 'residents'.  There is a possibility that this situation could change in future and a few people could be seeing very high council tax bills for arrears.

So if you want Percy - and the mooring that comes with it - look hard at the asking price and ask blunt questions of the vendor. 

Starting with: Is a Lisson Grove mooring really such a valuable sitting tenancy?

Heart of the Water podcast, Edition 2

The second edition of the Heart of the Water podcast is out, and  you can listen online or download to your iPod (other MP3 players are available.)

Creator Anna Lovatt (producer? DJ?) has put together a two-parter, including a special Halloween edition, and done it on time.  No 'second album syndrome' for her.

Anna says the pilot show last month reached nearly 600 downloads, which is pretty impressive for an initial programme recorded privately like this.

The new edition contains three interviews - notably 15 year old 'canalia' artist Ellie Payne - and a news section with Canal Boat editor Nick Wall.

The Halloween special includes a complete recording of the original Orson Welles 1938 radio version of War of the Worlds. 

I describe this as all chit-chat and drama, but really it's a music programme interspersed with words.  Anna's 'thing' is the music, primarily country, folk and 'roots' music. 

I always thought 'roots' meant the sort of raw West Indian reggae stuff, but there's another type, a more United States version, perhaps as defined on the PBS website:

American roots music draws on the lived experience of ordinary men and women, who were and often still are defined and limited by cultural constructions of race, class and gender.

Or put more simply, the rawer, rougher and more 'authentic' forms of American folk music:

A broad range of musical genres, which include blues, gospel, traditional country, zydeco, tejano, and native American pow-wow

A Googling Happy Birthday

I suppose it's a wonderful honour for me, but it seems that Google's new 'Happy Birthday' feature was actually launched on my birthday!

See: http://googlesystem.blogspot.com/2010/10/googles-first-personalized-doodle.html

What Anglers Want

I've finally been filing photographs taken at the turn of the year, and it's surprising how so many of them trigger memories for me. 

Often the pictures that do the most memory-triggering are not the picturesque ones, but the ones I took as 'notes', just to remind me of situations.

Here are a couple, taken near Alrewas.

I remember it like it was yesterday Boxing Day 2009.  The canal was icing over and hardly any boats were on the move, so I shouldn't have been surprised that a couple of anglers had stationed themselves either side of Cow Bridge at Wychnor (location here).

If you've been there, you'll know that it's a tricky turn for boats.  You have to hug the outside of the bend to fit under the footbridge - and at the best of times it takes a lot of careful manoeuvring to get through without touching either the bank or the bridge pillar.  

But I remember that it didn't stop the anglers from showing their displeasure at my selfishness in nearly crushing their keepnets.

I saw this coming up - I feared it - so was ready with the camera.

But in terms of angling rage these fisher-folk were very well controlled, with only a little muttering.  Nothing like the spectacular display of fireworks from the angler near Milton Keynes I was on the end of four years ago.

I would love to spend some time with anglers to find out what it is they really want, and if I really was as in-the-wrong and as incompetent as they thought at the time.

My birthday online

It's my birthday.  The calendar says I'm 58 today, although photographs tell me only that I'm bald, fat and ugly, and my mind says I'm still seventeen.

I don't remember the birthdays of other people very often.  So I can't now complain that my received birthday cards are outnumbered by the automated services triggering pre-scripted greetings. In fact the only real-world birthday card is from my sister.

I fire up the computer to find out who else might be remembering my birthday online.  And what's this? There's a strange Google Doodle onscreen: 

Something celebratory, but what?  I hover over it, but there's no pop-up to tell me what it is.  So I click on it.

And it clicks through to my own Google Profile.

I'm still puzzled - and then suddenly I notice a little birthday cake on the right of the window, and colourful confetti streamers start to fall down the screen.

And I realise that Google itself has remembered my birthday!

Isn't that sweet?  What an unexpected surprise.  I'm filled with pathos for myself, and today Google is my best mate.  As a birthday treat, I'm off to laugh at that new Facebook film. Who needs friends?

But before I do, a big thank-you to my erstwhile employer, Tim of The Publicity Works and his colleagues, who sent me an Amazon token, a valuable gift, but all in bits.   Yes, my entire birthday is online.  Someone hold on to my feet, please, before I fall through the screen into this otherworld.