Making choices

23 December

John Rebus is back again. Ian Rankin’s new novel is Another Rebus story, this time shortly after his retirement for the police. I bought the hardback copy of it seeing as its Crimble and I had a bit of extra dosh to spend. In the past I have felt that the dust cover gets in the way as I read, so now I remove it, not only does it not get in the way, it also doesn’t get damaged either.

Anyway, I noticed that the cover price for the book was £19.99, yet I only paid £13 for it from Waterstones. A quick look on Amazon and it’s down to just £9.99. This got me thinking about how much Royalty the writer gets when the price keeps falling like that. It seems like a lot of hard work for so little gain, and that makes me wonder just whether it’s worthwhile writing in the first place.

I am a bit surprised that AP arrived here this morning. I hadn’t been expecting it seeing as the Christmas issue was here last week – not that I’m complaining of course, I’m most certainly not. I’ve managed to read about half of it so far and it’s a pretty good issue. Two articles stand out for me right now. The first is by mag editor Nigel Atherton who decided that a New Year’s resolution for him for 2015, was to shoot more film. To that end he bought himself a second hand Nikon FM2, and off he went.

After ten years of shooting with what he calls, ‘… a computer with lens on the front …’ he soon found that he was struggling with his FM2. Years before his eyesight was a lot better than it is now, and he found it not so easy to use get pin sharpe focus. He also realized that he was going to have to wait for his shots before he could see how well he had done, so he ended up taking the same shot with his iPhone too. Now Nigel says he won’t be going back to film on a regular basis, simply because of the wait for results. He likes the instant feedback that digital gives.

I made the same decision when we lived in Bed’th. I had bought a Minolta XD7 off Ebay and it was great fun shooting on B&W film, until that is, it came to the point where I was running out of film, photo-chemical and inkjet printer ink. As we couldn’t afford all of it, I had to a choice of what way to go. At the same time I was still studying with the OU and had an assignment due to be sent in, and that meant I needed the printer inks. So I made the decision that I had to go digital on the photography as well. I sold all the film kit I had and made a slight profit on it, so that was OK, and my Konica Minolta Z5 was doing a great job on me photos.

If you were to look at a lot of landscape photos, nine time out of ten, you will see a lump of rock(s) stuck at the front. The sea or a river of mountain/wooded stretching out behind. The rock is ‘foreground interest’, and is supposed to be there to balance as well as lead the eye into the image. I’ve never really liked that idea and the odd landscape I have tried doesn’t follow it. Another article in today’s mag covers that same issue. Craig Roberts is a pro-snapper who thinks that foreground interest is compulsory and argues that sometimes using the rule of thirds it can be ignored. Craig isn’t saying that it can got rid of altogether, oh no; what he says is that it all depends on the view and conditions at the time. He includes a number of his shots to illustrate what he means. Yet again, well worth going out to buy the mag for.

While Jan was out last night, I sat and watched the rest of 2001: A Space Odyssey, Jan can’t stand it, far too slow for her. Anyway, I have always loved the film and watch it as often as it appears on telly, even if I do have to watch it in two parts. I suppose it is rather slow and even the few action scenes are not the usual fast paced punch ‘em up we see in so many other films, but for me it’s the whole visual affect that I like so much. Star Trek and Star Wars don’t compare to the shear vision behind 2001. Kubrick is supposed to have said that he wanted to create the greatest sci-fi ever made. He did, it still is for my money!

So, now time for a photo … 

A yellow flower, one of a large bunch I bought for Jan one time.

And today’s funny …

Josey wasn't the best pupil at Sunday school. She often fell asleep and one day while she was sleeping, the teacher asked her a question. "Who is the creator of the universe?" Joe was sitting next to Josey and decided to poke her with a pin to wake her up. Josey jumped and yelled, "God almighty!" The teacher congratulated her. A little later the teacher asked her another question, "Tell me who is our lord and savior?" Joe poked Josey again and she yelled out, "Jesus Christ!" The teacher congratulated her again. Later on the teacher asked, "What did Eve say to Adam after their 26th child?" Joe poked Josey again and she shouted, "If you stick that thing in me again, I'll snap it in half and stick it up your ass!"