Another Year, Another Batch of Resolutions

I guess it's that time of year again, to make a list of things I'd like to achieve, doable things though... not ridiculous things like shrinking down to a size 6.

1. Visit Hot Bed Press at least 3 times a month - I've been a member of the print studios for almost 6 months, and really haven't spent enough time getting back into it.
2. Read a new book every month - I must have at least 30 books sat on various shelves waiting to be read, it's time I really started ploughing through them
3. travel to at least 2 new countries - hoping to do either a couple of city breaks this year, or go for a bit longer and travel through a couple of countries, Northern Europe is high on the list.
4. Get fit and run a race - I've put back on 10lbs in the last 5 months, since I stopped exercising regularly - mainly due to the weather being awful and running being my exercise of choice, so I've bought a wii and intend to use it, aiming to lose around 20lbs by easter time.
5. learn how to use illustrator - I'm terrible for not sticking at things I find difficult, so I need some recommendations on good tutorials and to get stuck in really.
6. Get the bottle to try out colour film processing at home - apparently the only real difference is that colour film is more sensitive when it comes to the temperature, I just need to get out there and buy the chemicals.
7. Complete my NVQ level 3 before Easter and swiftly start on level 4 - this is a qualification I'm doing through work, and need to complete if I'm going to achieve my goal of getting a new job
8. Update my blog regularly (ie more than once a month) - I have a list of stuff I keep meaning to blog about, but never seem to find the time/inclination

I'm sure I'll come back and amend this, as I'm sure there's more things I will think of over the next few days

A permanent (aka year round) list of my goals can be found over at 43 Things

Happy New Year, lets hope 2010 is a damn sight better than 2009!


I'll finish 2009 with this photo, that was short listed for the Salford Photographic Prize 2009.

Photocamp Bradford

Now I know this is a bit of a late review, but hey I've been busy!
Photocamps are described as 'Open Photography Conferences' or 'Unconferences' with the simple aim of sharing knowledge.
Whilst quite a few of my friends have attended previous photocamps, this was my first.
Held at the National Media Museum in Bradford, 150 people attended this event which had something for everyone. Starting off with the welcomes and a keynote speech from Natalie Dybisz aka Miss Aniela apparently somewhat a flickr celeb, she gave a run down on how she got started in photography (as described in the link), she seemed to divide the crowd into those who love her and those who hate her given the comments I overheard as we left the theatre & throughout the day. I'm not sure if was arrogance or naivety on Natalie's part but she didn't seem to really understand why people who've put a lot of time & effort going to college/university to study photography, researching, applying for grants etc.. would be somehow aggrieved at someone getting exhibitions and making money from photography (I mean that's the dream right, making a living doing something you love) almost instantly - I suppose it's akin to the whole Pop Idol/X-Factor thing, no longer to you need to spend years struggling playing every dive in every town, instant celebrity is around the corner! But back on subject, I found Natalie's photos quite interesting, with an obvious nod to David Lachapelle's fashion stuff in terms of style.

There was a wide variety of sessions throughout the day, including practicals (making a pin hole camera, creating still life set ups, strobism to mention but a few), discussions and gallery tours it was very hard to choose what to see & do, but I ended up not attending any of the practical sessions which surprised myself.
The Museum had on a exhibition of Don McCullin's photographs In England, gritty black & white shots showing poverty & wealth and that in between - worth checking the above link as (my)words cannot do it justice.

Without waffling on too much, the sessions I attended included how to promote yourself on-line with loads of useful tips to do with building a website etc..
Desmond Wee did a fantastic talk on his project "How to Wear A Camera like a Tourist", which reminded me a lot of of the sort of stuff I did & researched on my MA course many moons ago!
Also the king of the pano's ASBO Allstar aka Neil did a really cool talk on how (allegedly) easy it is to create stunning panoramas and stitch them together


There was also a street session on the Sunday, but I didn't make it to this event but saw some excellent shots from the day. A varied selection from both days taken by organisers & participants alike can be seen here
All in all a fantastic event and I'm looking forward to the next one!

U-turn for Much Needed Manchester Transport Updates

In 2008 over 800,000 people in Greater Manchester voted against the Proposed Congestion Charge. I can recall endless online debates that at times got quite aggressive, over whether the congestion charge was a good or a bad thing. The only consistency from both sides of the argument was that transport across Greater Manchester needed a massive overhaul. Over crowded, over priced and at times not very convenient meant that driving into Manchester for many is an obvious and easy choice over the alternative of trains, trams & buses.
One of the 'promises' from the For Campaign was that the Congestion Charge would allow a massive fund to improve transport, however, we (Greater Manchester residents & voters) were firmly warned that if the charge did not go ahead, there would be absolutely no funding to pay for transport upgrades!


Very interesting then, that this week a leaflet dropped through the doors of many a resident, stating that (despite no congestion charge) that GMPTE are planning to (finally!) introduce bus services across the City Centre, as part of a larger programme to deliver £1.5 billion of transport improvements over the coming years. Currently people living in the of North of the city have to swap not only buses, but bus companies to travel south of Piccadilly Gardens resulting in having to buy multiple travel tickets, from what I have read in the distributed leaflets, this will be a thing of the past. I'm sure it's too much to expect a similar system to London, where everyone pays a flat fee per journey/time period.

Warehouse Project 2009

Last night we went to the Warehouse Project underneath Piccadilly train station. After spending almost 50 minutes trying to find the venue (GPS locator sending us in the wrong direction, ending up behind piccadilly, unable to cut through!), we eventually arrived a little after half 10. After seeing promotional pictures and the "strictly no entry after 11.30pm" message on tickets, we expected to be queuing for a quite a while, so it was a nice surprise to find on a handful of people waiting to be searched before entry. We went straight in to find the venue (a car park during the week) fairly empty, which gave us plenty of time to have a wander around and explore. Very cleverly laid out underneath the arches, there is a foyer with merchandise for sale & cloakroom, the main room, with a bar off that area, around the corner there is the second room, and a chill out lounge with cinema!


The cinema was showing Beetlejuice & The Bourne Identity along with another film I can't remember, there was no sound but that didn't seem to bother anyone as you wouldn't have been able to hear it over the sounds from the rest of the club, there was a popcorn seller, and you could get your photo taken in the Smirnoff Cinema Seats - for this you are rewarded with 3D glasses and a visor! Along with having your photo uploaded to Facebook

The drink prices were pretty reasonable for a club, £3 to £3.50 for a can of beer (tiger, kronenbourg, red stripe etc), to £3.30 for a spirit & mixer, the bars were never too busy, we managed to get served within a couple of minutes each time we went to any of the various bars. The toilets (portaloos) were plentiful and the queues were not too bad, although they ran out of loo roll before midnight, which isn't great when you consider the club is open until 5am.

On to the music - Rich Reason was the warm up dj for the main room, he was ok, nothing particularly stood out, but it wasn't offensive to the ears either, by the time BeardyMan came on at 11pm, the previously empty room was packed out, he started with Shimmy Shimmy Ya and the crowd went crazy, it was a real party atmosphere! If you haven't seen beardyman before it's worth checking him out on Youtube.
After that we chilled out in the cinema room for a while, waiting for DJ Krush to come on at 1am. We ended up queuing to get into the relatively small second room to see DJ Krush, because he's that popular - luckily the room emptied out as most people apparently wanted to go see the radio 1 dj who's name escapes me. We didn't see all of Krush's set, but it was very Shadow-eque, it was a shame that the accompanying visuals displayed on the wall behind the decks weren't very bright, but over all a good night.
We didn't manage to see Friction or Roni Size as these were on way after out bedtime!
We headed out into the night around 1.30am, being old & tired having had a really good night out, will definitely be looking forward to more similar events.

6 Reasons why the Paris Metro is better than the Tube

1. Zones - basically if you're a tourist, once 'in' Paris, everything is zone 1, apart from Euro Disney or the airports. So no need to worry about being taken to some French jail for not having the right ticket (the threat of which made me and my college friends spend a week doing Paris on foot, compliments of the course tutor). If you're only there a few days, the best thing to do is to buy a carnet (book - ooh get me showing off my GCSE French) of ten tickets - each one valid per journey or you can actually buy a few or many as you need - there is no saving for bulk buying.
2. Rush Hour - we travelled several times in what would be considered "Rush Hour" in most cities (ie between 5-6.30pm), and not once were we crammed sardine like into a carriage with our faces smooshed against the glass, which is a common occurrence in London, neither were we subjected to a smelly armpit in our face.. in fact the rush hour period was barely distinguishable from the rest of the day. My only conclusion can be that A. Parisians don't finish work the same time as the every other major city in the world, or B. because they keep the trains running regular the entire day - thus keeping everyone moving at all times, rather than trying to put on a few extra trains at peak times.. I swear we never waited more than 6 minutes for a train.

3. Air Con - now I don't know for sure if the Metro has air con, but despite it being 30c outside, the stations and trains themselves were fine, not humid or sweaty, maybe it's just that their tunnels are bigger? Either way, being able to travel by underground train in august at a temperature that do not exceed the legal level for transporting livestock is a plus point.
4. Vending Machines - Unless there has been some radical changes in the 6 months since I last stayed in London, the majority of platform vending machines were full of chocolate bars. Not very useful say when you're about to faint through dehydration (see No.3). Needless to say every platform we used on the Metro (and there were plenty) had vending machines that stocked most importantly - Water, and lots of it. Along side various sodas, crisps, and haribo - Bonus!
5. Buskers - I have to say I have no qualms with people busking, on the underground or anywhere else, but in Paris we saw a puppet show (although I have to admit, we were subjected to some pretty awful dancing and karaoke).
6. Doors - the doors on a lot of Paris Metro trains are not controlled by the driver! which means (as we often saw) that you can open the doors a second or two before the train fully stops to jump out! It also means the doors only open if people are entering/leaving the train.

Summertime Catch Up

My blog posts over the summer have been very sporadic at best. I just feel like the past 2 months have passed in a blur!
I spent almost 3 weeks of July volunteering for Manchester International Festival along side my day job. I worked mostly as front of house for the Bach/Hadid Salon at Manchester City Art Gallery

I was very lucky in that I managed to catch at least one half of each performance for the three different concert solos (piano, cello and violin). I also worked at It Felt Like A Kiss although that was mainly waiting at designated 'escape routes' in case people left because the experience got too scary/intense, on my last shift the assistant director gave us a whistle stop tour of the space/show explaining the story including a lot of the more subtle clues through out which was the highlight of my time volunteering. The film by Adam Curtis which is a part of the installation can be viewed online at the BBC. I have to say, if I'd known a bit more about it, I would definitely have bought a ticket to go see, although I thought that about quite a few of the MiF events.

Along side that during August I joined Hot Bed Press, a print studio in Salford. I thought it was time I got back into it and put my MA to good use! I have successfully exposed a zinc plate with photec, hoping to go back next week to dip it into the acid so I can produce my first print in about 5 years!

Mid August also saw me & Ant heading to Paris for a 4 day city break - I'm still processing the photos, so a full blog post on that at a later date, but here's one of my fav shots so far taken on the Metro

Prima Donna at the Palace Theatre

One of the perks of volunteering for Manchester International festival is that hopefully you get to see parts of the shows/events you work on, but a totally unexpected bonus was that we got to choose a free ticket to a dress rehearsal of some of the events, I chose to go to Rufus Wainwright's Opera, Prima Donna at the Palace Theatre.


The story is about a day in the life of an opera singer, and without wanting to ruin it for anyone, the storyline has some amusing and ironic elements to the plot. The singing was truly amazing, as was the music.. I was so blown away by the scale of it all... the sets were the best I've seen in any stage show before and along with the costumes, felt very contemporary whilst being set in 1970. The subtitles were large enough to easily read, whilst not interfering with watching the performance, although I'd forgotten how cramped the chairs are at the Palace, even with me at 5'4" and my friend at 5'2" our legs were seriously cramped.
It is definitely worth a visit to see this, although I suspect it's close to selling out/sold out - Prima Donna is on at the Palace Theatre Manchester on the 10th, 12th, 14th, 17th & 19th July 2009, check here for ticket details.

Mark Thomas Comedy Product

On Thursday we went to the Dancehouse Theatre on Oxford Road, Manchester (opposite the BBC) to see comedian Mark Thomas. On approaching the venue there seemed to be a polling booth set up in the downstairs lobby, this was not in fact some stunt/ploy.. but a genuine polling booth!

The premise of the tour is that at each gig, the audience submits manifestos that are then read out and voted on, with Mark trying to make some of them a reality in the future.



There was also photos and anecdotes about recent protests held, including one outside Hazel Blears' house that day. They were also handing out various leaflets etc at the merch stall including a Stop & Search card, which is for any unfortunate person who gets stopped and searched under the new ridiculous anti-terrorism laws...

The night was just so funny, I haven't laughed that hard in ages, who would've thought politics could be so entertaining?
Now time to buy the book...

Cardiff - Hen Weekend

Last weekend I travelled to Cardiff for Dawn's hen weekend. I'd love to say it was a smooth journey, but it wasn't. I Caught the bus from Salford, what should have been a swift 20 minute non rush hour journey into Piccadilly somehow turned into an almost 40 minute journey of taking the massive piss slowness. I then had to rush with my awful suitcase on wheels to Piccadilly train station, legged it to the platform with about 3 minutes to spare. To find that the train was not there yet. But before I could weigh up the chances of being able to visit a near by concession for journey supplies, the train approached so I thought, I'll get something to eat on the train.
Oh more fool me, Arriva trains don't provide food OR drinks for their almost 4 hour journey to South Wales. (although it was apparent from the litter around my seat that the previous passengers had had the courtesy of Arriva refreshments).
Luckily I had thought to pack wine & mints for the journey (and a cup!) so I drank that... and arrived at Cardiff to find that everywhere in the station was closed at 11pm also!
Wow.
Then I got in a taxi, and the driver had no clue where I was going, even though I offered the postcode for sat nav (as all the taxis in Manc have sat nav), but he just decided to ask other taxi drivers at the station... needless to say when Dawn rang me 15 mins later, I was no where near where I should've been. At this point, bright spark taxi driver pulls out the sat nav and apologises (for being thick or not using it in the first place? couldn't really tell), so yeah, get to Dawn's quite late.

Day 2: Wake up fairly early and sit in the garden as the weather is beautiful, Helen made pancakes for breakie (awesome)- I had mine with lemon and chocolate spread! then it was time to crack out the margaritas!


After a few drinks we headed into Cardiff which is a pleasant 20 or so minutes walk from James & Dawn's house,(although a quick stop off at the local junk shop for a kitsch Pope plate was in order).
We had a good wander around the shops before stopping off at Zushi for some Sake and sustenance

I would say this prepared us for the walk home, but to be fair, we went to Cuba where we had Long Island Iced Teas and then jumped in a cab back to the house!
Where we fired up the barbie for tofu kebabs as well as Dawn doing a fab spread of tabouleh, raita and general salady goodness

This was then washed down with more alcohol... probably margaritas as we managed to grab some margarita mix whilst out in town, plus a few shots of tequila!


After the barbie we got a wee bit dressed up and decided to head back into Cardiff for a few cocktails. First stop was buddha bar, we'd passed it earlier in the day when it was really busy and as we approached we thought they were playing some decent DnB, but alas, that was the flat above the bar...the bar itself was barren at barely 10pm. we asked for cocktails and the barmaid informed us they didn't do them, at which point a smooth talking bar man said he could make us a funky buddha which was blah blah and midori... only to find a minute later, they were out of midori so he would substitute it for something else... ahh well

Dawn & Helen looking very bemused when the final concoction was brought over, I know it had Blue Curaçao in it... hence the colour
After that we headed to Inncognito

another bar that does cocktails, which was also surprisingly empty, but still took the barman about 15 minutes to make a round of cosmopolitans because they had run out of Cointreau, but at least we got a discount. We sat out the back of the bar, where you could actually hear yourself speak... no idea who they were pumping the music to, as it wasn't the 10 customers.
After there we headed to Buffalo, but this bar was charging £4 a person after 11pm (although I completely understand why) it was no good for us hens who were only going to have one drink in there, so we headed off for somewhere else and ended up some place random, there were plenty of restaurants with outdoor seating so we ordered a round of G&T's and V&T's (after the obligatory tequila slammers)

Natasha had along with the lovely medals brought a selection of miniature plastic instruments including a Harmonica, Kazoo, Football rattle and Mini saxophone.




After this we grabbed a cab back to the house where we had left a few small potatoes on the barbie which were now cooked to perfection, and ready to dip into coleslaw and such. We sat out until about 1am when it got a wee bit chilly and Natasha had to drive back to London the following morning at 7am! Crazy lady!

Sunday am, we had a full cooked breakfast courtesy of James: bacon, eggs, hash browns and other meat n stuff... i was so full. Then Helen left to get her 8 hour coach!! (Crazy lady), then after a few hours of garden lazing (and apparently burning), I went home also!

Goodbye Cardiff, I was quite sad, could have happily stayed a few more days with that awesome weather :)

Eurocultured

The Bank Holiday Weekend of 25th/26th May saw the return of the Eurocultured Festival, I went with Ant & Elizabeth - we only managed to make the Monday, but was a nice cheaper alternative to Hungry Pigeon (which I wanted to go to, but was a wee bit to skint/busy to go to). We arrived at just after 1pm and paid our dues to go in, only to be turned back as "they weren't ready yet", told to come back in half an hour, we retreated to the nearby Grand Central pub, which over looked the entrance.. to see the others we had been "thrown out with" being let back in.. sigh!
So after finishing drinks in GC we headed to the Font where we had arranged to meet any other flickrites who might be in the vicinity. Had some nice food in the Font (as usual, I had my old fav, the chicken Caesar wrap!) The weather kinda went a bit clouded over at this point, although still warm, so we had a wander around, marvelled at the graffiti, especially this piece:

By Fauna - although I freely admit, didn't know anything about until someone on flickr pointed me in the right direction!
We saw a band or two on the stage that was powered by bicycles, but ended up heading into the Thirsty Scholar where Adam's friend was DJ'ing - really cool Hip Hop set with some cypress hill and plenty of old school hip hop, was the best set I'd heard in a while


As well as bands and Dj's and the afore mentioned graffiti walls for artists to create pieces over the weekend the festival also had a market area

selling everything from tshirts to scarves to jewellery, as well as a nearby Haunted House which was also a bouncy castle. We would've stayed a bit later but the weather which had been quite overcast, really started to turn, so we went home! Great Day in all.. i hope to see more of it next year maybe (As I seem to have missed it the past 2 years!) Rest of the photos here

La Gayola

Today we visited Spinningfields to go to La Gayola Spiegeltent - part of the Queer Up North Festival, the tent was situated on large grassy area next door to the new justice building. We parked across from the Courts for £2 all day parking on a Sunday - bargain, but get there early, when we left at 1pm it was full!
We arrived quite early so to pass the time decided to explore Spinningfields, which is home to lots of cafés/restaurants including Gourmet Burger Kitchen, Café Rouge and Zizzi - although I suspect we must have missed a fairly large chunk of the development as we didn't see Wagamama's, Pret or Nando's that are apparently there. We did however discover Giraffe which had a really tasty looking breakfast menu which we fully intend to try out in the near future. There's also a Carluccio's which has apparently been voted best cup of take-away coffee by some Manchester Review type site (that I can't recall the name of right now) - so I decided to see for myself. Easily the best coffee I've had in years, I opted for the smooth roast and was not disappointed - I normally find I need sugar in 'proper' coffee but this needed no additives, it was also served at the optimum drinking temperature, so I didn't need to take the lid off for 10 minutes whilst waiting for it to cool. At £1 a cup for take away it ticks every box for the perfect coffee - will definitely be visiting again soon. We actually went back later on to sample many delights including a raspberry and mascarpone tart, limoncello, mushroom pasta and ice cream!

The Spiegeltent opened shortly before 11am, and we chose a booth towards the left of the stage, breakfast was catered by Café Rouge - with a selection of pastries including croissants and pain au chocolat with a choice of tea or coffee.

The pain au chocolat was to die for, with the chocolate just melting in your mouth, of course the rest of it was lovely too. We'd actually finished eating by about 11.15 and patiently waited for the acts to start - 3 were listed on the website when we booked. At 12 there was still no sign of the entertainment, which was beginning to confuse us as the event was supposed to finish at 12.30, however about five past 12, the first act came on stage who I assume was Our Lady J, who sang 2 very amusing songs, quickly followed by Scottee

who also sang 2 songs and in his own words wasn't funny, but entertaining non the less - no idea what happened to the 3rd act, as once Scottee left the stage it was apparent that it was over, and most people started leaving (well not including the ones who had left before the acts even came on stage). All in all a fun event, but maybe not quite billed/advertised right, as like a few people sat near us, we thought that breakfast would be served and eaten whilst watching the acts, not waited around for almost an hour.
The tent itself was beautiful and worth a visit, it reminded me of an old fashioned circus crossed with a wild west saloon, the centre roof of the tent was draped yellow and red velvet, along with lots of stained glass, mirrors and dark wood.

More photos of the Spiegeltent can be found here

Holy Fuck and It Hugs Back - Academy 3

On Sunday we went to see Canadian band Holy Fuck at Manchester Academy 3. Having only heard of them a couple of months before - after being introduced to a few live performances on YouTube, we were unsure but quietly excited of what to expect especially after reading reviews about how they just went on stage and freestyled.
We missed most of the support (in fact we were only aware of It Hugs Back, not the others who I can't recall right now), but caught maybe the last 15 mins of It Hugs Back, who were cool in the interesting, quirky noise making kinda way towards the end.

The gig was in Academy 3 and was from what I can tell, no where near sold out (there's a lot of people who need educating to the ways of Holy Fuck), as there was loads of room to stand/drink/dance, in fact we walked up the right hand side and stood right at the front (well I did), bar a few under-age looking nerdy types who were literally touching the front of the stage from way before Holy Fuck came on.


Obviously once Holy Fuck came on stage at around half nine, it really got going, I'm not going to pretend I can remember the whole set list... I definitely remember Super Inuit, Lovely Allen, The Pulse and Milkshake but to be honest it was just a blur of good music, the weird tape scratching had to be seen to be believed.

This gig was also the first chance we'd had to try out Ant's Cybershot I'd bought him for Christmas, and I have to say it performs brilliantly under low light conditions.. not much else to say, amazing gig with the band giving it their all, it was also broadcast live over t'net via U-stream like quite a few gigs from this tour have.
gonna sign off with a couple of gig photos more of which can be found here

London Again... Part II

On Easter Sunday we decided to do some touristy type stuff - first stop Monument to the Great Fire of London.

A staggering 202 feet tall with 311 steps taking you to the top, you climb the narrow spiral staircase which runs inside, and when I say narrow, i mean backs against the wall whilst passing people going the other way!
It was well worth the effort (as the steps are harder work than you would think) with amazing views over the city, even though visibility was limited we got some decent photos.
After waving at Ant (who was waiting at the bottom) and snapping as far as the eye could see, we started our decent back down the spiral staircase, this invoked my mild vertigo and it took a wee bit longer to get back down
Once at the bottom we were presented with a certificate congratulating us for climbing the stairs! Here's Jen with hers
After that we headed up towards Camden, which was absolutely rammed with people (more so than usual) making the walk up the main street to the market quite arduous.
Once there we checked out the Proud Gallery which was showing two photography exhibitions, one of AC/DC and one of Withnail & I, there were also some live acoustic acts playing as well. We also stopped in the bar there for some much needed refreshments, before heading back out into the throngs of shoppers and into the markets to find some lunch.
We ended the day by meeting Danielle and her Fiancé for drinks, choosing the wetherspoons pub for it's cheap drinks, room to sit down and cleanliness! We had visited the World's End, but after waiting about 15 minutes to be served, being charged a stupid amount even by London standards for a pint, then sitting at tables covered in pots and food that the staff kept on walking past we left.

Easter Monday we a tootle down Oxford Street and bought a few obligatory souvenirs for family then left for the sanctuary of St Pancras for the train home!

London Again... Part I

Back in April we took another trip down south to stay with Jen in London. We had tickets for a gig/event so it was not entirely through choice we ended up being there over the Easter Bank Holiday (one of the peak times of the year to visit, bar Christmas). As usual we travelled first to my mum's in Nottinghamshire who would be dog sitting for the weekend, and travelled via Chesterfield - high speed train meant we were in London in a little over 2 hours! Upon arriving in London it was time to buy our travel cards for the weekend and to find out that TfL being as clever as usual have chosen this weekend to close several tube lines, which wouldn't normally be a problem except that in most cases they couldn't be bothered to put on rail replacement buses - which when trying to get from areas of central London, the buses became dangerously overcrowded, more so than I've ever seen before.. very surprised there were no accidents!
On the Saturday, Jen being a member of Liverpool FC's London Supporters Club she was going to a pub to meet other members and watch the game, on the spur of the moment we decided to stay on the train to Kew Gardens. only a couple of minutes walk from the train station through very 'leafy suburbs' (think how London is portrayed in Hollywood movies), we found it very easily: entry is £13 adults, £12 concessions and under 17's free when accompanying an adult (entry to the palace is extra). I think we both had no clue how big Kew was and you could easily spend a full day there (we didn't arrive until lunchtime). Although it was overcast most of the day, there was plenty to see indoors as well as in the grounds

One of my favourite parts was the Japanese area with the pagodas and cherry blossoms, although the tropical/rainforest areas was a close second

There is also a Sky Walk which is basically a rather large platform that you climb around 180 stairs to reach the top, then walk around in a circle ish shape near the tree tops, this is where you might notice that Kew is under a flight path, with incoming planes being so low down you can see the wheels lowering!
We ended up spending a good 4-5 hours at Kew including lunch time - if you're on a budget avoid the 'restaurant' and head for the Café - we paid about £4 for a jacket potato the size of a small melon - very tasty and great value!

Later on that evening we went to the Ether Festival at the Royal Festival Hall to see Royksopp supported by Fever Ray. Absolutely amazing, mind blowing gig - once again Royksopp did not disappoint live, the amazing energy they throw into their live performances always impresses me. They played a selection of tracks from each album, including all the favourites such as Eple, So Easy, Sparks, 49 Percent, Remind Me, Only This Moment - but the gig really got going once the newly released single Happy Up Here was played, it's worth noting that this was a seated venue, but all it took was one man on the front row to start dancing and gradually the whole crowd was up, the security towards the middle and right of the stage were really chilled and people were allowed to get up and walk to the front to dance and take photos, but on our side there was some jobsworth usher who's sole intent that night was to try and ruin the gig for a handful of people. Long story short she kept trying to stop my friend and I from taking photos when Royksopp had specifically asked the fans to take photos and upload them to their website! I'm a reasonable person but when she then happily let the men in front of me take photos and the guy sat behind me film it I was non impressed to say the least! So towards the end we decided to ignore her as it seemed very much like victimisation when at one point I could count 20+ people within 10 feet of me openly photographing the show and still she only singled out us! This was the biggest let down of what was one of my top 5 gigs of all time.

Anneli Drecker joined Royksopp on stage for most of their set and was crazy, really working the crowd up

They were also joined by Swedish singer Robyn who is very popular from what I could tell by the crowd reaction.

One of the support acts Fever Ray were also amazing with some very weird costumes and a great light show

Definitely worth checking out if they come to a city near you!

Studio Session

For my City & Guilds Level 3 course in Photography, I have chosen as one of my projects to do portraits. I chose to do portraits as it's something well out of my comfort zone but something I really would like to get into. For the course I need to produce at least 10 photographs, so I'm planning on taking two shots of each person - a formal studio shot and a relaxed candid type shot (of course meaning I need at least 5 willing people). My first shoot was in the studio last week with Jon, Gideon and Adam. I brought a few props with me (a football and a few hats) and the studio itself was equipped with a few bits & bobs to keep ideas going and amusement levels up, Jon & Gids even brought wardrobe changes! Many thanks to the guys as I think I would have floundered badly if I'd had to do a lot of directing myself. I learnt a lot from this shoot, especially around the ideas and planning I need to do myself in future. I've got started on the processing tonight and it should keep me busy for a few weeks yet (managed to take around 150 photos!)






The rest of the photos can be found here (more will be added in future).

Iraq - The Space Between

German born photographer Christoph Bangert has spent several months over the last 3 years in Iraq on assignment from the New York Times - during some of the most dangerous times when most other journalists had long gone. The result is some of the most shocking and stunning photographs I've seen, and I don't shock easily.
I was originally drawn to the exhibition after seeing this image, taken in the Karada neighbourhood of Baghdad, during a sandstorm.

But don't be lulled into a false sense of security - Bangert bridges the gap with unexpected striking and beautiful images of a warzone mixed in with what you might expect; images of death, pain and destruction and then everything in between - the civilians caught in the middle who still have to go about their daily business. I was fortunate enough to go to Bangert's talk at the Midland hotel and it was good to see he hadn't been number or come accustomed to the experiences of war.
He also told us the ironic story behind the image below (the cover image from the accompanying book) of an abandoned children's play area

The soldiers built it for the Iraqi people, but because of it's location people are too afraid to use it. This is a truly breathtaking exhibition that really needs to be seen.
The exhibition Iraq - The Space In Between is on at the Artland Gallery in Manchester until 14th March 2009.