View allAll Photos Tagged precise
atelier ying, nyc
This is a wonderful accessory for this famed conductor known for his precise yet lyric and exciting interpretations. Here the metaphor seems to be that he works the orchestra as a race car, recalled in the 35ti's ultra-cool dashboard atop the camera, and it's high quality optics. It is very difficult to modify such a tiny camera as the machinery is packed so densely inside. However, this design proposes twin hydroponic gardens reminiscent of Sir Georg's countryside hut in Roccamere where he studied orchestral scores and prepared for his seasons as music director of the Chicago Symphony. The gardens are a living memento of his favorite retreat, containing moss from the site. The "Swarovski" styling mimics piano keys as Solti was a concert pianist and spent much of his early career as a repetiteur for the ballet. Solti as a street photographer is an interesting proposition. His conducting style is visually unforgettable; you were either addicted to it or nauseated by it. i have a photo of him horsing around with a singer both of them carrying water guns during a picnic. The idea of Solti on a busy corner shooting street might be a tad intimidating. I've been making plans for more Solti-inspired cameras, his legendary Ring cycle recording, etc. It's easier for me to say things across a few designs rather than clump it all together in one creation. And I'd really like one of these Nikons too. The Rollei 35 is also on my mind.
Those that follow my drawings might ask themselves, why the combination of these unsuitable ideas for a camera? Actually, cameras with fantasies allow me to work and think at a detached aesthetic distance; it frees my mind, like the element of chance did in the work of John Cage or Marcel Duchamp.
Note that this plan is only for the all-black Nikon 35TI. Also, the "oxidized copper" moss cladding will need a breathable plastic cover for short term storage to protect the optics of the camera.
This design drawing is copyright 2013 by David Lo,
..tigress to be precise.
This was one very close encounter with the tigress in wild.
This tigress keeping an eye on us moved few feets away.
And I was in an open jeep.
This is first time I felt the limitation of my prime 300mm lens. If I had a zoom, I could have got better composition.
But I am assuming this is that one off situation, all though I would like to see this beautiful animal closely, but only from a well sealed vehicle :)
This photo was taken at Tadoba Andhari Tiger Reserve.
In March 2025, I photographed Dr. Catie Cuan, a rare kind of technologist—one who does not merely study movement but inhabits it, shaping our understanding of both human and robotic motion in ways that feel at once inevitable and revolutionary. To witness her at work is to see someone in deep conversation with machines, coaxing out a language of movement that is not just efficient but expressive, not just technical but emotional.
A trained dancer and mechanical engineer, Cuan is a pioneer in ‘choreorobotics,’ a field that merges artificial intelligence, human-robot interaction, and art. Her career has been a dance in itself, moving fluidly between performance, research, and entrepreneurship, all in pursuit of a singular question: how can robots move in a way that feels alive?
Cuan holds a PhD and a Master’s of Science in robotics and AI from Stanford, where she is also a postdoctoral researcher leading the art and robotics efforts at the new Stanford Robotics Center. Her dissertation, “Compelling Robot Behaviors through Supervised Learning and Choreorobotics,” explores how machine learning can teach robots to move in ways that evoke presence—where motion itself carries meaning. During her doctoral research, funded by the National Institutes of Health, Google, and Stanford University, she led the first multi-robot machine learning project at Everyday Robots (Google X) and Robotics at Google, now part of Google DeepMind.
But Cuan is not content to leave her work in the realm of academia. She has spent years choreographing robots, treating them not as rigid automatons but as performers capable of communicating through motion. She has held residencies at the Smithsonian, the Exploratorium, Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, TED, Everyday Robots (Google X), the RAD Lab, and ThoughtWorks Arts, working with nearly a dozen different robotic platforms—from the industrial ABB IRB 6700 to small, interactive tabletop machines. Her performances reimagine robots not as servants or tools, but as collaborators, capable of moving with grace, intention, and even artistry.
Cuan’s vision is as much about rethinking robotics as it is about rethinking humanity’s relationship to machines. Her work suggests that the way a robot moves can influence the way we feel about it—that movement is not just a function of engineering but of psychology, of storytelling, of something deeply embedded in how we perceive life itself. In healthcare, she envisions robots that move with a bedside manner, adjusting their motion to put patients at ease. In entertainment, she imagines robots that can dance, that can anticipate and respond to human motion as a partner rather than an operator. Her work, at its core, is about breaking down the binary between the organic and the artificial.
Photographing Cuan, I saw someone who carries these ideas not just in her mind but in her body. Her own movements are precise yet fluid, deliberate yet spontaneous, as though she is always attuned to the forces of motion around her. In that moment, it was clear: she is not just designing how robots move—she is teaching them how to be seen, how to be understood, how to exist in a world that has, until now, only made space for the living.
Singapore's Poh Swee Kiat Johnson in action during the 28th SEA Games Men's Individual Round 4 at the Sentosa Serapong Golf Course on 12 June 2015
Kryžių kalnas, or the Hill of Crosses, (Lithuanian: Kryžių kalnas) is a site of pilgrimage about 12 km north of the city of Šiauliai in northern Lithuania. The precise origin of the practice of leaving crosses on the hill is uncertain, but it is believed that the first crosses were placed on the former hill fort after the 1831 Uprising in Poland, Lithuania, and other western regions of the Tsarist Empire. Over the generations, not only crosses and crucifixes, but statues of the Virgin Mary, carvings of Lithuanian patriots and thousands of tiny effigies and rosaries have been brought here by pilgrims. The exact number of crosses is unknown, but estimates put it at about 100,000 at present.
Over the generations, the place has come to signify the peaceful endurance of Lithuanian Catholicism despite the threats it faced throughout history. After the Third Partition of Poland in 1795, Lithuania became part of the Russian Empire. Poles and Lithuanians unsuccessfully rebelled against Russian authorities in 1831 and 1863. These two uprisings are connected with the beginnings of the hill: as families could not locate bodies of perished rebels, they started putting up symbolic crosses in their memory.
When the old political structure of Eastern Europe fell apart in 1918, Lithuania once again declared its independence. Throughout this time, the Hill of Crosses was used as a place for Lithuanians to pray for peace, for their country, and for the loved ones they had lost during the Wars of Independence.
The site took on a special significance during the years 1944–1990, when Lithuania was occupied by the Soviet Union. Continuing to travel to the hill and leave their tributes, Lithuanians used it to demonstrate their allegiance to their original identity, religion and heritage. It was a venue of peaceful resistance, although the Soviets worked hard to remove new crosses, and bulldozed the site at least three times (including attempts in 1963 and 1973). There were even rumors that the authorities planned to build a dam on the nearby Kulvė River, a tributary to Mūša, so that the hill would end up underwater.
On September 7, 1993, Pope John Paul II visited the Hill of Crosses, declaring it a place for hope, peace, love and sacrifice. In 2000 a Franciscan hermitage was opened nearby. The interior decoration draws links with La Verna, the mountain where St. Francis is said to have received his stigmata. The hill remains under nobody’s jurisdiction; therefore people are free to build crosses as they see fit.
Occasionally, significant parts of the site burn down in accidental fires. The site attracts pilgrims from across Europe, but especially Lithuania and Poland.
This description incorporates text from the English Wikipedia.
Une photo n'est pas toujours capable de montrer aussi précisément les détails que ce que nos yeux voient, encore moins de faire vivre les sensations percues dans un endroit ou á un moment donné, comme la chaleur, l'ambiance, la lumière, les odeurs etc. Les émotions ressenties rendent magiques ces instants, il est probable que personne ne puisse les apprécier á notre manière. Les photos qui nous font vibrer suite á ce vécu ne recoivent parfois pas l'attention que l'on croirait, ce n'est pas grave, elle font partie de notre jardin secret...
No siempre puede una foto mostrar precisamente los detalles que nuestros ojos ven, aún menos hacer vivir las sensaciones percibidas en un lugar o en un momento dado, como el calor, el ambiente, la luz, las fragancias, etc. Las emociones experimentadas hacen que estén mágicos estos instantes, es probable que nadie pueda apreciarlas a nuestra manera. A veces las fotos que nos hacen vibrar por lo vivido no reciben la atención que se pensaría, no esta grave, hacen parte de nuestro jardín secreto...
It's July and the annual aerial photography season just started. For work I shoot 10x10 large format film pointing down for creating precise maps but shoot through the plane windows for my own pleasure.
Surtsey is the south most part of Iceland and is only 40 years old, Surtsey surfaced following an underwater volcanic eruption the lasted for years. The island has since it's "birth" been a laboratory for the science community and normal people are not allowed to visit.
Kryžių kalnas, or the Hill of Crosses, (Lithuanian: Kryžių kalnas) is a site of pilgrimage about 12 km north of the city of Šiauliai in northern Lithuania. The precise origin of the practice of leaving crosses on the hill is uncertain, but it is believed that the first crosses were placed on the former hill fort after the 1831 Uprising in Poland, Lithuania, and other western regions of the Tsarist Empire. Over the generations, not only crosses and crucifixes, but statues of the Virgin Mary, carvings of Lithuanian patriots and thousands of tiny effigies and rosaries have been brought here by pilgrims. The exact number of crosses is unknown, but estimates put it at about 100,000 at present.
Over the generations, the place has come to signify the peaceful endurance of Lithuanian Catholicism despite the threats it faced throughout history. After the Third Partition of Poland in 1795, Lithuania became part of the Russian Empire. Poles and Lithuanians unsuccessfully rebelled against Russian authorities in 1831 and 1863. These two uprisings are connected with the beginnings of the hill: as families could not locate bodies of perished rebels, they started putting up symbolic crosses in their memory.
When the old political structure of Eastern Europe fell apart in 1918, Lithuania once again declared its independence. Throughout this time, the Hill of Crosses was used as a place for Lithuanians to pray for peace, for their country, and for the loved ones they had lost during the Wars of Independence.
The site took on a special significance during the years 1944–1990, when Lithuania was occupied by the Soviet Union. Continuing to travel to the hill and leave their tributes, Lithuanians used it to demonstrate their allegiance to their original identity, religion and heritage. It was a venue of peaceful resistance, although the Soviets worked hard to remove new crosses, and bulldozed the site at least three times (including attempts in 1963 and 1973). There were even rumors that the authorities planned to build a dam on the nearby Kulvė River, a tributary to Mūša, so that the hill would end up underwater.
On September 7, 1993, Pope John Paul II visited the Hill of Crosses, declaring it a place for hope, peace, love and sacrifice. In 2000 a Franciscan hermitage was opened nearby. The interior decoration draws links with La Verna, the mountain where St. Francis is said to have received his stigmata. The hill remains under nobody’s jurisdiction; therefore people are free to build crosses as they see fit.
Occasionally, significant parts of the site burn down in accidental fires. The site attracts pilgrims from across Europe, but especially Lithuania and Poland.
This description incorporates text from the English Wikipedia.
"Dive bombing requires precise maneuverability and accuracy to fly at steep trajectory and hit a moving target. The Douglas SBD Dauntless was sturdy enough for pilots to dive at a near-vertical 80 degrees. The US Navyâs primary dive-bomber at the warâs start, the bomber earned its reputationâand helped earn victoryâat the 1942 Battle of Midway, sinking four Japanese carriers. By some accounts, the Dauntless sank more Japanese ships than any other plane.
SBD-3 Dauntless Dive Bomber
SBD-3, Bureau Number (BuNo) 06508 was built by Douglas Aircraft Company at El Segundo, California, and is a combat veteran of the Guadalcanal Campaign operating from Henderson Field by Marine Scout Bombing Squadrons (VMSB) 141 and 132. In the spring of 1943, BuNo 06508 was assigned to Navy Bombing Squadron 10 aboard the aircraft carrier Enterprise for a short time before being returned to the States to serve as a trainer at Naval Air Station Glenview, Illinois. In November 1944, this aircraft was lost on a training flight in Lake Michigan where it remained until 1990 when it was recovered by the US Navy and restored to its present condition." - www.nationalww2museum.org
Kathakali (Malayalam: കഥകളി, kathakaḷi; Sanskrit: कथाकळिः, kathākaḷiḥ) is a stylized classical Indian dance-drama noted for the attractive make-up of characters, elaborate costumes, detailed gestures and well-defined body movements presented in tune with the anchor playback music and complementary percussion. It originated in the country's present day state of Kerala during the 17th century and has developed over the years with improved looks, refined gestures and added themes besides more ornate singing and precise drumming.
HISTORY
Popular belief is that kathakali is emerged from "Krishnanattam", the dance drama on the life and activities of Lord Krishna created by Sri Manavedan Raja, the Zamorin of Calicut (1585-1658 AD). Once Kottarakkara Thampuran, the Raja of Kottarakkara who was attracted by Krishnanattam requested the Zamorin for the loan of a troupe of performers. Due to the political rivalry between the two, Zamorin did not allow this. So Kottarakkara Thampuran created another art form called Ramanattam which was later transformed into Aattakatha. Krishnanaattam was written in Sanskrit, and Ramanattam was in Malayalam. By the end of 17th century, Attakatha was presented to the world with the title 'Kathakali'.
Kathakali also shares a lot of similarities with Krishnanattam, Koodiyattam (a classical Sanskrit drama existing in Kerala) and Ashtapadiyattam (an adaptation of 12th-century musical called Gitagovindam). It also incorporates several other elements from traditional and ritualistic art forms like Mudiyettu, Thiyyattu, Theyyam and Padayani besides a minor share of folk arts like Porattunatakam. All along, the martial art of Kalarippayattu has influenced the body language of Kathakali. The use of Malayalam, the local language (albeit as a mix of Sanskrit and Malayalam, called 'Manipravaalam'), has also helped the literature of Kathakali sound more transparent for the average audience.
As a part of modernising, propagating, promoting and popularizing Kathakali, the International Centre for Kathakali at New Delhi has taken up a continuing project since 1980 of producing new plays based on not only traditional and mythological stories, but also historical stories, European classics and Shakespeare's plays. Recently they produced Kathakali plays based on Shakespeare's Othello and Greek-Roman mythology of Psyche and Cupid.
Even though the lyrics/literature would qualify as another independent element called Sahithyam, it is considered as a component of Geetha or music, as it plays only a supplementary role to Nritham, Nrithyam and Natyam.
KATHAKALI PLAYS
Traditionally there are 101 classical Kathakali stories, though the commonly staged among them these days total less than one-third that number. Almost all of them were initially composed to last a whole night. Nowadays, there is increasing popularity for concise, or oftener select, versions of stories so as the performance lasts not more than three to four hours from evening. Thus, many stories find stage presentation in parts rather than totality. And the selection is based on criteria like choreographical beauty, thematic relevance/popularity or their melodramatic elements. Kathakali is a classical art form, but it can be appreciated also by novices—all contributed by the elegant looks of its character, their abstract movement and its synchronisation with the musical notes and rhythmic beats. And, in any case, the folk elements too continue to exist. For better appreciation, perhaps, it is still good to have an idea of the story being enacted.
The most popular stories enacted are Nalacharitham (a story from the Mahabharata), Duryodhana Vadham (focusing on the Mahabharata war after profiling the build-up to it), Kalyanasougandhikam, (the story of Bhima going to get flowers for his wife Panchali), Keechakavadham (another story of Bhima and Panchali, but this time during their stint in disguise), Kiratham (Arjuna and Lord Shiva's fight, from the Mahabharata), Karnashapatham (another story from the Mahabharata), Nizhalkuthu and Bhadrakalivijayam authored by Pannisseri Nanu Pillai. Also staged frequently include stories like Kuchelavrittam, Santanagopalam, Balivijayam, Dakshayagam, Rugminiswayamvaram, Kalakeyavadham, Kirmeeravadham, Bakavadham, Poothanamoksham, Subhadraharanam, Balivadham, Rugmangadacharitam, Ravanolbhavam, Narakasuravadham, Uttaraswayamvaram, Harishchandracharitam, Kacha-Devayani and Kamsavadham.
Recently, as part of attempts to further popularise the art, stories from other cultures and mythologies, such as those of Mary Magdalene from the Bible, Homer's Iliad, and William Shakespeare's King Lear and Julius Caesar besides Goethe's Faust too have been adapted into Kathakali scripts and on to its stage. Synopsis of 37 kathakali stories are available in kathakalinews.com.
MUSIC
The language of the songs used for Kathakali is Manipravalam. Though most of the songs are set in ragas based on the microtone-heavy Carnatic music, there is a distinct style of plain-note rendition, which is known as the Sopanam style. This typically Kerala style of rendition takes its roots from the temple songs which used to be sung (continues even now at several temples) at the time when Kathakali was born.
As with the acting style, Kathakali music also has singers from the northern and southern schools. The northern style has largely been groomed by Kerala Kalamandalam in the 20th century. Kalamandalam Neelakantan Nambisan, an overarching Kathakali musician of those times, was a product of the institute. His prominent disciples include Kalamandalam Unnikrishna Kurup, Kalamandalam Gangadharan, Kalamandalam P.G. Radhakrishnan, Rama Varrier, Madambi Subramanian Namboodiri, Tirur Nambissan, Kalamandalam Sankaran Embranthiri, Kalamandalam Hyderali, Kalamandalam Haridas, Subramanian, Kalanilayam Unnikrishnan and Kalamandalam Bhavadasan. The other prominent musicians of the north feature Kottakkal Vasu Nedungadi, Kottakkal Parameswaran Namboodiri, Kottakkal P.D. Narayanan Namboodiri, Kottakkal Narayanan, Kalamandalam Anantha NarayananKalamandalam Sreekumar Palanad Divakaran, Kalanilayam Rajendran, Kolathappilli Narayanan Namboodiri, Kalamandalam Narayanan Embranthiri, Kottakkal Madhu, Kalamandalam Babu Namboodiri, Kalamandalam Harish and Kalamandalam Vinod. In the south, some of whom are equally popular in the north these days, include Pathiyur Sankarankutty. Southerner musicians of the older generation include Cherthala Thankappa Panikker, Thakazhi Kuttan Pillai, Cherthala Kuttappa Kurup, Thanneermukkam Viswambharan and Mudakkal Gopinathan.
PERFORMANCE
Traditionally, a Kathakali performance is usually conducted at night and ends in early morning. Nowadays it isn't difficult to see performances as short as three hours or fewer. Kathakali is usually performed in front of the huge Kalivilakku (kali meaning dance; vilakku meaning lamp) with its thick wick sunk till the neck in coconut oil. Traditionally, this lamp used to provide sole light when the plays used to be performed inside temples, palaces or abodes houses of nobles and aristocrats. Enactment of a play by actors takes place to the accompaniment of music (geetha) and instruments (vadya). The percussion instruments used are chenda, maddalam (both of which underwent revolutionary changes in their aesthetics with the contributions of Kalamandalam Krishnankutty Poduval and Kalamandalam Appukutty Poduval) and, at times, edakka. In addition, the singers (the lead singer is called “ponnani” and his follower is called “singidi”) use chengila (gong made of bell metal, which can be struck with a wooden stick) and ilathalam (a pair of cymbals). The lead singer in some sense uses the Chengala to conduct the Vadyam and Geetha components, just as a conductor uses his wand in western classical music. A distinguishing characteristic of this art form is that the actors never speak but use hand gestures, expressions and rhythmic dancing instead of dialogue (but for a couple of rare characters).
ACTING
A Kathakali actor uses immense concentration, skill and physical stamina, gained from regimented training based on Kalaripayattu, the ancient martial art of Kerala, to prepare for his demanding role. The training can often last for 8–10 years, and is intensive. In Kathakali, the story is enacted purely by the movements of the hands (called mudras or hand gestures) and by facial expressions (rasas) and bodily movements. The expressions are derived from Natyashastra (the tome that deals with the science of expressions) and are classified into nine as in most Indian classical art forms. Dancers also undergo special practice sessions to learn control of their eye movements.
There are 24 basic mudras—the permutation and combination of which would add up a chunk of the hand gestures in vogue today. Each can again can be classified into 'Samaana-mudras'(one mudra symbolising two entities) or misra-mudras (both the hands are used to show these mudras). The mudras are a form of sign language used to tell the story.
The main facial expressions of a Kathakali artist are the 'navarasams' (Navarasas in anglicised form) (literal translation: Nine Tastes, but more loosely translated as nine feelings or expressions) which are Sringaram (amour), Hasyam (ridicule, humour), Bhayanakam (fear), Karunam (pathos), Roudram (anger, wrath), Veeram (valour), Beebhatsam (disgust), Adbhutam (wonder, amazement), Shantam (tranquility, peace). The link at the end of the page gives more details on Navarasas.
One of the most interesting aspects of Kathakali is its elaborate make-up code. Most often, the make-up can be classified into five basic sets namely Pachcha, Kathi, Kari, Thaadi, and Minukku. The differences between these sets lie in the predominant colours that are applied on the face. Pachcha (meaning green) has green as the dominant colour and is used to portray noble male characters who are said to have a mixture of "Satvik" (pious) and "Rajasik" (dark; Rajas = darkness) nature. Rajasik characters having an evil streak ("tamasic"= evil) -- all the same they are anti-heroes in the play (such as the demon king Ravana) -- and portrayed with streaks of red in a green-painted face. Excessively evil characters such as demons (totally tamasic) have a predominantly red make-up and a red beard. They are called Red Beard (Red Beard). Tamasic characters such as uncivilised hunters and woodsmen are represented with a predominantly black make-up base and a black beard and are called black beard (meaning black beard). Women and ascetics have lustrous, yellowish faces and this semi-realistic category forms the fifth class. In addition, there are modifications of the five basic sets described above such as Vella Thadi (white beard) used to depict Hanuman (the Monkey-God) and Pazhuppu, which is majorly used for Lord Shiva and Balabhadra.
NOTABLE TRAINING CENTRES & MASTERS
Kathakali artistes need assiduous grooming for almost a decade's time, and most masters are products of accomplished institutions that give a minimum training course of half-a-dozen years. The leading Kathakali schools (some of them started during the pre-Independent era India) are Kerala Kalamandalam (located in Cheruthuruthy near Shoranur), PSV Natya Sangham (located in Kottakal near Kozhikode), Sadanam Kathakali and Classical Arts Academy (or Gandhi Seva Sadan located in Perur near Ottappalam in Palakkad), Unnayi Varier Smaraka Kalanilayam (located in Irinjalakuda south of Thrissur), Margi in Thiruvananthapuram, Muthappan Kaliyogam at Parassinikkadavu in Kannur district and RLV School at Tripunithura off Kochi and Kalabharathi at Pakalkkuri near Kottarakkara in Kollam district, Sandarshan Kathakali Kendram in Ambalapuzha and Vellinazhi Nanu Nair Smaraka Kalakendra in Kuruvattor. Outside Kerala, Kathakali is being taught at the International Centre for Kathakali in New Delhi, Santiniketan at Visva-Bharati University in West Bengal, Kalakshetra in Chennai and Darpana Academy in Ahmedabad among others. PadmaSree Guru Chengannur Raman Pillai mostly known as 'Guru Chengannur'was running a traditional Gurukula Style approach to propagate Kathakali.
‘Guru Chengannur” is ever renowned as the Sovereign Guru of Kathakali. His precision in using symbols, gestures and steps were highest in the field of Kathakali. Guru Chegannur's kaththi vesham, especially the portrayal of Duryodhana enthralled the audience every time he performed. A master of the art, he found immense happiness and satisfaction in the success and recognition of his disciples.
Senior Kathakali exponents of today include Padma Bhushan Kalamandalam Ramankutty Nair, Padma Shri Kalamandalam Gopi, Madavoor Vasudevan Nair, Chemancheri Kunhiraman Nair, Kottakkal Krishnankutty Nair, Mankompu Sivasankara Pillai, Sadanam Krishnankutty, Nelliyode Vasudevan Namboodiri, Kalamandalam Vasu Pisharody, FACT Padmanabhan, Kottakkal Chandrasekharan, Margi Vijayakumar, Kottakkal Nandakumaran Nair, Vazhenkada Vijayan, Inchakkattu Ramachandran Pillai, Kalamandalam Kuttan, Mayyanad Kesavan Namboodiri, Mathur Govindan Kutty, Narippatta Narayanan Namboodiri, Chavara Parukutty, Thonnakkal Peethambaran, Sadanam Balakrishnan, Kalanilayam Gopalakrishnan, Chirakkara Madhavankutty, Sadanam K. Harikumaran, Thalavadi Aravindan, Kalanilayam Balakrishnan, Pariyanampatta Divakaran, Kottakkal Kesavan, Kalanilayam Gopi and Kudamaloor Muralikrishnan. The late titan actor-dancers of Kathakali's modern age (say, since the 1930s) include Pattikkamthodi Ravunni Menon, Chenganoor Raman Pillai, Chandu Panicker, Thakazhi Guru Kunchu Kurup, Padma Shri Kalamandalam Krishnan Nair, Padma Shri Vazhenkada Kunchu Nair, Kavalappara Narayanan Nair, Kurichi Kunhan Panikkar, Thekkinkattil Ramunni Nair, Padma Shri Keezhpadam Kumaran Nair, Kalamandalam Padmanabhan Nair, Mankulam Vishnu Namboodiri, Oyur Kochu Govinda Pillai, Vellinezhi Nanu Nair, Padma Shri Kavungal Chathunni Panikkar, Kudamaloor Karunakaran Nair, Kottakkal Sivaraman, Kannan Pattali, Pallippuram Gopalan Nair, Haripad Ramakrishna Pillai, Champakkulam Pachu Pillai, Chennithala Chellappan Pillai, Guru Mampuzha Madhava Panicker, and Vaikkom Karunakaran.
Kathakali is still hugely a male domain but, since the 1970s, females too have made entry into the art form on a recognisable scale. The central Kerala temple town of Tripunithura has, in fact, a ladies troupe (with members belonging to several part of the state) that performs Kathakali, by and large in Travancore.
KATHAKALI STYLES
Known as Sampradäyaṃ(Malayalam: സമ്പ്രദായം); these are leading Kathakali styles that differ from each other in subtleties like choreographic profile, position of hand gestures and stress on dance than drama and vice versa. Some of the major original kathakali styles included:
Vettathu Sampradayam
Kalladikkodan Sampradyam
Kaplingadu Sampradayam
Of late, these have narrowed down to the northern (Kalluvazhi) and southern (Thekkan) styles. It was largely developed by the legendary Pattikkamthodi Ravunni Menon (1881-1949) that is implemented in Kerala Kalamandalam (though it has also a department that teaches the southern style), Sadanam, RLV and Kottakkal. Margi has its training largely based on the Thekkan style, known for its stress on drama and part-realistic techniques. Kalanilayam, effectively, churns out students with a mix of both styles.
OTHER FORMS OD DANCE & OFFSHOOTS
Kerala Natanam is a kind of dance form, partly based on Kathakali techniques and aesthetics, developed and stylised by the late dancer Guru Gopinath in the mid-20th century. Kathakali also finds portrayal in Malayalam feature films like Vanaprastham, Parinayam, Marattam, and Rangam. Besides documentary films have also been shot on Kathakali artistes like Chenganoor Raman Pillai, Kalamandalam Krishnan Nair, Keezhpadam Kumaran Nair, Kalamandalam Ramankutty Nair, Kalamandalam Gopi and Kottakkal Sivaraman.
As for fictional literature, Kathakali finds mention in several Malayalam short stories like Karmen (by N.S. Madhavan) and novels like Keshabharam (by P.V. Sreevalsan). Even the Indo-Anglian work like Arundhati Roy's Booker prize-winning The God of Small Things has a chapter on Kathakali, while, of late, Anita Nair's novel, Mistress, is entirely wrapped in the ethos of Kathakali.
Similar musical theater is popular in Kasaragod and the coastal and Malenadu regions of Karnataka, viz. Yakshagana. Though Yakshagana resembles Kathakali in terms of its costume and makeup to an extent, Yakshagana is markedly different from Kathakali as it involves dialogues and method acting also the narration is in Kannada, wherein philosophical debates are also possible within framework of the character. As per records the art form of Yakshagana was already rooted and well established at the time of Sri Manavedan Raja. There is possibilities of its significant influence in formation of Kathakkali as the troupe of performers of "Krishnanattam" designed the basic costume of the art form already established in other parts of south India including Males playing the female roles (until more recently).
Kottayam thamburan's way of presenting kathakali was later known as Kalladikkoden sambradayam. Chathu Paniker,the introducer of Kallikkoden Sambrathayam, stayed in Kottayam for five years with Kottayam Thamburan's residence and practiced Kalladikkoden Sambrathayam. Then he returned to his home place. After a short period Chathu Paniker reached Pulapatta as instructed by Kuthiravattath nair. That was around the year ME 865. Many deciples from Kadathanadu, Kurumbra nadu, Vettathu nadu, Palakkadu and Perumpadappu studied kathakali(Kalladikkoden Sambrathayam ) By that time Chathu Paniker was an old man. Some years later he died from Pulapatta.
NOTED KATHAKALI VILLAGES & BELTS
There are certain pockets in Kerala that have given birth to many Kathakali artistes over the years. If they can be called Kathakali villages (or some of them, these days, towns), here are some of them: Vellinezhi, Kuruvattoor, Karalmanna, Cherpulassery, Kothachira, peringode, sreekrishnapuram Kongad and Ottapalam in Palakkad district, Vazhenkada in Malappuram district, Thichur or Tichoor, Guruvayur, Thiruvilwamala and Irinjalakuda in Thrissur district, Tripunithura, Edappally, Thekkan Chittoor in Ernakulam district and Kuttanad, Harippad belt in Alappuzha district besides places in and around Thiruvanathapuram in south Travancore and Payyannur in north Malabar.
AWARDS FOR KATHAKALI ARTISTS
Sangeet Natak Akademi Awardees - Kathakali (1956–2005)
Nambeesan Smaraka Awards—For artistic performances related kathakali{1992-2008}
KATHAKALI ATTAMS (ELAKI ATTAMS)
Attams or more specifically "elaki attams" are sequences of acting within a story acted out with the help of mudras without support from vocal music. The actor has the freedom to change the script to suit his own individual preferences. The actor will be supported ably by Chenda, Maddalam, and Elathalam (compulsory), Chengila (not very compulsory).
The following are only some examples. 'Kailasa Udharanam' and 'Tapas Attam' are very important attams and these are described at the end. Two of the many references are Kathakali Prakaram, pages 95 to 142 by Pannisheri Nanu Pillai and Kathakaliyile Manodharmangal by Chavara Appukuttan Pillai.
VANA VARNANA: BHIMA IN KALYANA SAUGANDHIKA
Modern man looks at the forest, indeed the birthplace of primates, with a certain wonder and a certain respect. Kathakali characters are no exception.
When Pandavas were living in the forest, one day, a flower, not seen before, wafted by the wind, comes and falls at the feet of Panchali. Exhilarated by its beauty and smell, Panchali asks Bhima to bring her more such flowers. To her pleasure Bhima is ready to go at once. But Panchali asks him what he shall do for food and drink on the way. Bhima thinks and says "Food and Drink! Oh, this side glance (look) of yours. This look of longing. This look of anticipation. The very thought fills me up. I don't need any food and drink at all. Let me go." He takes his mace and off he goes. Ulsaham (enthusiasm) is his Sdhayi Bhavam (permanent feature).
"Let me go at once in search of this flower," says Bhima. "The scented wind is blowing from the southern side. Let me go that way." After walking some distance he sees a huge mountain called Gandhamadana and three ways. He decides to take the middle one which goes over the mountain. After going further "The forest is getting thicker. Big trees, big branches in all directions. The forest looks like a huge dark vessel into which even light can not penetrate. This is my (Bhima's) way. Nothing can hinder me." So saying he pulls down many trees. Sometimes he shatters the trees with his mace. Suddenly he sees an elephant. "Oh! Elephant." He describes it. Its trunk. Sharp ears.
The itching sensation in the body. It takes some mud and throws on the body. Oh good. Then it sucks water and throws on the body. Somewhat better. Slowly it starts dosing even though alert at times. A very huge python is approaching steadily. Suddenly it catches hold of the elephant's hind leg. The elephant wakes up and tries to disengage the python. The python pulls to one side. The elephant kicks and drags to the other side. This goes on for some time. Bhima looks to the other side where a hungry lion is looking for food. It comes running and strikes the elephants head and eats part of the brain and goes off. The python completes the rest. "Oh my god, how ruthless!" says Bhima and proceeds on his way.
UDYANA VARNANA: NALA IN NALACHARITHAM SECOND DAY
Descriptions of gardens are found in most dance forms of India and abroad. These are also common in Kathakali.
Newly married Nala and Damayanthi are walking in the garden. When Nala was lovingly looking at Damayanthi a flower falls on her. Nala is overjoyed and thinks that this is a kindness nature has shown on his wife. Nala says "On seeing the arrival of their queen, the trees and climbers are showing happiness by dropping flowers on you." He tells her, "See that tree. When I used to be alone the tree used to hug the climber and seemingly laugh at my condition." Then he looks at the tree and says, "Dear Tree, look at me now. See how fortunate I am with my beautiful wife."
Both wander about. A bumblebee flies towards Damayanthi. Immediately Nala protects her face with a kerchief. He looks at the bee and then at Damayanthi. He says, "On seeing your face the bee thought it was a flower and came to drink the nectar." Nala and Damayanthi listen to the sounds coming out of the garden. Damayanti says, "It appears that the whole garden is thrilled. The flowers are blooming and smiling. Cuckoos are singing and the bees are dancing. Gentle winds are blowing and rubbing against our bodies. How beautiful the whole garden looks." Then Nala says that the sun is going down and it is time for them to go back and takes her away.
SHABDA VARNANA: HANUMAN IN KALYANA SAUGANDHIKAM
While Bhima goes in search of the flower, here Hanuman is sitting doing Tapas with mind concentrated on Sri Rama.
When he hears the terrible noises made by Bhima in the forest he feels disturbed in doing his Tapas. He thinks "What is the reason for this?" Then the sounds become bigger. "What is this?" He thinks, "The sounds are getting bigger. Such a terrible noise. Is the sea coming up thinking that the time is ripe for the great deluge (Pralaya). Birds are flying helter-skelter. Trees look shocked. Even Kali Yuga is not here. Then what is it? Are mountains quarreling with each other? No, That can't be it. Indra had cut off the wings of mountains so that they don't quarrel. Is the sea changing its position? No it can't be. The sea has promised it will not change its position again. It can't break the promise." Hanuman starts looking for clues. "I see elephants and lions running in fear of somebody. Oh a huge man is coming this way. Oh, a hero is coming. He is pulling out trees and throwing it here and there. Okay. Let him come near, We will see."
THANDEDATTAM: RAVANA IN BALI VADHAM
After his theranottam Ravana is seen sitting on a stool. He says to himself "I am enjoying a lot of happiness. What is the reason for this?" Thinks. "Yes I know it. I did Tapas to Brahma and received all necessary boons. Afterwards I won all ten directions. I also defeated my elder brother Vaishravana. Then I lifted Kailas mountain when Siva and Parvathi were having a misunderstanding. Parvathi got frightened and embraced Siva in fear. Siva was so happy he gave a divine sword called Chandrahasa. Now the whole world is afraid of me. That is why I am enjoying so much happiness." He goes and sits on the stool. He looks far away. "Who is coming from a distance. he is coming fast. Oh, it is Akamba. Okay. Let me find out what news he has for me."
ASHRAMA VARNANA: ARJUNA IN KIRATHAM
Arjuna wants to do Tapas to Lord Siva and he is looking a suitable place in the Himalayan slopes. He comes to place where there is an ashram. Arjuna looks closely at the place. "Oh. What a beautiful place this is. A small river in which a very pure water is flowing. Some hermits are taking baths in the river. Some hermits are standing in the water and doing Tapsas. Some are facing the Sun. Some are standing in between five fires." Arjuna salutes the hermits from far. He says to himself "Look at this young one of a deer. It is looking for its mother. It seems to be hungry and thirsty. Nearby a female tiger is feeding its young ones. The little deer goes towards the tigress and pushes the young tiger cubs aside and starts drinking milk from the tigress. The tigress looks lovingly at the young deer and even licks its body as if it were its own child. How beautiful. How fulfilling."
Again he looks "Here on this side a mongoose and a serpent forgetting their enmity are hugging each other. This place is really strange and made divine by saints and hermits. Let me start my Tapas somewhere nearby."
A sloka called "Shikhini Shalabha" can be selected instead of the above if time permits.
AN ATTAM BASED ON A SLOKA
Sansrit slokas are sometimes shown in mudras and it has a pleasing and exhilarating effect. Different actors use slokas as per his own taste and liking. However, the slokas are taught to students during their training period. An example is given below.
Kusumo Kusumolpatti Shrooyathena Chathushyathe
Bale thava Mukhambuje Pashya Neelolpaladwayam
Meaning a flower blooming inside another flower is not known to history. But, my dear, in your lotus like face are seen two blue Neelolpala flowers (eyes).
A CONVERSATION BASED ON A SLOKA
Sanskrit slokas can also be used to express an intent. One such example is a sloka used by Arjuna addressed to Mathali the charioteer in Kalakeya Vadham. Sloka:
Pitha: Kushalee Mama hritha Bhujaam
Naatha Sachee Vallabha:
Maatha: kim nu Pralomacha Kushalinee
Soonurjayanthasthayo
Preethim va Kushchate Thadikshnavidhow
Cheta Samutkanuthe
Sutha: tvam Radhamashu Chodaya vayam
Dharmadivam Mathala
Meaning: The husband of Indrani and the lord of gods my father - Is he in good health? His son Jayantha - Is he strictly following the commands of his father? Oh, I am impatient to see all of them.
SWARGA VARNANA: ARJUNA IN KELAKEYA VADHAM
Arjuna goes to heaven on the invitation of his father, Indra. After taking permission from Indrani he goes out to see all the places in Swarga. First he sees a building, his father's palace. It is so huge with four entrances. It is made of materials superior to gold and jewels of the world. Then he goes ahead and sees Iravatha. Here he describes it as a huge elephant with four horns. He is afraid to touch it. Then he thinks that animals in Swarga can't be cruel like in the world and so thinking he goes and touches and salutes Iravatha. He describes the churning of the white sea by gods and demons with many details and how Iravatha also came out of the white sea due to this churning.
He walks on and sees his father's (Indra's) horse. It is described as being white and its mane is sizzling like the waves of the white sea from which it came. He touches and salutes the horse also. Then he goes to see the river of the sky (or milky way). He sees many birds by this river and how the birds fly and play is shown.
Then he sees the heavenly ladies. Some are collecting flowers, and one of them comes late and asks for some flowers for making garland. The others refuse. She goes to the Kalpa Vriksha and says "please give me some flowers." Immediately a shower of flowers occurs which she collects in her clothes and goes to make garlands chiding the others. "See... I also got flowers." After this he sees the music and dance of the heavenly ladies. First it starts with the adjustments of instruments Thamburu, Mridangam, Veena. Then the actual music starts along with the striking of cymbals. Then two or three types of dances are shown. Then comes juggling of balls. It is described by a sloka thus:
Ekopi Thraya Iva Bhathi Kandukoyam
Kanthayaa: Karathala Raktharaktha:
Abhrastho Nayanamareechi Neelaneelo
Popular belief is that kathakali is emerged from "Krishnanattam", the dance drama on the life and activities of Lord Krishna created by Sri Manavedan Raja, the Zamorin of Calicut (1585-1658 AD). Once Kottarakkara Thampuran, the Raja of Kottarakkara who was attracted by Krishnanattam requested the Zamorin for the loan of a troupe of performers. Due to the political rivalry between the two, Zamorin did not allow this. So Kottarakkara Thampuran created another art form called Ramanattam which was later transformed into Aattakatha. Krishnanaattam was written in Sanskrit, and Ramanattam was in Malayalam. By the end of 17th century, Attakatha was presented to the world with the title 'Kathakali'. Kathakali also shares a lot of similarities with Krishnanattam, Koodiyattam (a classical Sanskrit drama existing in Kerala) and Ashtapadiyattam (an adaptation of 12th-century musical called Gitagovindam). It also incorporates several other elements from traditional and ritualistic art forms like Mudiyettu, Thiyyattu, Theyyam and Padayani besides a minor share of folk arts like Porattunatakam. All along, the martial art of Kalarippayattu has influenced the body language of Kathakali. The use of Malayalam, the local language (albeit as a mix of Sanskrit and Malayalam, called ), has also helped the literature of Kathakali sound more transparent for the average audience. As a part of modernising, propagating, promoting and popularizing Kathakali, the International Centre for Kathakali at New Delhi has taken up a continuing project since 1980 of producing new plays based on not only traditional and mythological stories, but also historical stories, European classics and Shakespeare's plays. Recently they produced Kathakali plays based on Shakespeare's Othello and Greek-Roman mythology of Psyche and Cupid.
Even though the lyrics/literature would qualify as another independent element called Sahithyam, it is considered as a component of Geetha or music, as it plays only a supplementary role to
Bhumau Talcharana Naghamshu Gaurgaura:
Meaning One ball looks like three balls. When it is in the hands of the juggler, it takes the redness of the hands, when it goes up it takes the blueness of the eyes, when it strikes the ground it becomes white from the whiteness of the leg nails. Once a juggled ball falls down. Then she, the juggler, somehow manages to proceed and remarks "See.. how I can do it".
At one time a garment slips from a lady's body and she adjusts the cloth showing shameful shyness (Lajja). Then the ladies go in for a Kummi dance. As Arjuna was enjoying this dance, suddenly somebody calls him. Arjuna feels scared. "Oh God, where am I?" he says and beats a hasty retreat.
TAPAS ATTAM: RAVANA IN RAVANA ULBHAVAM
[Background: Mali, Sumali and Malyavan were three brothers ruling Sri Lanka. During a war between them and Indra, Indra requested help from Lord Vishnu and as a consequence Lord Vishnu killed Mali. Sumali and Malyavan escaped to Patala. Kaikasi was the daughter of Sumali. She wandered in the forest. She belong three boys through a great sage called Vishravassu. (Vishravassu had an earlier son called Vaishravana who became the richest among all people.) The eldest boy of Kaikasi was Ravana followed by Kumbhakarna and Vibhishana.]
SCENE 1
When Ravana was a young boy (Kutti Ravana vesham), one day he was sleeping on his mothers lap in a place called madhuvanam. At that time Kaikasi sees Vaishravana flying overhead in his vimana (mythical aeroplane). She thinks “Oh, that is Vaishravana, technically a brother of my son who is sleeping on my lap. He is rich and strong. My son is so poor and weak. While thinking thus a drop of tear from her eyes drops on Ravana’s face. Ravana suddenly wakes up and sees his mother crying. When he knew the reason he could not bear it. He says he is going to do tapas to Brahma to get boons so that he will be strong and rich.
SCENE 2
(The tapas itself is shown as a part of autobiographical narration of adult ravana)
Ravana (adult Ravana, not kutti Ravana) is sitting on a stool. He thinks “Why am I so happy? How did I become so rich and strong? Oh yes. It is because of the tapas I did. What made me do the tapas? When I was a young boy, one day I was sleeping on my mother’s lap in a place called Madhuvanam. A drop of tear from her eyes falls on my face. I asked her why she was crying. She said she saw Vaishravana flying overhead in his vimana (plane). She told me Vaishravan was a brother of mine now flying in a plane. He is rich and strong. I am so poor and weak. When I heard this comparison between me and my brother, I could not bear it. I am going to do tapas to Brahma to get boons so that I will be strong and rich.
I made five different types of fires (while doing tapas gods are approached through Agni the god of fire). Then I started my tapas. I asked my brothers to stand guard and also keep the fires burning. Then I fully concentrated on tapas. Time passed but Brahma did not appear. I looked. Why is Brahma not appearing? I doubled my concentration. Time passed. Brahma is not appearing. Still not appearing? I cut one of my heads and put it in the fire. Waited, Brahma did not come. One more head rolls. Still no Brahma comes. Heads roll and roll. No Brahma. Only one head is left. First I thought of stopping my tapas. But no! Never! That will be an insult to me and my family. It is better to die than stop. Also when I die Brahma will be judged as being partial. With great determination I swung the sword at my last neck, when, lo and behold, suddenly Brahma appeared and caught my hand. I looked at him with still un-subsided, but gradually subsiding anger. Brahma asked me what boons I wanted. I asked for a boon that I should win all the worlds and have all the wealth and fame and that I should not be killed except by man. I also asked him to give boons for my brothers.
In the next scene Ravana asks Kumbhakarna and Vibhishana what boons they got. Unfortunately Kumbhakarna’s tongue got twisted while asking for boon and he got ‘sleep’ instead of becoming the ‘king of gods’. Ravana laughed it off. As for Vibhishana, he being a bhaktha of Vishnu, asked for Vishnu’s blessings and got it. Ravana laughs it off and also decides to conquer all the worlds and starts preparing his grand army for the big conquest of the worlds.
[This method of presentation with a peculiar sequence has a tremendous dramatic affect. The main actor redoes a small part of what happened to kutti Ravana vesham, and this gives a view of the high contrast between the boy and the man Ravana. Similarly the presence of Kumbhakarna and Vibhishana in the subsequent scene offers a good smile on the face of the viewer at the end of the play.]
KAILASA UDDHARANAM: RAVANA IN BALI VIJAYAM
[Background and Previous scene: After receiving the boons, and widening his kingdom in all directions, Ravana lives in Sri Lanka with great pomp and splendor. One day he sees Saint Narada approaching his palace singing songs in praise of him ‘Jaya jaya Ravana, Lanka Pathe’. Happily he receives Narada and seats him next to him. After telling Narada about the victory of his son Indrajith on Indra, Ravana tells Narada “Now there is nobody on earth or other worlds who can fight with me”. To this Narada replies “ Very true indeed, but there is one huge monkey called Bali who says he can defeat you. He even said that you are just like a blade of grass to him. Well let him say what he wants. You are unbeatable.” Then Narada says ‘let us go there and see him’. Both decide to go. But Ravana takes his famous sword called “Chandrahasam”. Then Narada asks the history of this sword. Ravana’s Attam Starts.]
Ravana says “I received this sword from Lord Siva. It happened thus. Once when I was conquering new places and expanding my empire I happened to be going across the Kailasa mountain. The plane got stuck on the mountain unable to move forward. I got down from the plane and looked at the mountain. (Looks from one end to the other first horizontally and then vertically.) So huge it was. Then I decided to lift it with my bare hand and keep it aside and move forward. I started sticking my hands under it one by one. Then I tried to lift it. It doesn’t move. I put more force and more force. It moved just a bit. I pushed harder and harder, slowly it started moving then again and again and it moved easily. Then I lifted it up with my hands and started juggling it (exaggeration evident).
“At that particular time Lord Siva was quarreling with his wife Parvathi. Why did they fight? The story is as follows. Parvathi had gone for enjoying swimming and bathing in some beautiful pond. At that time Siva opened his jata (disheveled long hair) and called Ganga for some entertainment after asking Ganapathi and Subramania to go for some errands. Somehow becoming suspicious, right at that time, Parvathi came back in a hurry with wet clothes and saw Siva with Ganga. Siva was wondering what to do and it was at that time that Ravana started lifting the Kailasa. When Kailasa started shaking Parvathi got scared and ran to Siva and hugged him. So the quarrel ended and Siva was happy. “As a reward Siva called me and gave me this famous Chandrahasa sword.”
Then Narada and Ravana leave to meet Bali. Ravana wanted to take the sword along with him, but Narada suggested that the sword is not required for teaching a lesson to Bali who is after all an unarmed monkey.
WIKIPEDIA
Ahi weaves precise slashes and pyroclastic strikes to form his unique eruptive fighting style, leaving only ash and obsidian in his wake.
Made some changes to Ahi. The shins have been replaced to be more sleek, and some of the torso colors have been changed to be less messy. Also, the sword blade is the correct color. The leg articulation is a lot better in this version, so he can actually pull off some neat poses.
Renamed the Burlington Bay James N. Allan Skyway Bridge to be precise(I use the locals' original name "Skyway").
This bridge is a rare surviving example in Canada of a suspended deck truss bridge. The suspended deck variety of truss has the appearance of a though arch bridge, but functions as a arch-shaped continuous through truss. The arch shape of the truss takes the truss far above the height of the deck at the center of the span, and thus the deck must be connected to this section of the truss by hangers, which is the suspended deck portion of the bridge. A high level bridge that allows freighters to pass under the fixed bridge, this bridge has a very long approach system of deck truss and deck girder spans.
The bridge has a number of unusual details. The approach spans are unusual because they include a series of spans that are supported by two alternating types of supports: traditional concrete piers and unusual riveted steel piers. It is unclear why two different supports were used. The bridge also has unusual trussed floor beams. Floor beams are more commonly solid rolled or built-up i-beams. The trussed floor beams give the underside of the bridge a unique geometric complexity.
The bridge's channel span is 495 feet (150.9 meters) while the anchor spans on either side are 275 feet (83.8 meters).
John Turner Bell was a noted Hamilton architect who assisted in the design of this bridge. The famous Philip Louis Pratley was the consulting engineer for the bridge, although he died in 1958, the year this bridge was completed.
For such a major bridge, very little online information about the history of this bridge is available. HistoricBridges.org hopes to expand this article with additional information in the future.
In 1985, this bridge was turned into part of a one way couplet of bridges with the construction of a second high level bridge at this location. Now, the heritage bridge carries traffic toward Toronto while the new bridge carries traffic toward the Niagara Region. The construction of this second bridge is sometimes described as the "twinning" of the bridge. Such a statement is highly inaccurate and misleading however. The replacement bridge is one of the ugliest bridges ever encountered, with the appearance of little more than a slab of concrete. Visually, the second bridge only serves to obstruct the view of the heritage bridge. Absolutely no attempt appears to have been made to make the second bridge compliment the heritage bridge. The second bridge is useful however as a "teaching tool" to describe how most post 1970 bridges lack aesthetics or beauty of any kind, while unaltered pre-1970 bridges usually include at least some level of aesthetic quality.
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Precise work with my glasses off, not only to get the thread through the needle, but to have and keep the focus on the needle and my eye behind it as well.
Manual focus appeared the best option here, and I measured the distance between lens and needle for each shot. Many shots were still out of focus but some succeeded.
ODC - Theme (13-10-2012): Eyes
Created in the 1930s and redeveloped in more recent years to include artist-designed ornamental gardens, events area, play area with splash pad, Café and toilets. Grassed areas and riverside walks for quiet relaxation, picnics and kite flying or more vigorous pursuits such as running and cycling.
Chester-le-Street is a market town in the County Durham district, in the ceremonial county of Durham, England. It is located around 6 miles (10 kilometres) north of Durham and is also close to Newcastle upon Tyne. The town holds markets on Tuesdays, Fridays and Saturdays. In 2011, it had a population of 24,227.
The town's history is ancient; records date to a Roman-built fort called Concangis. The Roman fort is the Chester (from the Latin castra) of the town's name; the Street refers to the paved Roman road that ran north–south through the town, now the route called Front Street. The parish church of St Mary and St Cuthbert is where the body of Anglo-Saxon St Cuthbert remained for 112 years before being transferred to Durham Cathedral and site of the first Gospels translation into English, Aldred writing the Old English gloss between the lines of the Lindisfarne Gospels there.
The Romans founded a fort named Concangis or Concagium, which was a Latinisation of the original Celtic name for the area, which also gave name to the waterway through the town, Cong Burn. The precise name is uncertain as it does not appear in Roman records, but Concangis is the name most cited today. Although a meaning "Place of the horse people" has been given, scholarly authorities consider the meaning of the name obscure.
Old English forms of the name include Cuneceastra and Conceastre, which takes its first two syllables from the Roman name, with the addition of the Old English word ceaster 'Roman fortification' The Universal etymological English dictionary of 1749 gives the town as Chester upon Street (and describes it as "a Village in the Bishoprick of Durham"). At some point this was shortened to the modern form.
There is evidence of Iron Age use of the River Wear near the town, but the history of Chester-le-Street starts with the Roman fort of Concangis. This was built alongside the Roman road Cade's Road (now Front Street) and close to the River Wear, around 100 A.D., and was occupied until the Romans left Britain in 410 A.D. At the time, the Wear was navigable to at least Concangis and may also have provided food for the garrisons stationed there.
After the Romans left, there is no record of who lived there (apart from some wounded soldiers from wars who had to live there), until 883 when a group of monks, driven out of Lindisfarne seven years earlier, stopped there to build a wooden shrine and church to St Cuthbert, whose body they had borne with them. While they were there, the town was the centre of Christianity for much of the north-east because it was the seat of the Bishop of Lindisfarne, making the church a cathedral. There the monks translated into English the Lindisfarne Gospels, which they had brought with them. They stayed for 112 years, leaving in 995 for the safer and more permanent home at Durham. The title has been revived as the Roman Catholic titular see of Cuncacestre.
The church was rebuilt in stone in 1054 and, despite the loss of its bishopric, seems to have retained a degree of wealth and influence. In 1080, most of the huts in the town were burned and many people killed in retaliation for the death of William Walcher, the first prince-bishop, at the hands of an English mob. After this devastation wrought by the Normans the region was left out of the Domesday Book of 1086; there was little left to record and the region was by then being run from Durham by the prince-bishops, so held little interest for London.
Cade's Road did not fall out of use but was hidden beneath later roads which became the Great North Road, the main route from London and the south to Newcastle and Edinburgh. The town's location on the road played a significant role in its development, as well as its name, as inns sprang up to cater for the travelling trade: both riders and horses needed to rest on journeys usually taking days to complete. This trade reached a peak in the early 19th century as more and more people and new mail services were carried by stagecoach, before falling off with the coming of the railways. The town was bypassed when the A167 was routed around the town and this was later supplanted by the faster A1(M).
The coal industry also left its mark on the town. From the late 17th century onwards, coal was dug in increasing quantities in the region. Mining was centred around the rivers, for transportation by sea to other parts of the country, and Chester-le-Street was at the centre of the coal being dug and shipped away down the Wear, so a centre of coal related communication and commerce. At the same time, the growth of the mines and the influx of miners supported local businesses, not just the many inns but new shops and services, themselves bringing in more people to work in them. These people would later work in new industries established in the town to take advantage of its good communications and access to raw materials.
One of the most tragic episodes in the town's history and that of the coal industry in NE England occurred during a miners' strike during the winter of 1811/12. Collieries owned by the Dean and Chapter of Durham Cathedral were brought to a standstill by the strike, causing much hardship amongst the people of the town. The strike was broken on New Year's Day, 1 January 1812, when the Bishop of Durham, Shute Barrington, sent a detachment of troops from Durham Castle to force a return to work. It is thought that this uncharacteristic act by Barrington was due to pressure from the national government in Westminster who were concerned that the strike was affecting industrial output of essential armaments for the Napoleonic Wars.
On the evening of 5 October 1936, the Jarrow Marchers stopped at the town centre after their first day's walk. The church hall was used to house them before they continued onward the following day.
From 1894 until 2009, local government districts were governed from the town. From 1894 to 1974, it had a rural district, which covered the town and outlying villages. In 1909, the inner rural district formed an urban district, which covered the town as it was at that time.
By 1974, the town expanded out of the urban district, during that year's reforms the urban and rural districts, as well as other areas formed a non-metropolitan district. It was abolished in 2009 reforms when the non-metropolitan county became a unitary authority.
The town has a mild climate and gets well below average rainfall relative to the UK. It does though experience occasional floods. To the east of the town lies the Riverside cricket ground and Riverside Park. They were built on the flood plains of the River Wear, and are often flooded when the river bursts its banks. The town centre is subject to occasional flash flooding, usually after very heavy rain over the town and surrounding areas, if the rain falls too quickly for it to be drained away by Cong Burn. The flooding occurs at the bottom of Front Street where the Cong Burn passes under the street, after it was enclosed in concrete in 1932.
Chester-le-Street's landmarks
A brick-red, elliptically curved arch, twice as wide as it is high, over an open area with a brick-red surface
Front of a three-storey building, six windows across, with a large-framed wood door at ground level and a painted sign with the words "THE QUEENS HEAD"
Square castle with square tower
A large railway viaduct made from red bricks, topped by railings and electric pylons
The general Post Office, the marketplace with the former Civic Heart sculpture (now demolished), the Queens Head Hotel on Front Street, Lumley Castle and Chester Burn viaduct
John Leland described Chester-le-Street in the 1530s as "Chiefly one main street of very mean building in height.", a sentiment echoed by Daniel Defoe.
The viaduct to the northwest of the town centre was completed in 1868 for the North Eastern Railway, to enable trains to travel at high speed on a more direct route between Newcastle and Durham. It is over 230m long with 11 arches, now spanning a road and supermarket car-park, and is a Grade II listed structure.
Lumley Castle was built in 1389. It is on the eastern bank of the River Wear and overlooks the town and the Riverside Park.
The Queens Head Hotel is located in the central area of the Front Street. It was built over 250 years ago when Front Street formed part of the main route from Edinburgh and Newcastle to London and the south of England. A Grade II listed building, it is set back from the street and is still one of the largest buildings in the town centre.
Chester-le-Street Post Office at 137 Front Street is in Art Deco style and replaced a smaller building located on the corner of Relton Terrace and Ivanhoe Terrace. It opened in 1936 and is unusual in that it is one of a handful[30] of post offices that display the royal cypher from the brief reign of Edward VIII.
Main article: St Mary and St Cuthbert, Chester-le-Street
St Mary and St Cuthbert church possesses a rare surviving anchorage, one of the best-preserved in the country. It was built for an anchorite, an extreme form of hermit. His or her walled-up cell had only a slit to observe the altar and an opening for food, while outside was an open grave for when the occupant died. It was occupied by six anchorites from 1383 to c. 1538, and is now a museum known as the Anker's House. The north aisle is occupied by a line of Lumley family effigies, only five genuine, assembled circa 1590. Some have been chopped off to fit and resemble a casualty station at Agincourt, according to Sir Simon Jenkins in his England's Thousand Best Churches. This and Lumley Castle are Chester-le-Street's only Grade I listed buildings.
The Bethel United Reformed church on Low Chare
The small United Reformed Church on Low Chare, just off the main Front Street, was built in 1814 as the Bethel Congregational Chapel and remodelled in 1860. It is still in use and is a Grade II listed building.
The Riverside Ground, known for sponsorship reasons as the Seat Unique Riverside, is home to Durham County Cricket Club which became a first class county in 1992. Since 1999, the ground has hosted many international fixtures, usually involving the England cricket team. The ground was also host to two fixtures at the 1999 Cricket World Cup, and three fixtures at the 2019 Cricket World Cup. The town also has its own cricket club, Chester-le-Street Cricket Club based at the Ropery Lane ground. They are the current Champions of the North East Premier League, won the national ECB 45 over tournament in 2009 and reached the quarter-final of the national 20/20 club championship in 2009.
Chester-le-Street Amateur Rowing Club is based on the River Wear near the Riverside cricket ground and has been there for over 100 years. During the summer months the club operate mainly on the river, but in the winter move to indoor sessions during the evenings and use the river at weekends.
The club has over 160 members of which 90 are junior members, with numbers increasing annually. The club are well thought of by British Rowing as a lead club for junior development with many juniors now competing at GB level, and some competing for GB at international events.
Medieval football was once played in the town. The game was played annually on Shrove Tuesday between the "Upstreeters" and "Downstreeters". Play started at 1 pm and finished at 6 pm. To start the game, the ball was thrown from a window in the centre of the town and in one game more than 400 players took part. The centre of the street was the dividing line and the winner was the side where the ball was (Up or Down) at 6 pm. It was played from the Middle Ages until 1932, when it was outlawed by the police and people trying to carry on the tradition were arrested. Chester-le-Street United F.C. were founded in 2020 and compete in the Northern Football League Division Two. In the 2022/23 season they finished above their local rivals Chester-le-Street Town F.C. who were founded in 1972 and compete in the Northern Football League Division Two and based just outside Chester-le-street in Chester Moor.
Chester-le-Street railway station is a stop on the East Coast Main Line of the National Rail network between Newcastle and Durham; it opened in 1868. The station is served by two train operating companies:
TransPennine Express provides services between Liverpool Lime Street, Manchester Piccadilly, Leeds, York, Durham and Newcastle;
Northern Trains runs a limited service in early mornings and evenings; destinations include Newcastle, Carlisle and Darlington.
The station is managed by Northern Trains.
The town is mentioned in the 1963 song "Slow Train" by Flanders and Swann:
No churns, no porter, no cat on a seat,
At Chorlton-cum-Hardy or Chester-le-Street.
Chester-le-Street's bus services are operated primarily by Go North East and Arriva North East; routes connect the town with Newcastle, Durham, Middlesbrough and Seaham.
The town is the original home of The Northern General Transport Company, which has since grown into Go North East; it operated from the Picktree Lane Depot until 2023 when it was demolished. It also pioneered the use of Minilink bus services in the North East in 1985.
Front Street first carried the A1 road, between London and Edinburgh, through the town. A bypass was built in the 1950s, which still exists today as the A167. The bypass road itself was partly bypassed by, and partly incorporated in, the A1(M) motorway in the 1970s.
The northern end of Front Street was once the start of the A6127, which is the road that would continue through Birtley, Gateshead and eventually over the Tyne Bridge; it become the A6127(M) central motorway in Newcastle upon Tyne. However, when the Gateshead-Newcastle Western Bypass of the A1(M) was opened, many roads in this area were renumbered; they followed the convention that roads originating between single digit A roads take their first digit from the single digit A road in an anticlockwise direction from their point of origin. Newcastle Road, which was formerly designated A1, is now unclassified. The A6127 was renamed the A167. Car traffic is now banned from the northern part of Front Street and it is restricted to buses, cyclists and delivery vehicles.
Education
Primary schools
Cestria Primary School
Bullion Lane Primary School
Woodlea Primary School
Lumley Junior and Infant School
Newker Primary School
Red Rose Primary School
Chester-le-Street CE Primary School
St Cuthbert's RCVA Primary School
Secondary schools
Park View School
Hermitage Academy
Notable people
Michael Barron, footballer
Aidan Chambers, children's author, Carnegie Medal and Hans Christian Andersen Award winner
William Browell Charlton, trade union leader, Durham County Colliery Enginemen's Association, National Federation of Colliery Enginemen and Boiler Firemen
Ellie Crisell, journalist and television presenter
Ronnie Dodd, footballer
Danny Graham, footballer
Andrew Hayden-Smith, actor and presenter
Grant Leadbitter, footballer
Sheila Mackie, artist
Jock Purdon, folk singer and poet
Adam Reach, footballer
Bryan Robson, former England football captain, and his brothers Justin and Gary, also footballers
Gavin Sutherland, conductor and pianist
Colin Todd, football manager and former England international player
Olga and Betty Turnbull, child entertainers of the 1930s who performed for royalty
Kevin "Geordie" Walker, guitarist of post-punk group Killing Joke
Peter Ward, footballer
Bruce Welch of pop group The Shadows
It is twinned with:
Germany Kamp-Lintfort in Germany.
County Durham, officially simply Durham is a ceremonial county in North East England. The county borders Northumberland and Tyne and Wear to the north, the North Sea to the east, North Yorkshire to the south, and Cumbria to the west. The largest settlement is Darlington, and the county town is the city of Durham.
The county has an area of 2,721 km2 (1,051 sq mi) and a population of 866,846. The latter is concentrated in the east; the south-east is part of the Teesside built-up area, which extends into North Yorkshire. After Darlington (92,363), the largest settlements are Hartlepool (88,855), Stockton-on-Tees (82,729), and Durham (48,069). For local government purposes the county comprises three unitary authority areas—County Durham, Darlington, and Hartlepool—and part of a fourth, Stockton-on-Tees. The county historically included the part of Tyne and Wear south of the River Tyne, and excluded the part of County Durham south of the River Tees.
The west of the county contains part of the North Pennines uplands, a national landscape. The hills are the source of the rivers Tees and Wear, which flow east and form the valleys of Teesdale and Weardale respectively. The east of the county is flatter, and contains by rolling hills through which the two rivers meander; the Tees forms the boundary with North Yorkshire in its lower reaches, and the Wear exits the county near Chester-le-Street in the north-east. The county's coast is a site of special scientific interest characterised by tall limestone and dolomite cliffs.
What is now County Durham was on the border of Roman Britain, and contains survivals of this era at sites such as Binchester Roman Fort. In the Anglo-Saxon period the region was part of the Kingdom of Northumbria. In 995 the city of Durham was founded by monks seeking a place safe from Viking raids to house the relics of St Cuthbert. Durham Cathedral was rebuilt after the Norman Conquest, and together with Durham Castle is now a World Heritage Site. By the late Middle Ages the county was governed semi-independently by the bishops of Durham and was also a buffer zone between England and Scotland. County Durham became heavily industrialised in the nineteenth century, when many collieries opened on the Durham coalfield. The Stockton and Darlington Railway, the world's first public railway to use steam locomotives, opened in 1825. Most collieries closed during the last quarter of the twentieth century, but the county's coal mining heritage is remembered in the annual Durham Miners' Gala.
Remains of Prehistoric Durham include a number of Neolithic earthworks.
The Crawley Edge Cairns and Heathery Burn Cave are Bronze Age sites. Maiden Castle, Durham is an Iron Age site.
Brigantia, the land of the Brigantes, is said to have included what is now County Durham.
There are archaeological remains of Roman Durham. Dere Street and Cade's Road run through what is now County Durham. There were Roman forts at Concangis (Chester-le-Street), Lavatrae (Bowes), Longovicium (Lanchester), Piercebridge (Morbium), Vindomora (Ebchester) and Vinovium (Binchester). (The Roman fort at Arbeia (South Shields) is within the former boundaries of County Durham.) A Romanised farmstead has been excavated at Old Durham.
Remains of the Anglo-Saxon period include a number of sculpted stones and sundials, the Legs Cross, the Rey Cross and St Cuthbert's coffin.
Around AD 547, an Angle named Ida founded the kingdom of Bernicia after spotting the defensive potential of a large rock at Bamburgh, upon which many a fortification was thenceforth built. Ida was able to forge, hold and consolidate the kingdom; although the native British tried to take back their land, the Angles triumphed and the kingdom endured.
In AD 604, Ida's grandson Æthelfrith forcibly merged Bernicia (ruled from Bamburgh) and Deira (ruled from York, which was known as Eforwic at the time) to create the Kingdom of Northumbria. In time, the realm was expanded, primarily through warfare and conquest; at its height, the kingdom stretched from the River Humber (from which the kingdom drew its name) to the Forth. Eventually, factional fighting and the rejuvenated strength of neighbouring kingdoms, most notably Mercia, led to Northumbria's decline. The arrival of the Vikings hastened this decline, and the Scandinavian raiders eventually claimed the Deiran part of the kingdom in AD 867 (which became Jórvík). The land that would become County Durham now sat on the border with the Great Heathen Army, a border which today still (albeit with some adjustments over the years) forms the boundaries between Yorkshire and County Durham.
Despite their success south of the river Tees, the Vikings never fully conquered the Bernician part of Northumbria, despite the many raids they had carried out on the kingdom. However, Viking control over the Danelaw, the central belt of Anglo-Saxon territory, resulted in Northumbria becoming isolated from the rest of Anglo-Saxon Britain. Scots invasions in the north pushed the kingdom's northern boundary back to the River Tweed, and the kingdom found itself reduced to a dependent earldom, its boundaries very close to those of modern-day Northumberland and County Durham. The kingdom was annexed into England in AD 954.
In AD 995, St Cuthbert's community, who had been transporting Cuthbert's remains around, partly in an attempt to avoid them falling into the hands of Viking raiders, settled at Dunholm (Durham) on a site that was defensively favourable due to the horseshoe-like path of the River Wear. St Cuthbert's remains were placed in a shrine in the White Church, which was originally a wooden structure but was eventually fortified into a stone building.
Once the City of Durham had been founded, the Bishops of Durham gradually acquired the lands that would become County Durham. Bishop Aldhun began this process by procuring land in the Tees and Wear valleys, including Norton, Stockton, Escomb and Aucklandshire in 1018. In 1031, King Canute gave Staindrop to the Bishops. This territory continued to expand, and was eventually given the status of a liberty. Under the control of the Bishops of Durham, the land had various names: the "Liberty of Durham", "Liberty of St Cuthbert's Land" "the lands of St Cuthbert between Tyne and Tees" or "the Liberty of Haliwerfolc" (holy Wear folk).
The bishops' special jurisdiction rested on claims that King Ecgfrith of Northumbria had granted a substantial territory to St Cuthbert on his election to the see of Lindisfarne in 684. In about 883 a cathedral housing the saint's remains was established at Chester-le-Street and Guthfrith, King of York granted the community of St Cuthbert the area between the Tyne and the Wear, before the community reached its final destination in 995, in Durham.
Following the Norman invasion, the administrative machinery of government extended only slowly into northern England. Northumberland's first recorded Sheriff was Gilebert from 1076 until 1080 and a 12th-century record records Durham regarded as within the shire. However the bishops disputed the authority of the sheriff of Northumberland and his officials, despite the second sheriff for example being the reputed slayer of Malcolm Canmore, King of Scots. The crown regarded Durham as falling within Northumberland until the late thirteenth century.
Following the Battle of Hastings, William the Conqueror appointed Copsig as Earl of Northumbria, thereby bringing what would become County Durham under Copsig's control. Copsig was, just a few weeks later, killed in Newburn. Having already being previously offended by the appointment of a non-Northumbrian as Bishop of Durham in 1042, the people of the region became increasingly rebellious. In response, in January 1069, William despatched a large Norman army, under the command of Robert de Comines, to Durham City. The army, believed to consist of 700 cavalry (about one-third of the number of Norman knights who had participated in the Battle of Hastings), entered the city, whereupon they were attacked, and defeated, by a Northumbrian assault force. The Northumbrians wiped out the entire Norman army, including Comines, all except for one survivor, who was allowed to take the news of this defeat back.
Following the Norman slaughter at the hands of the Northumbrians, resistance to Norman rule spread throughout Northern England, including a similar uprising in York. William The Conqueror subsequently (and successfully) attempted to halt the northern rebellions by unleashing the notorious Harrying of the North (1069–1070). Because William's main focus during the harrying was on Yorkshire, County Durham was largely spared the Harrying.
Anglo-Norman Durham refers to the Anglo-Norman period, during which Durham Cathedral was built.
Matters regarding the bishopric of Durham came to a head in 1293 when the bishop and his steward failed to attend proceedings of quo warranto held by the justices of Northumberland. The bishop's case went before parliament, where he stated that Durham lay outside the bounds of any English shire and that "from time immemorial it had been widely known that the sheriff of Northumberland was not sheriff of Durham nor entered within that liberty as sheriff. . . nor made there proclamations or attachments". The arguments appear to have prevailed, as by the fourteenth century Durham was accepted as a liberty which received royal mandates direct. In effect it was a private shire, with the bishop appointing his own sheriff. The area eventually became known as the "County Palatine of Durham".
Sadberge was a liberty, sometimes referred to as a county, within Northumberland. In 1189 it was purchased for the see but continued with a separate sheriff, coroner and court of pleas. In the 14th century Sadberge was included in Stockton ward and was itself divided into two wards. The division into the four wards of Chester-le-Street, Darlington, Easington and Stockton existed in the 13th century, each ward having its own coroner and a three-weekly court corresponding to the hundred court. The diocese was divided into the archdeaconries of Durham and Northumberland. The former is mentioned in 1072, and in 1291 included the deaneries of Chester-le-Street, Auckland, Lanchester and Darlington.
The term palatinus is applied to the bishop in 1293, and from the 13th century onwards the bishops frequently claimed the same rights in their lands as the king enjoyed in his kingdom.
The historic boundaries of County Durham included a main body covering the catchment of the Pennines in the west, the River Tees in the south, the North Sea in the east and the Rivers Tyne and Derwent in the north. The county palatinate also had a number of liberties: the Bedlingtonshire, Islandshire and Norhamshire exclaves within Northumberland, and the Craikshire exclave within the North Riding of Yorkshire. In 1831 the county covered an area of 679,530 acres (2,750.0 km2) and had a population of 253,910. These exclaves were included as part of the county for parliamentary electoral purposes until 1832, and for judicial and local-government purposes until the coming into force of the Counties (Detached Parts) Act 1844, which merged most remaining exclaves with their surrounding county. The boundaries of the county proper remained in use for administrative and ceremonial purposes until the Local Government Act 1972.
Boldon Book (1183 or 1184) is a polyptichum for the Bishopric of Durham.
Until the 15th century, the most important administrative officer in the Palatinate was the steward. Other officers included the sheriff, the coroners, the Chamberlain and the chancellor. The palatine exchequer originated in the 12th century. The palatine assembly represented the whole county, and dealt chiefly with fiscal questions. The bishop's council, consisting of the clergy, the sheriff and the barons, regulated judicial affairs, and later produced the Chancery and the courts of Admiralty and Marshalsea.
The prior of Durham ranked first among the bishop's barons. He had his own court, and almost exclusive jurisdiction over his men. A UNESCO site describes the role of the Prince-Bishops in Durham, the "buffer state between England and Scotland":
From 1075, the Bishop of Durham became a Prince-Bishop, with the right to raise an army, mint his own coins, and levy taxes. As long as he remained loyal to the king of England, he could govern as a virtually autonomous ruler, reaping the revenue from his territory, but also remaining mindful of his role of protecting England’s northern frontier.
A report states that the Bishops also had the authority to appoint judges and barons and to offer pardons.
There were ten palatinate barons in the 12th century, most importantly the Hyltons of Hylton Castle, the Bulmers of Brancepeth, the Conyers of Sockburne, the Hansards of Evenwood, and the Lumleys of Lumley Castle. The Nevilles owned large estates in the county. John Neville, 3rd Baron Neville de Raby rebuilt Raby Castle, their principal seat, in 1377.
Edward I's quo warranto proceedings of 1293 showed twelve lords enjoying more or less extensive franchises under the bishop. The repeated efforts of the Crown to check the powers of the palatinate bishops culminated in 1536 in the Act of Resumption, which deprived the bishop of the power to pardon offences against the law or to appoint judicial officers. Moreover, indictments and legal processes were in future to run in the name of the king, and offences to be described as against the peace of the king, rather than that of the bishop. In 1596 restrictions were imposed on the powers of the chancery, and in 1646 the palatinate was formally abolished. It was revived, however, after the Restoration, and continued with much the same power until 5 July 1836, when the Durham (County Palatine) Act 1836 provided that the palatine jurisdiction should in future be vested in the Crown.
During the 15th-century Wars of the Roses, Henry VI passed through Durham. On the outbreak of the Great Rebellion in 1642 Durham inclined to support the cause of Parliament, and in 1640 the high sheriff of the palatinate guaranteed to supply the Scottish army with provisions during their stay in the county. In 1642 the Earl of Newcastle formed the western counties into an association for the King's service, but in 1644 the palatinate was again overrun by a Scottish army, and after the Battle of Marston Moor (2 July 1644) fell entirely into the hands of Parliament.
In 1614, a Bill was introduced in Parliament for securing representation to the county and city of Durham and the borough of Barnard Castle. The bishop strongly opposed the proposal as an infringement of his palatinate rights, and the county was first summoned to return members to Parliament in 1654. After the Restoration of 1660 the county and city returned two members each. In the wake of the Reform Act of 1832 the county returned two members for two divisions, and the boroughs of Gateshead, South Shields and Sunderland acquired representation. The bishops lost their secular powers in 1836. The boroughs of Darlington, Stockton and Hartlepool returned one member each from 1868 until the Redistribution of Seats Act 1885.
The Municipal Corporations Act 1835 reformed the municipal boroughs of Durham, Stockton on Tees and Sunderland. In 1875, Jarrow was incorporated as a municipal borough, as was West Hartlepool in 1887. At a county level, the Local Government Act 1888 reorganised local government throughout England and Wales. Most of the county came under control of the newly formed Durham County Council in an area known as an administrative county. Not included were the county boroughs of Gateshead, South Shields and Sunderland. However, for purposes other than local government, the administrative county of Durham and the county boroughs continued to form a single county to which the Crown appointed a Lord Lieutenant of Durham.
Over its existence, the administrative county lost territory, both to the existing county boroughs, and because two municipal boroughs became county boroughs: West Hartlepool in 1902 and Darlington in 1915. The county boundary with the North Riding of Yorkshire was adjusted in 1967: that part of the town of Barnard Castle historically in Yorkshire was added to County Durham, while the administrative county ceded the portion of the Borough of Stockton-on-Tees in Durham to the North Riding. In 1968, following the recommendation of the Local Government Commission, Billingham was transferred to the County Borough of Teesside, in the North Riding. In 1971, the population of the county—including all associated county boroughs (an area of 2,570 km2 (990 sq mi))—was 1,409,633, with a population outside the county boroughs of 814,396.
In 1974, the Local Government Act 1972 abolished the administrative county and the county boroughs, reconstituting County Durham as a non-metropolitan county. The reconstituted County Durham lost territory to the north-east (around Gateshead, South Shields and Sunderland) to Tyne and Wear and to the south-east (around Hartlepool) to Cleveland. At the same time it gained the former area of Startforth Rural District from the North Riding of Yorkshire. The area of the Lord Lieutenancy of Durham was also adjusted by the Act to coincide with the non-metropolitan county (which occupied 3,019 km2 (1,166 sq mi) in 1981).
In 1996, as part of 1990s UK local government reform by Lieutenancies Act 1997, Cleveland was abolished. Its districts were reconstituted as unitary authorities. Hartlepool and Stockton-on-Tees (north Tees) were returned to the county for the purposes of Lord Lieutenancy. Darlington also became a third unitary authority of the county. The Royal Mail abandoned the use of postal counties altogether, permitted but not mandatory being at a writer wishes.
As part of the 2009 structural changes to local government in England initiated by the Department for Communities and Local Government, the seven district councils within the County Council area were abolished. The County Council assumed their functions and became the fourth unitary authority. Changes came into effect on 1 April 2009.
On 15 April 2014, North East Combined Authority was established under the Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Act 2009 with powers over economic development and regeneration. In November 2018, Newcastle City Council, North Tyneside Borough Council, and Northumberland County Council left the authority. These later formed the North of Tyne Combined Authority.
In May 2021, four parish councils of the villages of Elwick, Hart, Dalton Piercy and Greatham all issued individual votes of no confidence in Hartlepool Borough Council, and expressed their desire to join the County Durham district.
In October 2021, County Durham was shortlisted for the UK City of Culture 2025. In May 2022, it lost to Bradford.
Eighteenth century Durham saw the appearance of dissent in the county and the Durham Ox. The county did not assist the Jacobite Rebellion of 1715. The Statue of Neptune in the City of Durham was erected in 1729.
A number of disasters happened in Nineteenth century Durham. The Felling mine disasters happened in 1812, 1813, 1821 and 1847. The Philadelphia train accident happened in 1815. In 1854, there was a great fire in Gateshead. One of the West Stanley Pit disasters happened in 1882. The Victoria Hall disaster happened in 1883.
One of the West Stanley Pit disasters happened in 1909. The Darlington rail crash happened in 1928. The Battle of Stockton happened in 1933. The Browney rail crash happened in 1946.
The First Treaty of Durham was made at Durham in 1136. The Second Treaty of Durham was made at Durham in 1139.
The county regiment was the Durham Light Infantry, which replaced, in particular, the 68th (Durham) Regiment of Foot (Light Infantry) and the Militia and Volunteers of County Durham.
RAF Greatham, RAF Middleton St George and RAF Usworth were located in County Durham.
David I, the King of Scotland, invaded the county in 1136, and ravaged much of the county 1138. In 17 October 1346, the Battle of Neville's Cross was fought at Neville's Cross, near the city of Durham. On 16 December 1914, during the First World War, there was a raid on Hartlepool by the Imperial German Navy.
Chroniclers connected with Durham include the Bede, Symeon of Durham, Geoffrey of Coldingham and Robert de Graystanes.
County Durham has long been associated with coal mining, from medieval times up to the late 20th century. The Durham Coalfield covered a large area of the county, from Bishop Auckland, to Consett, to the River Tyne and below the North Sea, thereby providing a significant expanse of territory from which this rich mineral resource could be extracted.
King Stephen possessed a mine in Durham, which he granted to Bishop Pudsey, and in the same century colliers are mentioned at Coundon, Bishopwearmouth and Sedgefield. Cockfield Fell was one of the earliest Landsale collieries in Durham. Edward III issued an order allowing coal dug at Newcastle to be taken across the Tyne, and Richard II granted to the inhabitants of Durham licence to export the produce of the mines, without paying dues to the corporation of Newcastle. The majority was transported from the Port of Sunderland complex, which was constructed in the 1850s.
Among other early industries, lead-mining was carried on in the western part of the county, and mustard was extensively cultivated. Gateshead had a considerable tanning trade and shipbuilding was undertaken at Jarrow, and at Sunderland, which became the largest shipbuilding town in the world – constructing a third of Britain's tonnage.[citation needed]
The county's modern-era economic history was facilitated significantly by the growth of the mining industry during the nineteenth century. At the industry's height, in the early 20th century, over 170,000 coal miners were employed, and they mined 58,700,000 tons of coal in 1913 alone. As a result, a large number of colliery villages were built throughout the county as the industrial revolution gathered pace.
The railway industry was also a major employer during the industrial revolution, with railways being built throughout the county, such as The Tanfield Railway, The Clarence Railway and The Stockton and Darlington Railway. The growth of this industry occurred alongside the coal industry, as the railways provided a fast, efficient means to move coal from the mines to the ports and provided the fuel for the locomotives. The great railway pioneers Timothy Hackworth, Edward Pease, George Stephenson and Robert Stephenson were all actively involved with developing the railways in tandem with County Durham's coal mining industry. Shildon and Darlington became thriving 'railway towns' and experienced significant growths in population and prosperity; before the railways, just over 100 people lived in Shildon but, by the 1890s, the town was home to around 8,000 people, with Shildon Shops employing almost 3000 people at its height.
However, by the 1930s, the coal mining industry began to diminish and, by the mid-twentieth century, the pits were closing at an increasing rate. In 1951, the Durham County Development Plan highlighted a number of colliery villages, such as Blackhouse, as 'Category D' settlements, in which future development would be prohibited, property would be acquired and demolished, and the population moved to new housing, such as that being built in Newton Aycliffe. Likewise, the railway industry also began to decline, and was significantly brought to a fraction of its former self by the Beeching cuts in the 1960s. Darlington Works closed in 1966 and Shildon Shops followed suit in 1984. The county's last deep mines, at Easington, Vane Tempest, Wearmouth and Westoe, closed in 1993.
Postal Rates from 1801 were charged depending on the distance from London. Durham was allocated the code 263 the approximate mileage from London. From about 1811, a datestamp appeared on letters showing the date the letter was posted. In 1844 a new system was introduced and Durham was allocated the code 267. This system was replaced in 1840 when the first postage stamps were introduced.
According to the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition (1911): "To the Anglo-Saxon period are to be referred portions of the churches of Monk Wearmouth (Sunderland), Jarrow, Escomb near Bishop Auckland, and numerous sculptured crosses, two of which are in situ at Aycliffe. . . . The Decorated and Perpendicular periods are very scantily represented, on account, as is supposed, of the incessant wars between England and Scotland in the 14th and 15th centuries. The principal monastic remains, besides those surrounding Durham cathedral, are those of its subordinate house or "cell," Finchale Priory, beautifully situated by the Wear. The most interesting castles are those of Durham, Raby, Brancepeth and Barnard. There are ruins of castelets or peel-towers at Dalden, Ludworth and Langley Dale. The hospitals of Sherburn, Greatham and Kepyer, founded by early bishops of Durham, retain but few ancient features."
The best remains of the Norman period include Durham Cathedral and Durham Castle, and several parish churches, such as St Laurence Church in Pittington. The Early English period has left the eastern portion of the cathedral, the churches of Darlington, Hartlepool, and St Andrew, Auckland, Sedgefield, and portions of a few other churches.
'Durham Castle and Cathedral' is a designated UNESCO World Heritage Site. Elsewhere in the County there is Auckland Castle.
No precise date on this one, Crosville Bristol RE TFM268K which has ECW C47F is seen with a little boy climbing or descending the mountainous steps at Victoria Coach Station.
The coach was new in July 1972 and was I think one of the first two Crosville coaches delivered in National livery, give the coaches behind it and next to it are in company livery I would guess this is late 1972 or 1973.
Image from a slide in my collection by an unknown photographer.
At the precise time,
something extraordinary
may sprout
out of something dull dark.
At the exact place
something different
may reborn
out of something pitch black.
At the right person
something new
may resurface
out of something pure simple.
Bass Harbor Head Lighthouse
Mount desert island
Trenton, Maine
lighting after sunset on foggy summer night
Provincial Yelets was once considered one of the most beautiful towns in Russia. It was adorned with two monasteries, three dozen Orthodox churches, a Polish Catholic church, a German church, and a Jewish synagogue. The precise rhythm of its domes and bell towers still defines the skyline of the old town.
The great Russian writer Ivan Bunin, in exile in a distant land, recalled "...the ringing, the roar of the bells from the bell tower of St. Michael the Archangel, towering above everything in such grandeur, such splendor, such as the Roman Church of St. Peter never dreamed of, and such enormity that the Pyramid of Cheops could never again impress me." The Church of St. Michael the Archangel stands next to the administration building in the center of Yelets, the city where the future Nobel laureate spent his high school years. He often spoke warmly of the city of his youth.
On Red Square stands the colossal Ascension Cathedral. It claims to be the second largest Orthodox church in Russia after St. Isaac's Cathedral in St. Petersburg. The cathedral was designed by the renowned architect Konstantin Andreevich Ton (1794-1881), the architect of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior and the Grand Kremlin Palace. Approving the design, Tsar Nicholas I ordered the architect to be granted royal favor for the cathedral's beauty. The interior decoration was worked on by the Itinerant artists and academicians of painting, Alexei Ivanovich Korzukhin (1835-1894) and Klavdy Vasilyevich Lebedev (1852-1916).
Above the cathedral's left iconostasis is a painting of the "Mother of God of Yelets." The Virgin Mary and her heavenly host block the path of Tamerlane's invasion in 1395.
To commemorate the 500th anniversary of Rus''s miraculous deliverance from the invasion, the Church of Our Lady of Yelets was founded in Yelets. Its tented roof still dominates the modern architecture of the southern part of the city. People call it "the red church," either for the color of its brick or for the beauty of its unusual shapes.
Yelets has seen so many people within its walls over its thousand-year history. Presumably founded in 986 as the center of an appanage principality, the city was first mentioned in the Nikon Chronicle for 1146:
“Prince Svyatoslav Olgovich went to Rezan and visited Mchensk, and Tula, and Dubok on the Don, and Yelets, and Pronsk, and came to Rezan on the Oka...”
Its location on the southeastern outskirts of the Russian lands, bordering the "wild field," determined the city's fate for several centuries: "it was... the protector of the Russian lands." Polovtsian raids, Tatar-Mongol invasions, and attacks by Crimean and Golden Horde hordes repeatedly brought the city to desolation, but it was rebuilt and rose again.
"The city itself also boasted of its antiquity, and had every right to do so: it truly was one of the most ancient cities lying among the great black earth fields of the Substeppe, on that fateful line beyond which once stretched "wild, unknown lands," and in the times of the principalities of Suzdal and Ryazan, it belonged to those most important strongholds of Rus' that, according to the chroniclers, were the first to breathe in the storm, dust, and cold from under the menacing Asian clouds that continually passed over it, the first to see the glow of the terrible night and day fires ignited by them, the first to let Moscow know of the impending disaster and the first to lay down their lives for it..." (I. A. Bunin).
From the mid-17th century, Yelets developed as a city of artisans and traders. Livestock trading, tanneries, trade in grain, flour, and semolina, and the famous Yelets lace made the city prosperous and brought it fame.
Yelets's historical heritage includes approximately two hundred architectural monuments. The city itself is a monument to Russian urban planning. Narrow, straight streets running north to south and east to west, combined with low, two- and three-story buildings that are spacious enough to accommodate a person, create a uniquely cozy atmosphere. In Yelets, you don't feel lost, as you might in a larger city. Perhaps this is why the constant flow of tourists eager to see the green Russian city...
A small town, wandering its cozy streets, and visiting the church. Perhaps it's also because the Yelets region is the birthplace of writers Ivan Bunin and Mikhail Prishvin, philosopher Vasily Rozanov, composer Tikhon Khrennikov, and artists Vasily Meshkov, Nikolai Ulyanov, and Nikolai Zhukov. Yelets attracts visitors with its lacemaking industry, museums, art gallery, picturesque landscapes, and fascinating natural sites. It also draws visitors with its centuries-long, dramatic history, closely linked to the fate of Russia.
Many of Yelets' churches have suffered a tragic fate. Not all survived the destruction and hard times. Birch trees grow on the exposed domes of the Church of the Archangel Michael, which so captivated Ivan Bunin's youthful imagination. The traces of abandonment and neglect on many of the remaining churches speak to the hearts of the people. With Russia's rebirth comes a renaissance of its small and medium-sized towns, and Yelets is at the top of that list.
Will we restore its former beauty?
V. Gorlov.
Circa 1925
Angie had been warned about operating in Chicago, but she was too lured by the smell of big money not to take the chance.
She was not disappointed. For the first week she found a wealth of pick able pockets and purses. Swiftly accumulating more money in that short period of time than she had garnered in the past 4 months
But she was not sly enough and before the second weekend she was visited at the dump of an apartment she was renting by two suited men. There was a price to pay for the privilege of working in Mr. D…..’s turf, and they had come to collect. She was given a choice, if it could be called that. Either she could lose a pinky, at this one of the men pulled out a rather sharp looking stiletto knife, or she could earn her dues by performing a small task.
She had chosen the “small task”
Within a couple of days she was installed as a maid in one of Mr. D……’s plush, luxury apartments. She was given precise instructions. Within two weeks; Select a loaded lady, widow or one left alone most of her nights. Angie soon discovered that they were quite a few ladies who lived in the complex that fit that classification. It took her almost the entire first week to select one. When Angie told the Apartment complexes private detective the targets name, she found that she was assigned to clean that lady’s rooms on a daily schedule.
Next Angie was to shadow the targeted lady’s movements, learn her schedule. Find out where she keeps the good stuff and compile a list of anything valuable, especially small and easily carried items. Once that task was completed, Angie was to hand the list to the apartments Dick, and then she was told to await further instructions.
So she found herself carrying out those final instructions three weeks to the night that she had been paid her visit. She had taken her cleaning cart with towels up to the chosen victim’s room around 9:00 in the evening. Following her had been the gentlemen the private detective had led to her; cool as ice, as trim as the tailored suit he was wearing. She had knocked at the targets double door. When the silken night gowned lady who lived there answered, Mr. Ice took over, clamping his hand over the startled victim’s mouth, as he produced a knife from nowhere and forced her back inside. Angie was to stand guard outside with her cart until he had finished and called her in.
It as she was doing so that the door across the hall opened and a red headed man came out. He looked quite dapper in tux and tails, clenching a telegram in his slender fist. She recognized him as a newer tenant, who along with a wife, was newly moved into the city. (actually the wife had been on her short list, missing out only when her husband had come back into the picture early from his business trip abroad)
Spying Angie he asked where the nearest telegraph office was. Just down the street she informed him, amazed at how well she was keeping her cool, with Mr. Ice robbing the rich broad just a few feet away behind the door. She also did not mention that the office was doubtlessly closed. Spying her cart, he then ordered her to bring in some extra towels to his wife.
Angie smelled opportunity, and as the red headed man disappeared down the hall , she looked at the closed double doors, liking the odds ,figuring she could risk it. Picking up the towels she knocked on the door and was admitted by a pretty little thing in a black satin robe covering a long gold night gown of luxuriously glossy liquid satin. Around her neck was hanging a gold necklace just dripping with sparkly diamonds. Seeing the towels in Angie’s hands she pointed towards a far door instructing her to take them there, several gem encrusted rings flashing from her fingers.
Angie went in and placed the towels on the wicker hamper. Angie looked at the freshly laundered long evening gown that was hanging from a hook, taking a second to feel its luxurious softness before returning. Then coming back into the room the lady thanked her, telling her to wait, she had a little something.
She turned her back to Angie(mistake! thought the “maid”) and reached down into a small purse, Angie had moved so close she could smell the ladies ‘expensive perfume. The lady stood up, backing into Angie who apologized as she accepted the nickel tip from her. Angie left, returning to the cart.
She had made it back in time. As she waited Angie fingered something in her pocket, thinking back to the apartment she had just left:
As the satin clad rich lady had been reaching for her purse, Angie had in a flash made two observations: The first was that the lady had been putting lotion on her hands and that she had removed her rings, the second was that one pocket of her satiny black robe was a little more open than its twin. She had easily dipped her fingers into the robes pocket as the rich lady had backed into her and lifted the shiny rings up and out, extracting them as carefully as any surgeon, Palming the cool rings as she accepted her stingy tip from the rich broad.
As Angie now fingered those rings her mind had gone to the wealth lady’s magnificent diamond necklace. Too bad she thinks, too bad there wasn’t a way to acquire the jewels of a woman as she wore them.
Her thoughts were interrupted as the door opened a crack, he nodded to her and she went inside with the cart as he left, causally walking down the hall, whistling. She said nothing about her little episode.
The lady was nowhere in sight, but she could hear whimpering coming from a room. On a divan was a healthy pile of jewelry, expensive purses, a few pricy looking knickknacks, as well as a couple of stunning gowns, almost as nice as the one she had stolen a feet back across the hall. She quickly loaded the items in her cart, covered them with towels, than left.
She took the service elevator, riding it to the basement. Than taking the cart out a back door, Angie entered a dark alley. A van waited, two men took the cart from her and began to load it.. Angie turned her back and walked away down the desolated alley without turning back, soon disappearing into the misty streets.
Angie vanished back up into Canada where she spent a few weeks lying low. The first item of business she did was to unload the hot rings. Spying a pretty, silvery necklace she bargained for it, still making a nice chunk of change in addition. She than revisited her childhood haunts, feeing like a real lady wearing the fancy necklace, and her purse holding a modest amount of jake. In her line of work she usually refrained from wearing anything that would attract someone’s notice.
On a whim she stopped into a fortune tellers shop. The ancient, toothless gypsy read her palms, saying a few obligatory predictions, before looking Angie in the eyes, pausing abruptly. She worked her way to her feet, just a minute dearie, I’ll be right back. She soon was back and laid an old, very well thumbed pamphlet at Angie’s fingertips. This is something I believe you can use she murmured. Angie picked it up, looking through it, her eyes growing wide as she realized its purpose. I was just, she stammered, how did you know? she asked flabbergasted. The old gypsy smiled toothlessly, not saying anything. Angie though of the diamond necklace on the lady last week, the leaflet basically laid out how she could have taken that diamond necklace on the spot.
What do I owe you; Angie finally managed to ask when she had come to grips with herself. You have already paid love, she cackled, as she opened her dirty old shawl, revealing the shiny new silvery necklace around her wrinkled throat, the same necklace Angie had been wearing when she had entered the small shop. Her hand instinctively shot up to her throat, surprised to find it totally bare, despite the evidence before her.
Angie looked once again at the small pamphlets title:
Cutpurse: skilles, artes and Secretes of the Dip : inscribed by Gaston Monescu .
And with tingles of delight, she knew, that her ship had just come into port.
**********************************************************************
Editor’s Note:
Our Thanks to Mr Gardner for pointing out the existence of Mr. Monescu’s 1826 guide
This is a link to a You Tube Video of a thief not unlike our Angie.
Courtesy of Chatwick University Archives
*************************************************************************************
All rights and copyrights observed by Chatwick University, Its contributors, associates and Agents
The purpose of these chronological photos and accompanying stories, articles is to educate, teach, instruct, and generally increase the awareness level of the general public as to the nature and intent of the underlying criminal elements that have historically plagued humankind.
No Part of this can reprinted, duplicated, or copied be without the express written permission and approval of Chatwick University.
These photos and stories are works of fiction. Any resemblance to people, living or deceased, is purely coincidental.
As with any work of fiction or fantasy the purpose is for entertainment only, and should never be attempted in real life.
We accept no responsibility for any events occurring outside this website.
Made for SWFactions on Eurobricks.
www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?/forums/topic/180827-j...
Captured by pirates! While searching for the natives of Imynusoph, our trio are beset upon by the cavalier Colonel Corbett's callous rogues! The murderous pirates and their flamboyant leader drag our heroes to their camp, where intrigue abounds!
Clod blinked against the harsh light streaming in from above. His hands were shackled. It wasn’t the worst situation he’d been in, he thought. Then, to his surprise, his next thoughts were about his two companions. He hoped they were alright. It would be a million years before he’d admit it.
The sergeant called “Slyfoot” stood in the darkness a few feet away. He could feel the man watching him, disturbingly calm. Precise.
“Look at you,” he sneered. “A treasure hunter. Ha! I believed Klatoonians to be nothing but pirates and scum.”
It was a struggle to form words, but Clod couldn’t give up the opportunity for a zinger. “Look how the…tables have turned.”
He almost immediately regretted it. The droid administered a searing shock to his ribs that sent his limbs convulsing. His skin burned. He shouted, and for a moment, he panicked.
“Such wit. No more of that, I think,” he heard Slyfoot say. “You should put your words to better use, like securing a release for you and your companions. All you must do is tell me what it was you were searching for.”
“Fat chance—Augh!” Another shock. More horrible pain.
Slyfoot stepped into the light. He slowly shook his head.
“’Fat chance’, you say? On the contrary, Mr. Clod,” he said, and a smile crept onto his face. “I quite like my odds.”
“Tea or Caf, Professor?” offered Colonel Corbett, busying himself with a gleaming pot and an ion heater.
“O-Oh, tea, I suppose.”
The Colonel looked up at him, a pleasant expression on his face. “I see you appreciate my décor!”
Floon had been staring at some of the trophies scattered about; horns, hides, huge eggs, droid parts, scraps of clothing. Some from beasts, others from treasure hunters who’d come before.
“Why…yes! It’s very…eclectic. Er, thank you again for having me, Colonel.”
“Of course, of course! I must say, I’ve positively chuffed about you being here. An academy man! On Imynusoph! Chandrila, you say?”
“Er, yes. I had, er, tenure at the Chandrila Academy.”
“Ha! Chandrila! A professor from Chandrila makes my acquaintance here, of all places. Who would have thought it would happen? Certainly not me! I admit it! Please, make yourself comfortable, my questions are bound to be numerous.”
The Neimodian professor looked nervously around the tent. One of the pirates loitered at the door. Floon felt that he should do some great act of bravery, try to free Mr. Clod and Ms. Rigo, but he didn’t know where he would even start.
“Professor?”
The question shook Floon from his thoughts. “Oh, y-yes?”
Colonel Corbett smiled. “You don’t look very comfortable. Come, you’re in good company. I am a man of learning and intelligence myself.”
“Why, o-of course!” said Floon. Unable to muster a relaxed smile, he summoned a polite grimace.
The Colonel frowned. “Professor, I brought you here that we might engage in riveting conversation! Without conversation, I have no reason to bring you here rather than lock you up in our brig. Do you understand?”
Floon did, but he was not very good at staying calm when faced with threats. He knew all too well what the murderous pirates might do if the Colonel permitted. With a great amount of sweating and stuttering, he apologized. “I’m…m-most…s-sorry, Colonel. Most s-sorry. Let us…er…converse, s-shall we?”
“Very good, very good!” said the Colonel, settling in and looking at the professor expectantly. “Well then, let us get down to, as they say, brass tacks. I want to hear everything you know about the giant birds of Imynusoph! I expect I’ll be quite fascinated!”
“Er, yes…” mumbled Floon. “Quite.”
“Let go of me, you idiots!” Kitsa did her best to break her restraints through sheer will, but no dice. She settled for whacking one of her captors instead, sending him reeling with a broken nose. She couldn’t believe how lucky her aim was. And finally, something for her story!
“Let the Stud take care of her! I don’t want to get kicked again,” whined one of the pirates. The others parted, allowing the largest one, the one with the bandolier and the AT-AT driver helmet, to step towards her. He was enormous, at least 6’8”, and not what you’d call ‘lanky’. There was no chance she’d make a dent against this guy. He settled one giant hand on her shoulder, and he steered her away.
She muttered threats as they walked through the Imperial camp, shooting glances around to take in everything she was seeing. They had left the treeline onto an open savannah. The camp had clearly been an Imperial outpost, but now was all ramshackle and bolted together to keep out the wildlife. There was a junkyard of impounded vehicles that caught her attention. Most of them were scrap, but one airspeeder, red-and-white, looked intact. She took note of this for later.
She eyed the pirate. He was a muscular guy, that was for sure. Where was he taking her? A pit of gundarks, or an interrogation chamber?
Neither, it turned out. She was escorted to a quiet corner of the pirate camp, a breeze-blown tent with foliage breaking in overhead and enshrouding the space.
“You can stay here,” said the big pirate.
She scoffed. “What are you, good cop? And what’s this place, the torture waiting room?”
“It’s, well,” the pirate hesitated. “No, it’s just a tent. I had a wife when we came here. This used to be hers. Thought you’d like it more than a cage, but if I’m wrong…”
That was unexpected. She turned and sized him up suspiciously, but there wasn’t much to observe in the blank stare of the helmet’s facemask. “A wife, huh? What happened to her? Your pirate buddies shoot her?”
“You think they’d get past me? Nah, not in a million years,” he chuckled, but his tone turned somber. “No, one day she went out to get clean water, our purifier was broken, and one of the jungle beasts came out of the trees. She couldn’t get away fast enough. Her blaster misfired. That’s all it took.”
In a rare moment, Kitsa didn’t know what to say.
The pirate took a deep breath, then said, “So if you were thinking of running, I wouldn’t.”
“Sure,” she nodded, collecting herself. “Sorry about your wife. Thanks for the tent.”
“No problem,” said the pirate. He then stood there awkwardly for a moment, before asking, “So, uh, you, uh, some kind of reporter?”
Kitsa lit up. “I sure am, Galactic Gazette.”
The man swayed on his feet, coughing uncomfortably. “What’s, uh, what’s going on out there? In the galaxy? Rebels gone, yet? We heard we had another Death Star.”
Kitsa stared at the emotionless facemask for a moment. Of course, it made sense. When was the last time they would’ve heard any news?
Her story was really heating up.
She smiled and deflected the question. “What’s your name?”
“Deksen. They call me ‘the Stud’. What’s your name, uh, miss?”
“Kitsa Rigo,” she answered smartly. “What do you say about sitting for an interview with me, Deksen? In return, I’ll tell you whatever you want to know.”
The pirate said nothing for a moment. He looked over his shoulder to see if anyone was watching. “I guess that’d be alright. We don’t exactly get much press on Imynusoph. I suppose you can tell the galaxy about our bravery.”
Kitsa sat on the medical bed, her pen poised. “So, Deksen, what’s it been like for you, out here?”
The pirate set his gun to the side and took a deep breath.
“Well…” he began.
Another shock, another burn, another stab. Harnaby Clod struggled in the interrogation gurney, his mouth full of spit. He couldn’t take much more of this. He felt like his mind was slipping through his fingers, jolted free by every prod from the droid. Karfing droid. He’d smash that droid to bits if he ever got out of this.
Another stab of a needle. His vision swam. He’d get out of this, right? Could he?
“Tell me why you’re here. Tell me what you know,” Slyfoot said, walking around him. “I’d love to see you dead, believe me. Who will remember you if you’re gone? Some dog-faced lunatic on the edge of the galaxy, no one important. No accomplishments, no fealty, nothing of note. Another dead alien.”
“You…don’t…know…mersh.”
“Hm, perhaps. But tell me…am I wrong, Mr. Clod?”
The dark room blinked in and out of existence before Clod’s eyes. He felt his tongue go limp. His heart felt like it was drying up.
The sergeant watched him, smiling cruelly. “Alright, I’ll get it out of the Neimodian, then. Good bye, Mr.-“
“Waitsh, waitsh!” Clod gasped. “Ah’ll tell yoush…”
Slyfoot brightened. “Indeed, Mr. Clod? If you tell me, as I’ve said, this can all end.”
He couldn’t do this anymore. What was he thinking?
He wasn’t. Anything to stop this. Karf this place.
“Ah’ll…ah’ll…tell yoush anything…” he wheezed.
Slyfoot straightened his cap. “Very good, Mr. Clod. Go on then.” He leaned in, until his face dominated Clod’s view. Slyfoot tried to manage his own expectations, but he couldn’t suppress his excitement. He looked down at the drooling Klatoonian.
“Mr. Clod,” he said. “Is the treasure…real?”
“Wow!” muttered Kitsa, scribbling in her notebook.
“That’s just how it is out here. It’s made the other pirates what they are. It’s made me…” he shrugged. “Changed.”
“That’s really…tough! I’m so sorry you’ve had to suffer through this place.”
“Hm, I’ve been lucky…I think. But what about you, Ms. Rigo?” asked the pirate called Deksen.
“M-Me?”
He leaned in attentively. “How does a woman such as you find yourself in a place like this?”
Even with the facemask in the way, Rigo felt his gaze on her face. She frowned.
“Well, I work for the Gazette.”
He tilted his head. “Because you wish to tell stories?”
“Because I want to…” she paused before answering. “I want to make others see the truth.”
Deksen nodded slowly. He was impressed by the honesty of her answer. “Will you tell me more?”
In a strange moment, the both of them felt the softening in their spirits take its full course, and they entirely let down their guards. Kitsa avoided his gaze, but launched into a treatise on how it was she ended up here, the absurdity of the situation, and how she hoped she might get something out of it anyway because while she was here there was no one investigating the Ubrikkian corporation and something had to be done soon because those poor Duros in the factories had no one standing up for them, and if no one else was going to take Ubrikkian to task, she sure as shaft would.
Deksen listened quietly, occasionally asking questions or affirming how Kitsa felt. Eventually she had completed her story. She took a deep breath, which she had expended whilst going on about her passions.
Deksen folded his hands. “Your spirit…moves me.”
“Oh!” said Kitsa, not sure how to respond. She felt her cheeks burn, and said quietly, “Thanks for listening.”
“And thank you for talking.”
She laughed. “You’d be a much better editor than the one I’ve got. Getting him to listen is a full time job.”
A breeze blew through the tent, carrying the sounds of harsh laughter from where the other pirates were getting into the brew. Far off, Kitsa heard a howl of pain that made her skin crawl and her mind turn towards her lost companions.
After a moment of silence, she looked into Deksen’s facemask. It was a risk, could she trust an ex-stormtrooper-turned-pirate? Strangely, she felt that she could trust him more than almost anyone she’d met. This disturbed her in a profound way, but she didn’t have time to dwell on her emotions. She had to take action.
“Deksen, I need to get out of here.”
“Yes, you do.” His shoulders slumped as he prepared himself for the choice he was making. His life would never be the same after this. “And yes, before you ask; I will help you.”
Kitsa sighed with relief, but there was no time to waste. They had to get down to business. “Alright, here’s what I was thinking. Tell me if it makes sense…”
“Spiritual creatures, you say?”
Colonel Corbett stroked his moustache, listening to what Professor Floon had to say with a most attentive mind.
“Well, y-yes. Regarded as spiritual creatures by…” Floon kept himself from revealing the natives at only the last moment. “…by all who visit this planet, I’ve heard.”
It was all Floon could do to keep the existence of the native tribes a secret. Apparently these pirates had no clue they might still be around.
“Fascinating! And you say the wingspan…”
The words tumbled out of Floon like a brook. His trepidation could not dampen his excitement. “No one has seen it in millennia, but I do not lie when I say,” he leaned in, saying conspiratorially, “it is said to be three men across!”
Corbett rubbed his hands together and grinned. “Incredible! Simply incredible. Say, Professor, I know you count yourself among the squeamish, but do you suppose that shooting down a bird of spiritual importance grants a hunter more, how do you say, ‘bragging rights’?”
Floon raised an eyeridge and stared. “Are…are you…joking, sir?”
“I assure you, I am not!” said Corbett, jabbing the desk with his finger. “A hunter such as myself has precious little time for jokes, what with so much glory left unobtained. You’re the closest thing in the galaxy to an expert, Professor. Do you believe killing such a creature would grant me more glory?”
Floon watched the officer nervously. His eyes were eager, his face covered in sweat. The heat was dull and damp in the shade of the tent, the kind of environment Floon had been born into. Very much a comfort zone.
The professor summoned up all his courage, swelling up his chest in rather an alarming way. Corbett’s eyes widened.
“No!” squeaked Floon.
Corbett was puzzled. “…’No’?”
“No!” Floon stood his ground. “How can you talk of killing a creature such as this? For all your talk about appreciating great beasts, you end their magnificent lives with such…relish!” He licked his lipless mouth, his words sputtering and cracking as adrenaline shot through him. He’d never confronted anyone in his life. Certainly not anyone who was willing to kill him. “I don’t mind saying that it is…despicable! Yes, despicable!”
Colonel Corbett, who had initially been very surprised, now furrowed his brow. When he spoke, his tone was dark. “Professor…I’m not used to being talked to in such a-”
“Indeed, indeed!” squawked Floon, suddenly desperate to turn his situation around. “But nor are you used to talking to your intellectual equal, as you have said! This is true, yes?”
Corbett considered it. “Yes, it is true,” he admitted.
“Then please, hear my words, as another man of learning! These creatures are not for killing, they are for studying! For conserving! For…loving! Please, take my offer of friendship and understand I mean you no ill will. I only wish to see a force such as yourself used for…better things!”
Colonel Corbett looked bothered. He had never thought of it in such terms before. Professor Floon breathed heavily, waiting in silence, heart hammering, hoping for a reaction that spared his life.
Finally, the Colonel’s expression softened, and he began to speak. “Professor, I—“
“Colonel Corbett!” came a voice from the tent’s opening. Floon, uncharacteristically, cursed in his head. His heart sank.
“How dare you interrupt me? I said, very clearly I thought, that no one was to interrupt!”
The pirate at the opening was the huge, shirtless one, with the AT-AT driver’s helmet. “But it’s the others, sir, they’ve broken out!”
The moment had passed, Corbett’s mind was on other things. He grabbed his cap and marched towards the entrance. “Well then! Wait here with the Professor, we must hunt them down!”
Corbett marched toward the tent flap, where he was promptly whacked in the head with a blaster handle, and fell flat on his back. He lay there, hair mussed, tongue out, and unconscious.
“Oh my goodness!” cried Floon.
“Quiet, Professor! It’s just me, Kitsa. Ms. Rigo.”
Indeed it was. The reporter came ducking in, blaster in hand. The large pirate stood guard while she knelt down to rummage in Corbett’s holster.
“What-what is going on? Who is this abnormally large man at the door?” asked Floon, who’s voice dropped to an anxious whisper as he added, “Is he not one of the pirates?”
Kitsa pushed a strand of hair out of her face. “Huh? Oh, that’s Deksen,” she explained simply. “He’s gonna help us escape.”
The pirate named Deksen raised a hand in casual greeting.
“O-Oh, how do you do?” Floon replied weakly, and he tipped his hat on instinct. “You are…very big!”
“I get that a lot,” came Deksen’s reply, filtered through his helmet.
“He is, isn’t he?” Kitsa grinned.
“Y-Yes—hold on; escape, you said?” squeaked Floon, who’s brain was beginning to catch up at last.
“Yes, escape,” she repeated firmly, looking him in the eye. “But we have to go now, understand? Otherwise we’ll die?”
Floon withdrew a handkerchief and dabbed at his face. “O-Oh, my. This is all rather a lot. And so sudden…”
“Yes, it is. We still have to save Clod, against my better judgement.”
“S-Save…Clod, you say?” said Floon, wilting with every word, and very close to fainting.
Kitsa smiled wryly and patted him on the shoulder. “Come on, Professor,” she said, and she handed him the Colonel’s blaster before turning to leave. Deksen made to follow her.
Floon went after them, but before reaching the tent’s exit he spun around awkwardly to address his host.
“I’m…very sorry for all this,” he said to Corbett’s unconscious body. “It really w-was lovely meeting you.”
Floon felt it was polite for one to wait to be excused, but Corbett did not reply.
Thus, with a great deal of stumbling and nervous mumbling, the professor hurried to catch up with the others.
“And the natives,” said Slyfoot with relish. “You said you’ve met them before, is that true?”
“Yesh,” spat Clod. He eyed the interrogation droid floating a foot away, its red receptor blinking, prod extended towards him.
“Then you could lead us to them. You will lead me to them.”
“Didn’t you hear a word I said? They found me the first time. I don’t know how to find them now!”
Slyfoot waved a hand dismissively. “Well, no matter. They asked you to return, I’m sure they’ll show up to you soon.”
Clod wished he could wipe his mouth where he’d drooled after one of the many electroshocks. It was starting to chape. “…Thought you…were gonna let us go?” he groaned.
Slyfoot laughed. “Really? You did? I didn’t take you for a fool. No, Mr. Clod. You’ll stay in this luxury for many days to com--I said I wanted no interruptions!”
Light had flooded the room from the now-open door. He heard a blaster go off, and a red bolt smashed into the interrogation droid, knocking it to the ground.
“Pardon me!” said Professor Floon, turning the gun on Slyfoot. The pirate sergeant raised his hands in surrender. “I nearly forgot something on my way out!”
“P-professor?” slurred Clod, craning his neck to see. “I can’t believe it.”
“That’s right, it’s me! I’ve come to rescue you, Mr. Clod.”
Clod groaned with relief. He hadn’t expected this in a million years. “You gotta get me out of here, doc.”
“Indeed!” said the Professor, who prodded Slyfoot with his pistol until he gave up the key to the bindings.
“Nice entry."
Floon seemed pleased. “Thank you! I am honored by the compliment, especially from someone as…daring-do as yourself! I practiced on the way here.”
“It paid off. Now…” he stretched and groaned his weary, burnt muscles. Then he turned towards Slyfoot, who held to his dignity even while fear seeped in the cracks. Weakened though he was, the Klatoonian was dangerous. He proved this to Slyfoot by knocking him to the floor with a right hook.
“Jerk. Wish I had more time.”
“We really must go, Rigo is waiting! She found a way out!”
Clod looked at the Professor and raised an eyebrow. “You already saved her?”
“Saved her?” replied the professor, leading him into the daylight. “Why, it was her who saved me!”
“You’re kidding!”
“I am not kidding, Mr. Clod! I assure you, I am entirely serious!”
They caught up with Kitsa and Deksen at the camp’s boneyard, where ship and vehicle carcasses formed a monument to the pirates’ past conquests.
“He’s fine,” said Kitsa, in response to the alarmed look on Clod’s face. “His name is Deksen, he’s helping us.”
“Nice to meet you,” said Deksen, voice filtered through his helmet.
“Sure, sure. A pleasure,” muttered Clod. “Listen, I told that creepy imp about the natives.”
Kitsa and Floon looked at him with dismay.
“It wasn’t exactly by choice,” grumbled Clod, but he avoided their gaze. “I’m betting they didn’t torture either of you.”
They answered by way of silence.
“Of course not,” he grunted. “Who else here has a face like a Corellian hound?”
“Ahem...I cannot imagine what you went through in that little room, so I cannot blame you for anything you’ve done,” said Floon seriously. “Besides…I let slip quite a lot about the wildlife to the Colonel, and I was under no compulsion besides a foolish enthusiasm for my subject! Oh, how moronic of me. I’m far worse than you, Mr. Clod. Fear no condemnation from us.”
Clod looked at him with something approaching humility and gratitude.
“I didn’t tell anyone anything,” said Kitsa. “Except about myself.”
“Their knowledge simply means we must make greater haste to find the natives first. And with the skills and talents of us three, I find our chances encouraging!”
Kitsa gestured to their soon-to-be-stolen ride. “Especially with this thing.”
Clod hurried forward to look at what she’d found. Underneath a tarp sat a small, aged red-and-white craft. Barely enough space for two people. “What is this, an Incom? Tiny, isn’t it?”
“Who cares who built it?” she replied shortly. “It’s an Airspeeder. Deksen says it’ll still fly.”
Deksen shrugged. “We use it for scout missions.
“Wait," Clod frowned. "We can’t leave yet.”
Kitsa threw up her hands. “Why not?”
“Hat."
“Oh, for karf’s sake--I got your hat, here. Can’t believe you’d get us killed over your hat.”
“My hat! You’re alright, Rigo.”
Deksen cleared his throat. “You three should climb in, you don’t have a lot of time.”
They threw their things in the speeder. Clod clambered into the pilot’s seat and brushed some crumbs off the controls. He checked various switches and toggles with an air of familiarity. Floon crammed himself into the back.
Kitsa was last to get in. She turned and threw herself at Deksen, hugging him awkwardly. She didn’t hug many people. Were you supposed to do it so forcefully? Fortunately, Deksen didn't seem to mind. He folded her gently in his massive arms.
“Thank you. I wish you could come with us.”
His tone carried a smile she couldn’t see through his facemask.
“It was good to meet you. I’ll see you again.”
“And you’ll be okay? The other pirates won’t…”
He put a calming hand on her shoulder. “You think they could?”
“Miss Rigo!” called the professor from the speeder. “I’m quite nervous waiting in here! I wouldn’t say anything, except that my muttering has made Mr. Clod angry.”
The two shared a chuckle. Kitsa smiled sadly and let go of him. She clambered into the airspeeder with the others, where she discovered it was a much tighter fit than she’d expected. Once she’d negotiated space with Floon, she leaned against the window and gave Deksen a final wave.
The pirate waved back.
“Whoof. He’s ripped, huh?” she said wistfully.
“Ripped?” Floon squeaked. “I’d say his shirt is beyond ripped, madam! There’s hardly a shirt there at all!”
The speeder was humming to life, the way any vehicle does that’s taken some battering. A warm, clanky kind of hum.
“Alright,” said Clod from the front. “Off to find the natives?”
“Before the pirates do!” said Kitsa.
“Oh my! A race against pirates, for the good of knowledge and sentient life!” flushed Floon. “It’s all rather exciting, isn’t it?”
A more precise sketch of what I have in mind for this shiptember.
The initial Ultaran design was too aggressive for the purpose of this ship (a massive freighter)
------------------------------------------
I still won't be able to start building until the 15th. So this design will have a bit more time to mature.
Made for SWFactions on Eurobricks.
www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?/forums/topic/180827-j...
Captured by pirates! While searching for the natives of Imynusoph, our trio are beset upon by the cavalier Colonel Corbett's callous rogues! The murderous pirates and their flamboyant leader drag our heroes to their camp, where intrigue abounds!
Clod blinked against the harsh light streaming in from above. His hands were shackled. It wasn’t the worst situation he’d been in, he thought. Then, to his surprise, his next thoughts were about his two companions. He hoped they were alright. It would be a million years before he’d admit it.
The sergeant called “Slyfoot” stood in the darkness a few feet away. He could feel the man watching him, disturbingly calm. Precise.
“Look at you,” he sneered. “A treasure hunter. Ha! I believed Klatoonians to be nothing but pirates and scum.”
It was a struggle to form words, but Clod couldn’t give up the opportunity for a zinger. “Look how the…tables have turned.”
He almost immediately regretted it. The droid administered a searing shock to his ribs that sent his limbs convulsing. His skin burned. He shouted, and for a moment, he panicked.
“Such wit. No more of that, I think,” he heard Slyfoot say. “You should put your words to better use, like securing a release for you and your companions. All you must do is tell me what it was you were searching for.”
“Fat chance—Augh!” Another shock. More horrible pain.
Slyfoot stepped into the light. He slowly shook his head.
“’Fat chance’, you say? On the contrary, Mr. Clod,” he said, and a smile crept onto his face. “I quite like my odds.”
“Tea or Caf, Professor?” offered Colonel Corbett, busying himself with a gleaming pot and an ion heater.
“O-Oh, tea, I suppose.”
The Colonel looked up at him, a pleasant expression on his face. “I see you appreciate my décor!”
Floon had been staring at some of the trophies scattered about; horns, hides, huge eggs, droid parts, scraps of clothing. Some from beasts, others from treasure hunters who’d come before.
“Why…yes! It’s very…eclectic. Er, thank you again for having me, Colonel.”
“Of course, of course! I must say, I’ve positively chuffed about you being here. An academy man! On Imynusoph! Chandrila, you say?”
“Er, yes. I had, er, tenure at the Chandrila Academy.”
“Ha! Chandrila! A professor from Chandrila makes my acquaintance here, of all places. Who would have thought it would happen? Certainly not me! I admit it! Please, make yourself comfortable, my questions are bound to be numerous.”
The Neimodian professor looked nervously around the tent. One of the pirates loitered at the door. Floon felt that he should do some great act of bravery, try to free Mr. Clod and Ms. Rigo, but he didn’t know where he would even start.
“Professor?”
The question shook Floon from his thoughts. “Oh, y-yes?”
Colonel Corbett smiled. “You don’t look very comfortable. Come, you’re in good company. I am a man of learning and intelligence myself.”
“Why, o-of course!” said Floon. Unable to muster a relaxed smile, he summoned a polite grimace.
The Colonel frowned. “Professor, I brought you here that we might engage in riveting conversation! Without conversation, I have no reason to bring you here rather than lock you up in our brig. Do you understand?”
Floon did, but he was not very good at staying calm when faced with threats. He knew all too well what the murderous pirates might do if the Colonel permitted. With a great amount of sweating and stuttering, he apologized. “I’m…m-most…s-sorry, Colonel. Most s-sorry. Let us…er…converse, s-shall we?”
“Very good, very good!” said the Colonel, settling in and looking at the professor expectantly. “Well then, let us get down to, as they say, brass tacks. I want to hear everything you know about the giant birds of Imynusoph! I expect I’ll be quite fascinated!”
“Er, yes…” mumbled Floon. “Quite.”
“Let go of me, you idiots!” Kitsa did her best to break her restraints through sheer will, but no dice. She settled for whacking one of her captors instead, sending him reeling with a broken nose. She couldn’t believe how lucky her aim was. And finally, something for her story!
“Let the Stud take care of her! I don’t want to get kicked again,” whined one of the pirates. The others parted, allowing the largest one, the one with the bandolier and the AT-AT driver helmet, to step towards her. He was enormous, at least 6’8”, and not what you’d call ‘lanky’. There was no chance she’d make a dent against this guy. He settled one giant hand on her shoulder, and he steered her away.
She muttered threats as they walked through the Imperial camp, shooting glances around to take in everything she was seeing. They had left the treeline onto an open savannah. The camp had clearly been an Imperial outpost, but now was all ramshackle and bolted together to keep out the wildlife. There was a junkyard of impounded vehicles that caught her attention. Most of them were scrap, but one airspeeder, red-and-white, looked intact. She took note of this for later.
She eyed the pirate. He was a muscular guy, that was for sure. Where was he taking her? A pit of gundarks, or an interrogation chamber?
Neither, it turned out. She was escorted to a quiet corner of the pirate camp, a breeze-blown tent with foliage breaking in overhead and enshrouding the space.
“You can stay here,” said the big pirate.
She scoffed. “What are you, good cop? And what’s this place, the torture waiting room?”
“It’s, well,” the pirate hesitated. “No, it’s just a tent. I had a wife when we came here. This used to be hers. Thought you’d like it more than a cage, but if I’m wrong…”
That was unexpected. She turned and sized him up suspiciously, but there wasn’t much to observe in the blank stare of the helmet’s facemask. “A wife, huh? What happened to her? Your pirate buddies shoot her?”
“You think they’d get past me? Nah, not in a million years,” he chuckled, but his tone turned somber. “No, one day she went out to get clean water, our purifier was broken, and one of the jungle beasts came out of the trees. She couldn’t get away fast enough. Her blaster misfired. That’s all it took.”
In a rare moment, Kitsa didn’t know what to say.
The pirate took a deep breath, then said, “So if you were thinking of running, I wouldn’t.”
“Sure,” she nodded, collecting herself. “Sorry about your wife. Thanks for the tent.”
“No problem,” said the pirate. He then stood there awkwardly for a moment, before asking, “So, uh, you, uh, some kind of reporter?”
Kitsa lit up. “I sure am, Galactic Gazette.”
The man swayed on his feet, coughing uncomfortably. “What’s, uh, what’s going on out there? In the galaxy? Rebels gone, yet? We heard we had another Death Star.”
Kitsa stared at the emotionless facemask for a moment. Of course, it made sense. When was the last time they would’ve heard any news?
Her story was really heating up.
She smiled and deflected the question. “What’s your name?”
“Deksen. They call me ‘the Stud’. What’s your name, uh, miss?”
“Kitsa Rigo,” she answered smartly. “What do you say about sitting for an interview with me, Deksen? In return, I’ll tell you whatever you want to know.”
The pirate said nothing for a moment. He looked over his shoulder to see if anyone was watching. “I guess that’d be alright. We don’t exactly get much press on Imynusoph. I suppose you can tell the galaxy about our bravery.”
Kitsa sat on the medical bed, her pen poised. “So, Deksen, what’s it been like for you, out here?”
The pirate set his gun to the side and took a deep breath.
“Well…” he began.
Another shock, another burn, another stab. Harnaby Clod struggled in the interrogation gurney, his mouth full of spit. He couldn’t take much more of this. He felt like his mind was slipping through his fingers, jolted free by every prod from the droid. Karfing droid. He’d smash that droid to bits if he ever got out of this.
Another stab of a needle. His vision swam. He’d get out of this, right? Could he?
“Tell me why you’re here. Tell me what you know,” Slyfoot said, walking around him. “I’d love to see you dead, believe me. Who will remember you if you’re gone? Some dog-faced lunatic on the edge of the galaxy, no one important. No accomplishments, no fealty, nothing of note. Another dead alien.”
“You…don’t…know…mersh.”
“Hm, perhaps. But tell me…am I wrong, Mr. Clod?”
The dark room blinked in and out of existence before Clod’s eyes. He felt his tongue go limp. His heart felt like it was drying up.
The sergeant watched him, smiling cruelly. “Alright, I’ll get it out of the Neimodian, then. Good bye, Mr.-“
“Waitsh, waitsh!” Clod gasped. “Ah’ll tell yoush…”
Slyfoot brightened. “Indeed, Mr. Clod? If you tell me, as I’ve said, this can all end.”
He couldn’t do this anymore. What was he thinking?
He wasn’t. Anything to stop this. Karf this place.
“Ah’ll…ah’ll…tell yoush anything…” he wheezed.
Slyfoot straightened his cap. “Very good, Mr. Clod. Go on then.” He leaned in, until his face dominated Clod’s view. Slyfoot tried to manage his own expectations, but he couldn’t suppress his excitement. He looked down at the drooling Klatoonian.
“Mr. Clod,” he said. “Is the treasure…real?”
“Wow!” muttered Kitsa, scribbling in her notebook.
“That’s just how it is out here. It’s made the other pirates what they are. It’s made me…” he shrugged. “Changed.”
“That’s really…tough! I’m so sorry you’ve had to suffer through this place.”
“Hm, I’ve been lucky…I think. But what about you, Ms. Rigo?” asked the pirate called Deksen.
“M-Me?”
He leaned in attentively. “How does a woman such as you find yourself in a place like this?”
Even with the facemask in the way, Rigo felt his gaze on her face. She frowned.
“Well, I work for the Gazette.”
He tilted his head. “Because you wish to tell stories?”
“Because I want to…” she paused before answering. “I want to make others see the truth.”
Deksen nodded slowly. He was impressed by the honesty of her answer. “Will you tell me more?”
In a strange moment, the both of them felt the softening in their spirits take its full course, and they entirely let down their guards. Kitsa avoided his gaze, but launched into a treatise on how it was she ended up here, the absurdity of the situation, and how she hoped she might get something out of it anyway because while she was here there was no one investigating the Ubrikkian corporation and something had to be done soon because those poor Duros in the factories had no one standing up for them, and if no one else was going to take Ubrikkian to task, she sure as shaft would.
Deksen listened quietly, occasionally asking questions or affirming how Kitsa felt. Eventually she had completed her story. She took a deep breath, which she had expended whilst going on about her passions.
Deksen folded his hands. “Your spirit…moves me.”
“Oh!” said Kitsa, not sure how to respond. She felt her cheeks burn, and said quietly, “Thanks for listening.”
“And thank you for talking.”
She laughed. “You’d be a much better editor than the one I’ve got. Getting him to listen is a full time job.”
A breeze blew through the tent, carrying the sounds of harsh laughter from where the other pirates were getting into the brew. Far off, Kitsa heard a howl of pain that made her skin crawl and her mind turn towards her lost companions.
After a moment of silence, she looked into Deksen’s facemask. It was a risk, could she trust an ex-stormtrooper-turned-pirate? Strangely, she felt that she could trust him more than almost anyone she’d met. This disturbed her in a profound way, but she didn’t have time to dwell on her emotions. She had to take action.
“Deksen, I need to get out of here.”
“Yes, you do.” His shoulders slumped as he prepared himself for the choice he was making. His life would never be the same after this. “And yes, before you ask; I will help you.”
Kitsa sighed with relief, but there was no time to waste. They had to get down to business. “Alright, here’s what I was thinking. Tell me if it makes sense…”
“Spiritual creatures, you say?”
Colonel Corbett stroked his moustache, listening to what Professor Floon had to say with a most attentive mind.
“Well, y-yes. Regarded as spiritual creatures by…” Floon kept himself from revealing the natives at only the last moment. “…by all who visit this planet, I’ve heard.”
It was all Floon could do to keep the existence of the native tribes a secret. Apparently these pirates had no clue they might still be around.
“Fascinating! And you say the wingspan…”
The words tumbled out of Floon like a brook. His trepidation could not dampen his excitement. “No one has seen it in millennia, but I do not lie when I say,” he leaned in, saying conspiratorially, “it is said to be three men across!”
Corbett rubbed his hands together and grinned. “Incredible! Simply incredible. Say, Professor, I know you count yourself among the squeamish, but do you suppose that shooting down a bird of spiritual importance grants a hunter more, how do you say, ‘bragging rights’?”
Floon raised an eyeridge and stared. “Are…are you…joking, sir?”
“I assure you, I am not!” said Corbett, jabbing the desk with his finger. “A hunter such as myself has precious little time for jokes, what with so much glory left unobtained. You’re the closest thing in the galaxy to an expert, Professor. Do you believe killing such a creature would grant me more glory?”
Floon watched the officer nervously. His eyes were eager, his face covered in sweat. The heat was dull and damp in the shade of the tent, the kind of environment Floon had been born into. Very much a comfort zone.
The professor summoned up all his courage, swelling up his chest in rather an alarming way. Corbett’s eyes widened.
“No!” squeaked Floon.
Corbett was puzzled. “…’No’?”
“No!” Floon stood his ground. “How can you talk of killing a creature such as this? For all your talk about appreciating great beasts, you end their magnificent lives with such…relish!” He licked his lipless mouth, his words sputtering and cracking as adrenaline shot through him. He’d never confronted anyone in his life. Certainly not anyone who was willing to kill him. “I don’t mind saying that it is…despicable! Yes, despicable!”
Colonel Corbett, who had initially been very surprised, now furrowed his brow. When he spoke, his tone was dark. “Professor…I’m not used to being talked to in such a-”
“Indeed, indeed!” squawked Floon, suddenly desperate to turn his situation around. “But nor are you used to talking to your intellectual equal, as you have said! This is true, yes?”
Corbett considered it. “Yes, it is true,” he admitted.
“Then please, hear my words, as another man of learning! These creatures are not for killing, they are for studying! For conserving! For…loving! Please, take my offer of friendship and understand I mean you no ill will. I only wish to see a force such as yourself used for…better things!”
Colonel Corbett looked bothered. He had never thought of it in such terms before. Professor Floon breathed heavily, waiting in silence, heart hammering, hoping for a reaction that spared his life.
Finally, the Colonel’s expression softened, and he began to speak. “Professor, I—“
“Colonel Corbett!” came a voice from the tent’s opening. Floon, uncharacteristically, cursed in his head. His heart sank.
“How dare you interrupt me? I said, very clearly I thought, that no one was to interrupt!”
The pirate at the opening was the huge, shirtless one, with the AT-AT driver’s helmet. “But it’s the others, sir, they’ve broken out!”
The moment had passed, Corbett’s mind was on other things. He grabbed his cap and marched towards the entrance. “Well then! Wait here with the Professor, we must hunt them down!”
Corbett marched toward the tent flap, where he was promptly whacked in the head with a blaster handle, and fell flat on his back. He lay there, hair mussed, tongue out, and unconscious.
“Oh my goodness!” cried Floon.
“Quiet, Professor! It’s just me, Kitsa. Ms. Rigo.”
Indeed it was. The reporter came ducking in, blaster in hand. The large pirate stood guard while she knelt down to rummage in Corbett’s holster.
“What-what is going on? Who is this abnormally large man at the door?” asked Floon, who’s voice dropped to an anxious whisper as he added, “Is he not one of the pirates?”
Kitsa pushed a strand of hair out of her face. “Huh? Oh, that’s Deksen,” she explained simply. “He’s gonna help us escape.”
The pirate named Deksen raised a hand in casual greeting.
“O-Oh, how do you do?” Floon replied weakly, and he tipped his hat on instinct. “You are…very big!”
“I get that a lot,” came Deksen’s reply, filtered through his helmet.
“He is, isn’t he?” Kitsa grinned.
“Y-Yes—hold on; escape, you said?” squeaked Floon, who’s brain was beginning to catch up at last.
“Yes, escape,” she repeated firmly, looking him in the eye. “But we have to go now, understand? Otherwise we’ll die?”
Floon withdrew a handkerchief and dabbed at his face. “O-Oh, my. This is all rather a lot. And so sudden…”
“Yes, it is. We still have to save Clod, against my better judgement.”
“S-Save…Clod, you say?” said Floon, wilting with every word, and very close to fainting.
Kitsa smiled wryly and patted him on the shoulder. “Come on, Professor,” she said, and she handed him the Colonel’s blaster before turning to leave. Deksen made to follow her.
Floon went after them, but before reaching the tent’s exit he spun around awkwardly to address his host.
“I’m…very sorry for all this,” he said to Corbett’s unconscious body. “It really w-was lovely meeting you.”
Floon felt it was polite for one to wait to be excused, but Corbett did not reply.
Thus, with a great deal of stumbling and nervous mumbling, the professor hurried to catch up with the others.
“And the natives,” said Slyfoot with relish. “You said you’ve met them before, is that true?”
“Yesh,” spat Clod. He eyed the interrogation droid floating a foot away, its red receptor blinking, prod extended towards him.
“Then you could lead us to them. You will lead me to them.”
“Didn’t you hear a word I said? They found me the first time. I don’t know how to find them now!”
Slyfoot waved a hand dismissively. “Well, no matter. They asked you to return, I’m sure they’ll show up to you soon.”
Clod wished he could wipe his mouth where he’d drooled after one of the many electroshocks. It was starting to chape. “…Thought you…were gonna let us go?” he groaned.
Slyfoot laughed. “Really? You did? I didn’t take you for a fool. No, Mr. Clod. You’ll stay in this luxury for many days to com--I said I wanted no interruptions!”
Light had flooded the room from the now-open door. He heard a blaster go off, and a red bolt smashed into the interrogation droid, knocking it to the ground.
“Pardon me!” said Professor Floon, turning the gun on Slyfoot. The pirate sergeant raised his hands in surrender. “I nearly forgot something on my way out!”
“P-professor?” slurred Clod, craning his neck to see. “I can’t believe it.”
“That’s right, it’s me! I’ve come to rescue you, Mr. Clod.”
Clod groaned with relief. He hadn’t expected this in a million years. “You gotta get me out of here, doc.”
“Indeed!” said the Professor, who prodded Slyfoot with his pistol until he gave up the key to the bindings.
“Nice entry."
Floon seemed pleased. “Thank you! I am honored by the compliment, especially from someone as…daring-do as yourself! I practiced on the way here.”
“It paid off. Now…” he stretched and groaned his weary, burnt muscles. Then he turned towards Slyfoot, who held to his dignity even while fear seeped in the cracks. Weakened though he was, the Klatoonian was dangerous. He proved this to Slyfoot by knocking him to the floor with a right hook.
“Jerk. Wish I had more time.”
“We really must go, Rigo is waiting! She found a way out!”
Clod looked at the Professor and raised an eyebrow. “You already saved her?”
“Saved her?” replied the professor, leading him into the daylight. “Why, it was her who saved me!”
“You’re kidding!”
“I am not kidding, Mr. Clod! I assure you, I am entirely serious!”
They caught up with Kitsa and Deksen at the camp’s boneyard, where ship and vehicle carcasses formed a monument to the pirates’ past conquests.
“He’s fine,” said Kitsa, in response to the alarmed look on Clod’s face. “His name is Deksen, he’s helping us.”
“Nice to meet you,” said Deksen, voice filtered through his helmet.
“Sure, sure. A pleasure,” muttered Clod. “Listen, I told that creepy imp about the natives.”
Kitsa and Floon looked at him with dismay.
“It wasn’t exactly by choice,” grumbled Clod, but he avoided their gaze. “I’m betting they didn’t torture either of you.”
They answered by way of silence.
“Of course not,” he grunted. “Who else here has a face like a Corellian hound?”
“Ahem...I cannot imagine what you went through in that little room, so I cannot blame you for anything you’ve done,” said Floon seriously. “Besides…I let slip quite a lot about the wildlife to the Colonel, and I was under no compulsion besides a foolish enthusiasm for my subject! Oh, how moronic of me. I’m far worse than you, Mr. Clod. Fear no condemnation from us.”
Clod looked at him with something approaching humility and gratitude.
“I didn’t tell anyone anything,” said Kitsa. “Except about myself.”
“Their knowledge simply means we must make greater haste to find the natives first. And with the skills and talents of us three, I find our chances encouraging!”
Kitsa gestured to their soon-to-be-stolen ride. “Especially with this thing.”
Clod hurried forward to look at what she’d found. Underneath a tarp sat a small, aged red-and-white craft. Barely enough space for two people. “What is this, an Incom? Tiny, isn’t it?”
“Who cares who built it?” she replied shortly. “It’s an Airspeeder. Deksen says it’ll still fly.”
Deksen shrugged. “We use it for scout missions.
“Wait," Clod frowned. "We can’t leave yet.”
Kitsa threw up her hands. “Why not?”
“Hat."
“Oh, for karf’s sake--I got your hat, here. Can’t believe you’d get us killed over your hat.”
“My hat! You’re alright, Rigo.”
Deksen cleared his throat. “You three should climb in, you don’t have a lot of time.”
They threw their things in the speeder. Clod clambered into the pilot’s seat and brushed some crumbs off the controls. He checked various switches and toggles with an air of familiarity. Floon crammed himself into the back.
Kitsa was last to get in. She turned and threw herself at Deksen, hugging him awkwardly. She didn’t hug many people. Were you supposed to do it so forcefully? Fortunately, Deksen didn't seem to mind. He folded her gently in his massive arms.
“Thank you. I wish you could come with us.”
His tone carried a smile she couldn’t see through his facemask.
“It was good to meet you. I’ll see you again.”
“And you’ll be okay? The other pirates won’t…”
He put a calming hand on her shoulder. “You think they could?”
“Miss Rigo!” called the professor from the speeder. “I’m quite nervous waiting in here! I wouldn’t say anything, except that my muttering has made Mr. Clod angry.”
The two shared a chuckle. Kitsa smiled sadly and let go of him. She clambered into the airspeeder with the others, where she discovered it was a much tighter fit than she’d expected. Once she’d negotiated space with Floon, she leaned against the window and gave Deksen a final wave.
The pirate waved back.
“Whoof. He’s ripped, huh?” she said wistfully.
“Ripped?” Floon squeaked. “I’d say his shirt is beyond ripped, madam! There’s hardly a shirt there at all!”
The speeder was humming to life, the way any vehicle does that’s taken some battering. A warm, clanky kind of hum.
“Alright,” said Clod from the front. “Off to find the natives?”
“Before the pirates do!” said Kitsa.
“Oh my! A race against pirates, for the good of knowledge and sentient life!” flushed Floon. “It’s all rather exciting, isn’t it?”
50mm macro inverse test
1 of the 15 official wallpapers for ubuntu 12.04 Precise Pangolin.
higher resolution:
bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/ubuntu-wallpapers/+bug/...
A very precise and literal title for a weird abstract.
Playing around with CD refraction, light, water and reflections.
Didn't get anything near what I though I wanted, got this instead.
I got the framing I wanted in this shot as I did with the dam picture, but I got a little perspective distortion from not shooting it exactly level. One thing I like about On1 is that it has an excellent transform feature that lets me make precise corrections of keystoning. My Elements software does not have the ability to correct keystoning.
№ 18 is higly precise hunting rifle, combining advantages of american underbarrel magazine tube and elegancy of classic european bolt. With its excellent accuracy and .300 WHH caliber, this rifle is ideal for hunting large animals such as deers, bears, reindeers or wild boars.
Westinghouse also offers optional optics mounts, sling mounts of various sizes and 3 barrel lenghts (the one on picture is medium length).
So, yeah, for my 2nd Westinghouse weapon, I remade my first one. It´s been some time since I wanted to recreate combo underbarrel tube and classic bolt.
Now after I have this rifle, I can move onto another thing I wanted to recreate...... hunting rifle with underbarrel single shot shotgun barrel (if it causes chaos, you will see when I am finished).
Credits:
Westinghouse, Westinghouse logo and Westinghouse style goes to Xenol.
Engravings go to Worlock.
As ussualy, this weapon is fictional but is based on real weapons.
+++ DISCLAIMER +++
Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!
Some background:
Due to the restrictions of the Versailles treaties, the Reichswehr was already dealing with the increasing mobilization and motorization of the army after the end of the First World War. The realization that the speed of the troop units required appropriate equipment was available early on. However, the Reichswehr suffered from financial constraints and during the Weimar Republic the industry only had limited capacity for series production of larger, armored vehicles.
Nevertheless, at that time the Sd.Kfz. 3 (unarmored half-track transport vehicle/1927), the ARW (eight-wheel car/1928) and the ZRW (ten-wheel car/1928) provided fundamental experience. The findings of these tests and the troop testing with the Sd.Kfz. 3 enabled a more precise specification of the new vehicles to be developed. The "heavy" armored cars were primarily intended for the reconnaissance units of the new armored forces.
The incipient rearmament could only start with a "cheap" solution, though. A three-part armored structure for the chassis of commercially available off-road trucks was developed by the Army Weapons Office, Dept. WaTest 6, in cooperation with the company Deutsche Eisenwerke AG. The typical truck chassis featured front-wheel steering and a driven bogie at the rear (4x6 layout). In June 1929, the companies Magirus, Daimler-Benz and Büssing-NAG were commissioned to develop the desired armored car from it. If you consider that this truck class was developed for a payload of 1.5t, you can already conclude from this that the vehicles, which are now equipped with a significantly heavy armored structure, had little off-road mobility. Even if the appearance of the vehicles supplied by the different manufacturers was similar, there were external distinguishing features by which the manufacturer could be identified. The vehicles were tested in the Reichswehr from 1932 and introduced later.
One of the four crew members (driver, commander, gunner, radio-operator) was used as a reverse driver: with the narrow streets of the time and a turning circle of between 13 and 16m, this function was essential for a truck-sized heavy reconnaissance vehicle. The chassis had the excellent ladder-type configuration, able to withstand the stress of rough rides at high speed. The scout car was 5570 mm long, 1820 mm wide, 2250 mm high and weighed 5.35, 5.7 or 6 tons, depending on the manufacturer. The hull was made of welded steel armor, 5 to 14.5 mm (0.2-0.57 in) thick depending on the angle (bottom to front) with well-sloped plates. The armament consisted of a 2 cm KwK 30 with 200 rounds and a MG 13 with 1300 rounds in a manually operated turret. The fuel supply was 90, 105 or 110 liters, but with a consumption of about 35 or 40 liters per 100 km, this resulted in a completely inadequate range for a scout car.
Having no true alternatives at hand, the armored 4x6 car was accepted and became known as the Sd.Kfz. 231 (6-wheel), and it was subsequently developed into two more vehicles. Up until 1937, 123 vehicles were built as Sd.Kfz. 231 reconnaissance cars and Sd.Kfz. 232 radio trucks. A further 28 were manufactured as Sd.Kfz. 263 (Panzerfunkwagen) command vehicles.
As early as 1932, after testing the pilot series, it was clear that the interim solution of "cheap" 6-wheel vehicles would not meet the future requirements of the armored divisions now planned. It was planned that from 1935/36 at least 18 vehicles of a new type that would meet the requirements for off-road mobility and high road speeds should be produced annually. Büssing-NAG had obviously made a good impression with the ARW and was now commissioned to make the revised vehicle ready for series production, which would become the SdKfz. 231 (8-Rad). The overall concept was completed between 1934 and 1935 and already showed all the features of the future type: all 8 wheels driven and steered, the same speed forwards and backwards, ability to change direction in less than 10 seconds, and a turning circle of "only" 10.5m. The vehicle layout was changed, too: the engine bay was relocated to the rear, the crew compartment was placed at the front end. This improved weight distribution, handling, and the field of view for the main forward driver.
The purpose of the new vehicles was identical to that of the earlier heavy 6-wheel vehicles, they were used on the same sites and so the same ordnance inventory designation was adopted, despite the vehicle’s many modifications. The so-called Sd.Kfz. 231 (8-Rad) was armed, corresponding to its 6-Rad counterpart, with a 2cm KwK 30 and the MG 13 (later MG 34) in a rotating turret. Likewise, the Sd.Kfz. 232 (8-Rad) carried a large, curved bow antenna, and there was a Sd.Kfz. 263 (8-Rad) command vehicle, too.
Nevertheless, the Army Weapons Office demanded a short-term solution for a vehicle based on the 4x6 chassis that offered better off-road performance and armament, namely a 37 mm anti-tank gun, with at least comparable range and armor protection. This interim vehicle was supposed to be ready for service in early 1934. Magirus accepted the challenge and proposed the Sd.Kfz. 241, a 4x8 vehicle. It retained the old overall 6-Rad layout with the front engine under a long bonnet, but it had a fourth steered axle added to lower ground pressure and improve the vehicle’s trench bridging capabilities. The powered two rear axles retained the 6-Rad’s twin wheels, so that the vehicle stood on a total of twelve tires with a relatively large footprint. The armored hull was very similar to the Sd.Kfz. 231 6-Rad, but carried a new, bigger turret with a 3.7 cm KwK 30 L/45 gun and an axis-parallel 7.92 mm MG 34 light machine gun.
The box-shaped turret exploited the hull’s width to the maximum and had a maximum armor of 15 mm, no base and the seat of the commander was attached to the tower wall. The commander sat elevated under a raised cupola in the rear section of the turret, just behind the main gun. He had five viewing slits protected by glass blocks and steel slides for all-round visibility. The gunner/loader, standing to the left of the main gun, had to constantly follow the movement of the turret, which was done by hand. In order to support the gunner when slewing the turret, the commander had an additional handle on the right side. The two crew members also had a turret position indicator.
The cannon was fired electrically via a trigger, the machine gun was operated mechanically with a pedal. To aim and view the outside, the gunner had a gun sight to the left of the gun with an opening in the gun mantlet. Standard access to the vehicle was through low double-doors in the vehicle’ flank, but side exit openings in the turret with two flaps each were also frequently used to board it. Another entry was through the commander cupola’s lid.
With all this extra hardware, the Sd.Kfz. 241’s overall weight rose considerably from the late Sd.Kfz. 231 (6-Rad) nearly 6 tons to 7.5 tons. As a consequence, the chassis had to be reinforced and a more powerful engine was used, a 6-cylinder Maybach HL 42 TRKM w carburetor gasoline engine with 4170 cc capacity and 100 hp (74 kW) output at 3000 rpm.
As expected, the Sd.Kfz. 241 was not a success. Even though the first vehicles were delivered in time in mid-1934, its operational value was rather limited. Off-road capability was, due to the extra weight, the raised center of gravity and the lack of all-wheel drive, just as bad as the 6-Rad vehicles, and the more powerful engine’s higher fuel consumption allowed neither higher range, despite bigger fuel tanks, nor a better street performance. The only real progress was the new 3.7 cm KwK 30’s firepower, which was appreciated by the crews, even though the weapon was only effective against armored targets at close range. At 100 m, 64 mm of vertical armor could be penetrated, but at 500 m this already dropped to 31 mm, any angle in the armor weakened its hitting power even further. The weapon’s maximum range was 5.000m, though, and with HE rounds the Sd.Kfz. 241 could provide indirect fire support. Another factor that limited the vehicle’s effectiveness was that the gun had to be operated by a single crew member who had to load and aim at the same time – there was simply not enough space for a separate loader who would also have increased the gun’s rate of fire from six to maybe twelve rounds per minute. The vehicle’s armor was also inadequate and only gave protection against light firearms, but not against machine guns or heavier weapons. On the other side, the cupola on top of the turret offered the commander in his elevated position a very good all-round field of view, even when under full protection – but this progressive detail was not adopted for the following armored reconnaissance vehicles and remained exclusive to German battle tanks.
Only a total of fifty-five Sd.Kfz. 241s were completed by Magirus in Cologne until 1936, when production of the Sd.Kfz. 231 (8-Rad) vehicle family started and soon replaced the Sd.Kfz. 241, which was primarily operated at the Eastern Front in Poland and Czechoslovakia. By 1940, no Sd.Kfz. 241 was left in any frontline army unit, but a few survivors were grouped together and handed over to police units. Their main gun was either completely deleted or sometimes replaced with a second machine gun, and they were used for urban patrols and riot control duties. However, by 1942, no Sd.Kfz. 241 was left over.
Specifications:
Crew: Four (commander, gunner, driver, radio operator/rear driver)
Weight: 7.5 tons (11.450 lb)
Length: 5,85 metres (19 ft 2 in)
Width: 2,20 metres (7 ft 2 ½ in)
Height: 2,78 metres (9 ft 1 in)
Ground clearance: 28.5 cm (10 in)
Suspension: Torsion bar and leaf springs
Fuel capacity: 150 litres (33 imp gal; 40 US gal)
Armor:
8–15 mm (0.31 – 0.6 in)
Performance:
Maximum road speed: 70 km/h (43.5 mph)
52 km/h (32.3 mph) backwards
Operational range: 250 km (155 miles)
Power/weight: 13 PS/ton
Engine:
Maybach HL42 TRKM water-cooled straight 6-cylinder petrol engine with 100 hp (74 kW),
driving the rear pair of axles
Transmission:
Maybach gearbox with 5-speed forward and 4-speed reverse
Armament:
1× 37 mm KwK 30 L/45 cannon with 70 rounds
1× 7.92 mm MG 34 machine gun mounted co-axially with 1.300 rounds
The kit and its assembly:
This fictional armored car was inspired by a leftover rear axles from an Italeri Sd.Kfz. 231 (6-Rad) model that I converted into a fictional half-track variant some time ago. I wondered if the set could be transplanted under an 8-Rad chassis, to create a kind of missing link to the 8x8 successors of the Sd.Kfz. 231 (6-Rad) with a total of twelve tires on four axles.
The basis became a First to Fight 1:72 Sd.Kfz. 231 (8-Rad) kit – a rather simple and robust affair, apparently primarily intended for tabletop purposes. But the overall impression is good, and it would be modified, anyway, even though the plastic turned out to be rather soft/waxy and the parts’ sprue attachment points a bit wacky.
The hull was “turned around” to drive backwards, so that its rear engine ended up in the front. I eventually only used the rear twin wheels from the Sd.Kfz. 231 (6-Rad), but not its single axles and laminated springs. Instead, I first cut the OOB mudguards in two halves, removed their side skirts and glued them onto the lower hull in reversed order, so that the exhausts and their muffler boxes would end up at the rear of the front fenders. With these in place I checked the axles’ position from the OOB ladder chassis, which is a single, integral part, and found that the rear axles’ position had to be moved by 2mm backwards. Cutting the original piece and re-arranging it was easier to scratch a new rear suspension, and the rocker bars had to be shortened to accept the wider twin wheels.
The original small turret with the 20 mm autocannon was deleted and replaced with core elements from a Panzer III turret, left over from previous conversion projects. Wider than any original turret of the Sd.Kfz. 231/232 family, it had to be narrowed by roughly 5mm – I had to cut a respective plug from the turret’s and the mantlet’s middle section, the deformed hatch was covered under a Panzer III commander cupola. To mate the re-arranged turret with the OOB adapter plate to mount it onto the hull, and to add overall stability to the construction, I filled the interior with 2C putty.
The typical storage bin at the turret’s rear was omitted, though, it would have made it too large for the compact truck chassis. The shape was a perfect stylistic match, even though, with the longer gun barrel, the vehicle reminds a lot of the Soviet BA-10 heavy armored car?
Most small details like the bumpers and the headlights were taken OOB, I added a whip antenna base at the rear and mounted two spare wheels at the back, one of them covered with a tarpaulin (made from paper tissue drenched with white glue, this was also used to create the gun mantlet seals).
Painting and markings:
Typical for German vehicles from the early WWII stages the Sd.Kfz. 241 was painted Panzergrau (RAL 7021; I used Humbrol 67, which is authentic, but mixed it with some 125 to create a slightly lighter shade of grey) overall - quite dull, but realistic. To make the vehicle look more interesting, though, I added authentic contemporary camouflage in the form of low-contrast blotches with RAL 8017, a very dark reddish brown, mixed from Humbrol 160 and some 98. Better, but IMHO still not enough.
After the model received a washing with highly thinned red-brown acrylic artist paint I applied the few decals and gave the parts an overall dry-brushing treatment with grey and dark earth. Everything was sealed with matt acrylic varnish. For even more “excitement”, I decided to add a coat of snow.
For the simulated “frosting” I used white tile grout – which has the benefits of being water-soluble, quite sturdy to touch and the material does not yellow over time like gypsum.
First, the wheels, the chassis and the inside of the wheel arches received a separate treatment with relatively dryly mixed tile grout, simulating snow and dirt clusters. Once thoroughly dried, the wheels were mounted. Then the model was sprayed with low surface tension water and loose tile grout was drizzled over hull and turret, creating a flaky coat of fake snow. Once dry again, everything received another coat of matt acrylic varnish to protect and fixate everything further.
A relatively quick build, done in a few days. The First to Fight kit is very simple and went together well, but I’d use something else the next time due to the odd material it was molded with. The outcome of an 4x8 scout car looks quite plausible, though, like the missing link between the Sd.Kfz. 231 and 232 – the unintended similarity with the Soviet BA-10 heavy armored car was a bit surprising, though. And the snow on the model eventually makes it look a bit more interesting, the stunt was worth the effort.
Provincial Yelets was once considered one of the most beautiful towns in Russia. It was adorned with two monasteries, three dozen Orthodox churches, a Polish Catholic church, a German church, and a Jewish synagogue. The precise rhythm of its domes and bell towers still defines the skyline of the old town.
The great Russian writer Ivan Bunin, in exile in a distant land, recalled "...the ringing, the roar of the bells from the bell tower of St. Michael the Archangel, towering above everything in such grandeur, such splendor, such as the Roman Church of St. Peter never dreamed of, and such enormity that the Pyramid of Cheops could never again impress me." The Church of St. Michael the Archangel stands next to the administration building in the center of Yelets, the city where the future Nobel laureate spent his high school years. He often spoke warmly of the city of his youth.
On Red Square stands the colossal Ascension Cathedral. It claims to be the second largest Orthodox church in Russia after St. Isaac's Cathedral in St. Petersburg. The cathedral was designed by the renowned architect Konstantin Andreevich Ton (1794-1881), the architect of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior and the Grand Kremlin Palace. Approving the design, Tsar Nicholas I ordered the architect to be granted royal favor for the cathedral's beauty. The interior decoration was worked on by the Itinerant artists and academicians of painting, Alexei Ivanovich Korzukhin (1835-1894) and Klavdy Vasilyevich Lebedev (1852-1916).
Above the cathedral's left iconostasis is a painting of the "Mother of God of Yelets." The Virgin Mary and her heavenly host block the path of Tamerlane's invasion in 1395.
To commemorate the 500th anniversary of Rus''s miraculous deliverance from the invasion, the Church of Our Lady of Yelets was founded in Yelets. Its tented roof still dominates the modern architecture of the southern part of the city. People call it "the red church," either for the color of its brick or for the beauty of its unusual shapes.
Yelets has seen so many people within its walls over its thousand-year history. Presumably founded in 986 as the center of an appanage principality, the city was first mentioned in the Nikon Chronicle for 1146:
“Prince Svyatoslav Olgovich went to Rezan and visited Mchensk, and Tula, and Dubok on the Don, and Yelets, and Pronsk, and came to Rezan on the Oka...”
Its location on the southeastern outskirts of the Russian lands, bordering the "wild field," determined the city's fate for several centuries: "it was... the protector of the Russian lands." Polovtsian raids, Tatar-Mongol invasions, and attacks by Crimean and Golden Horde hordes repeatedly brought the city to desolation, but it was rebuilt and rose again.
"The city itself also boasted of its antiquity, and had every right to do so: it truly was one of the most ancient cities lying among the great black earth fields of the Substeppe, on that fateful line beyond which once stretched "wild, unknown lands," and in the times of the principalities of Suzdal and Ryazan, it belonged to those most important strongholds of Rus' that, according to the chroniclers, were the first to breathe in the storm, dust, and cold from under the menacing Asian clouds that continually passed over it, the first to see the glow of the terrible night and day fires ignited by them, the first to let Moscow know of the impending disaster and the first to lay down their lives for it..." (I. A. Bunin).
From the mid-17th century, Yelets developed as a city of artisans and traders. Livestock trading, tanneries, trade in grain, flour, and semolina, and the famous Yelets lace made the city prosperous and brought it fame.
Yelets's historical heritage includes approximately two hundred architectural monuments. The city itself is a monument to Russian urban planning. Narrow, straight streets running north to south and east to west, combined with low, two- and three-story buildings that are spacious enough to accommodate a person, create a uniquely cozy atmosphere. In Yelets, you don't feel lost, as you might in a larger city. Perhaps this is why the constant flow of tourists eager to see the green Russian city...
A small town, wandering its cozy streets, and visiting the church. Perhaps it's also because the Yelets region is the birthplace of writers Ivan Bunin and Mikhail Prishvin, philosopher Vasily Rozanov, composer Tikhon Khrennikov, and artists Vasily Meshkov, Nikolai Ulyanov, and Nikolai Zhukov. Yelets attracts visitors with its lacemaking industry, museums, art gallery, picturesque landscapes, and fascinating natural sites. It also draws visitors with its centuries-long, dramatic history, closely linked to the fate of Russia.
Many of Yelets' churches have suffered a tragic fate. Not all survived the destruction and hard times. Birch trees grow on the exposed domes of the Church of the Archangel Michael, which so captivated Ivan Bunin's youthful imagination. The traces of abandonment and neglect on many of the remaining churches speak to the hearts of the people. With Russia's rebirth comes a renaissance of its small and medium-sized towns, and Yelets is at the top of that list.
Will we restore its former beauty?
V. Gorlov.
I have what is probably going to be a lengthy response to an e-mail I recently received but before I get into that, a bit about this image. This was taken with an Holga of mine, a 120S to be precise. I am fortunate enough to have gotten one of these before Holgas became mainstreamed and were subsequently "improved" to be attractive to a mass audience. It used to be that no two Holgas were quite alike. Most would leak light, but often each in its own unique way. They would routinely spool the film loose, causing further light leaks. They would flare. They were much softer around the edges. They did not come with a square mask, just the rectangular one, so your frame edges were not terribly even or straight. Alas, now they rarely leak light without modification, foam has been added to make the film spool tighter. They include a square mask so that each negative is a neat square. I have a newer Holga and I still love that camera, but pulling my old 120S out and shooting it again reminded me just how much I appreciated the quirky and unpredictable nature of this camera.
My 120S took up the habit of scratching my film. Quite heavily at that. It was one of the reasons I eventually put it down and switched to my newer 120FN. But I decided to finally see if I could fix the scratching. I am willing to let a lot of the Holga's quirks go, but scratching is one that I do have trouble coping with. So I lined the interior edges of the frame mask with black electrical tape thinking that would do the trick as there are not too many places the film contacts the camera, that being about the only.
It didn't work. I am still not quite sure why. Chalk it up to the Holga being a Holga. What is more, somewhere along the shooting, my tape came unstuck and stuck out into my negative, creating those black edges you see along the borders of the image.
When I scanned this image in, one of the first things I did was crop it out and make my edges clean. As soon as I did so though, this image lost something. I don't know what, but those black edges lend this photo some extra little element. So I reversed the crop and kept it. I still do not quite understand why, other than that slight feeling that the image is more with them than without.
Now onto the e-mail. I get this e-mail quite a bit, and I try to answer it the best that I can. The basic request is generally for any helpful advice I have for photographers just getting started, who are not sure how to get better, and are generally discouraged by looking at all the great photography out there and thinking they will never get there.
I have answered this question more times that I can remember, in e-mails, over the counter at Blue Moon Camera, in high school and college classrooms, out in the field, etc. Each time that I answer it, my answer tends to evolve a little, so here is the latest evolution:
Be patient. Of all the traits a photographer should endeavor to possess, patience is the most important. Getting better at photography is like getting better at anything else; it takes time, practice and patience.
Forget talent. Talent, or the lack of it, is often used as an excuse for good and poor photography. Dedication, passion, and persistence trump talent every day of the week. I would take one passionate photographer for a dozen talented photographers any time.
Every photographer, no matter how good they are now, at one time had to start at the beginning. We all did. None of us started out making exceptional images. We all started out stumbling and feeling our way around, in varying degrees of confusion. All those mistakes you are embarrassed about making? Chances are I have made every one of them at least ten times over.
Make mistakes. And don't be afraid to. You learn more from your mistakes I think than your successes. Everything you do with a camera, should be teaching you how to do it better, regardless of the immediate results you get that day. Experiment, fail, learn, experiment some more.
The more you put in, the more you will get out. If you are going out one weekend a month to take photos, you will get better, but at a much slower rate. If you are going out everyday you will get better much more quickly. Now, not all of us have the opportunity to work with photography everyday. Some of us can only manage a weekend a month. That is fine, just try not to get too discouraged when you do not think you are growing as a photographer. It will happen, it may just take a bit longer.
Carry your camera everywhere. Never leave home without a camera. Ever. The best way to guarantee you will see a photo you really want to take is to not have a camera with you. It does not do much good sitting at home. And when I say everywhere, I mean everywhere, no matter how mundane the trip seems to be.
Shoot for yourself. Peer response is certainly important and can teach you a lot about your own photography, and you should definitely share your pictures with others every chance you get, but ultimately take photos for yourself, in your own way. You are your most important critic. If you are not happy with the images you are taking, it does not matter how popular they are. And don't make apologies for your photography. Some people will love it. Some will not. Some will think it completely pointless. That is fine, as long as you like it.
Shoot film. A lot of photographers getting into photography these days are "growing up" on strictly digital diets. Digital can do a lot, but it is a far from everything. Pick up a film camera to complement your digital camera. Film teaches different habits and styles from digital. It is like trying to build a house using only a screwdiver and not a hammer. It can be done, but you are missing out on a lot of other ways to create images. And what film has to teach, can very readily apply to digital photography too.
Shoot digital. If you are only into film photography, pick up a cheap digital camera. The quickness and readily available nature of the feedback they can give you can be a valuable learning tool. If you are limiting yourself to just film, you are missing a huge portion of the photographic spectrum.
Expose yourself to lots of other photography. Flickr is a good start, but it is a small pond in a much larger landscape. Hit up your local library and check out as many books as you can carry and go through them. Go to openings at museums and galleries. Attend artist lectures. Go to a workshop or two or attend a class at a local community college, not just for the instruction but the exposure to other photographers. Arrange photo outings with peers. The more photography you are exposed to, the wider the range of perspectives you will learn to see the world with.
A photographer is a photographer, no matter where they are. There are always pictures to be taken, everywhere. It is a photographer's task to see them. A good photographer realizes this, even if they cannot always see the pictures to be taken, they still try to.
Learn the rules to break them. There are a ton of rules in photography and they can be an excellent framework around which to improve your skills. Learn them thoroughly and how to use them. But, again, be careful for that very framework that has helped build you up can eventually become a cage that restricts you. Those that hold too tightly to the rules tend to see their creativity suffer.
Don't get too hung up on not knowing the technicals. Technical knowledge will come quickly, especially with practice. At first things like Depth of Field, aperture, resolution, aspect ratio, color temperature, exposure, shadows, highlights, zone V, reciprocity failure, visible spectrum, focal length, shutter speed can all seem confusing. Start slowly, and start simply, and put the these technical terms into practice as you learn them. But don't worry too much about knowing them because you will learn them quickly. I remember when I first picked up a camera I had no concept of what in the hell an aperture was. I just knew I had to rotate that ring on the lens until my meter needle pointed to the middle. That was how I began. Now years later this is all reflexive knowledge. You will get there too, probably within a few months. So don't stress out too much right now if you don't understand some of these technical terms. Find somebody helpful to explain them, get a good book, or go out and experiment. Or do all three.
Shoot manually. My boss often jokes that "Automatic means bad". He has a point. Turn all your auto functions on your camera to manual, especially focus and exposure. Taking photos this way will be more cumbersome and you will make more mistakes. But you will learn at a much quicker rate, and eventually you will understand how to use these features better than the automatic modes of your camera can. You are smarter than your camera, so try not to let the automatic features become a crutch, they will impair how quickly you understand what each shutter speed does, what each aperture does, how to learn to focus, etc. Keep as much control over your photography as possible.
Make scrapbooks. Routinely take your favorite photos and put them together into small scrapbooks. It is like keeping a visual journal of your progress. I did this for the first few years of photography and I noticed two big influences this had on my opinions of my own photography. First, when I got discouraged I could get out my latest albums and flip through them and see a collection of what were then my favorite photos, and I could see the cream of the crop. I could see how in fact I actually was making great images that I really liked. These scrapbooks helped remind me that I really was making progress. Second, I could go back to my earliest scrapbooks and see just how "awful" those photos that I had once thought were my best really were. I generally got a good chuckle out of this remembering how proud I was of those collections and how many people I showed them to, and then I would go back and flip through them and see, in contrast, just how much better I had become, but more importantly it kept me humble because it reminded me that there are times where we think our photos are much better than they may be, because we are so personally invested in them. This humble reminder of my beginnings was probably the biggest influence of these albums. So do not throw away or replace your old albums if you do this. If you use Flickr for this purpose, don't delete your old photos. They have a lot to teach you when you come back a few years later with a more experienced eye.
Have fun. For today, the last and most important piece of advice I have to offer. If you enjoy what you do, the rest of this will come quite naturally. This ties in with what I said about being passionate about your photography. Just go out and have fun and love what you do. In comparison very little else is nearly as important.
Now stop reading this, get your camera and go out and make some pictures, wherever you are.
Provincial Yelets was once considered one of the most beautiful towns in Russia. It was adorned with two monasteries, three dozen Orthodox churches, a Polish Catholic church, a German church, and a Jewish synagogue. The precise rhythm of its domes and bell towers still defines the skyline of the old town.
The great Russian writer Ivan Bunin, in exile in a distant land, recalled "...the ringing, the roar of the bells from the bell tower of St. Michael the Archangel, towering above everything in such grandeur, such splendor, such as the Roman Church of St. Peter never dreamed of, and such enormity that the Pyramid of Cheops could never again impress me." The Church of St. Michael the Archangel stands next to the administration building in the center of Yelets, the city where the future Nobel laureate spent his high school years. He often spoke warmly of the city of his youth.
On Red Square stands the colossal Ascension Cathedral. It claims to be the second largest Orthodox church in Russia after St. Isaac's Cathedral in St. Petersburg. The cathedral was designed by the renowned architect Konstantin Andreevich Ton (1794-1881), the architect of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior and the Grand Kremlin Palace. Approving the design, Tsar Nicholas I ordered the architect to be granted royal favor for the cathedral's beauty. The interior decoration was worked on by the Itinerant artists and academicians of painting, Alexei Ivanovich Korzukhin (1835-1894) and Klavdy Vasilyevich Lebedev (1852-1916).
Above the cathedral's left iconostasis is a painting of the "Mother of God of Yelets." The Virgin Mary and her heavenly host block the path of Tamerlane's invasion in 1395.
To commemorate the 500th anniversary of Rus''s miraculous deliverance from the invasion, the Church of Our Lady of Yelets was founded in Yelets. Its tented roof still dominates the modern architecture of the southern part of the city. People call it "the red church," either for the color of its brick or for the beauty of its unusual shapes.
Yelets has seen so many people within its walls over its thousand-year history. Presumably founded in 986 as the center of an appanage principality, the city was first mentioned in the Nikon Chronicle for 1146:
“Prince Svyatoslav Olgovich went to Rezan and visited Mchensk, and Tula, and Dubok on the Don, and Yelets, and Pronsk, and came to Rezan on the Oka...”
Its location on the southeastern outskirts of the Russian lands, bordering the "wild field," determined the city's fate for several centuries: "it was... the protector of the Russian lands." Polovtsian raids, Tatar-Mongol invasions, and attacks by Crimean and Golden Horde hordes repeatedly brought the city to desolation, but it was rebuilt and rose again.
"The city itself also boasted of its antiquity, and had every right to do so: it truly was one of the most ancient cities lying among the great black earth fields of the Substeppe, on that fateful line beyond which once stretched "wild, unknown lands," and in the times of the principalities of Suzdal and Ryazan, it belonged to those most important strongholds of Rus' that, according to the chroniclers, were the first to breathe in the storm, dust, and cold from under the menacing Asian clouds that continually passed over it, the first to see the glow of the terrible night and day fires ignited by them, the first to let Moscow know of the impending disaster and the first to lay down their lives for it..." (I. A. Bunin).
From the mid-17th century, Yelets developed as a city of artisans and traders. Livestock trading, tanneries, trade in grain, flour, and semolina, and the famous Yelets lace made the city prosperous and brought it fame.
Yelets's historical heritage includes approximately two hundred architectural monuments. The city itself is a monument to Russian urban planning. Narrow, straight streets running north to south and east to west, combined with low, two- and three-story buildings that are spacious enough to accommodate a person, create a uniquely cozy atmosphere. In Yelets, you don't feel lost, as you might in a larger city. Perhaps this is why the constant flow of tourists eager to see the green Russian city...
A small town, wandering its cozy streets, and visiting the church. Perhaps it's also because the Yelets region is the birthplace of writers Ivan Bunin and Mikhail Prishvin, philosopher Vasily Rozanov, composer Tikhon Khrennikov, and artists Vasily Meshkov, Nikolai Ulyanov, and Nikolai Zhukov. Yelets attracts visitors with its lacemaking industry, museums, art gallery, picturesque landscapes, and fascinating natural sites. It also draws visitors with its centuries-long, dramatic history, closely linked to the fate of Russia.
Many of Yelets' churches have suffered a tragic fate. Not all survived the destruction and hard times. Birch trees grow on the exposed domes of the Church of the Archangel Michael, which so captivated Ivan Bunin's youthful imagination. The traces of abandonment and neglect on many of the remaining churches speak to the hearts of the people. With Russia's rebirth comes a renaissance of its small and medium-sized towns, and Yelets is at the top of that list.
Will we restore its former beauty?
V. Gorlov.
The precise identification of aeroplanes produced by the Voisin brothers is difficult due to the non-existence of a specific factory identification system. The Voisin factory produced their aeroplanes. But there are also other complications.
The Voisin factory built its machines one by one. This meant that after the first completed machine, the next one built was based on the experience gained from the first. Most of the time something was altered in the design. This was a continuous process, resulting in machines that differed in some respects. A special point was the engine to be built in - a rotary or a water-cooled inline engine. This makes looking in detail to photographs of early Voisin pusher biplanes so fascinating.
Seen on this picture is a Voisin pusher biplane - generally identified as Voisin de Course (that is for competitions), dated around 1910. Ailerons with a somewhat rounded edge are mounted on the top wing only. The tail section consists of a single rudder and two small fixed ‘wings’- being the structural last remains of the box construction from former models. The elevator (single wing) is in the front connected to the short central fuselage. This elevator is operated by a rod - wheel construction, where the steering wheel is operated by the pilot. Behind the pilot is a large radiator for the inline or V-type engine. On the ground the machine rests on its tail skid but a large anti-nose over is attached to underneath the fuselage to prevent a ground loop. The whole fuselage is completely open and is a steel tube construction, giving more safety to the pilot but not much comfort in cold flights. The fuel tank is mounted somewhat above the engine.
When consulting other photos of what is generally identified as a Voisin de Course Type 1910 you will certainly notice differences between almost all of them.
In this photo their is a female in the pilot position. I was not able to identify her. Baronne Raymonde de Laroche - pseudo of Élisa Léontine Deroche - flew a Voisin pusher biplane but an earlier type which are generally identified as the Voisin Cellulaire type, distinguished by its compartments between the wings.
No kidding! It's a real rainbow and not digitized... and of all places she appear at Marina Bay Sands right in the middle of the Sands Sky Park. Co-incidence or just sheer luck. How I wish my lottery can be that precise.
Taken right before sunset. Manually stitched from 3 vertical images. I darken the sky a little with "Multiply" on layers to get a clearer view of the rainbow. Shot from Bras Basah Complex level 24, Blk133.
Provincial Yelets was once considered one of the most beautiful towns in Russia. It was adorned with two monasteries, three dozen Orthodox churches, a Polish Catholic church, a German church, and a Jewish synagogue. The precise rhythm of its domes and bell towers still defines the skyline of the old town.
The great Russian writer Ivan Bunin, in exile in a distant land, recalled "...the ringing, the roar of the bells from the bell tower of St. Michael the Archangel, towering above everything in such grandeur, such splendor, such as the Roman Church of St. Peter never dreamed of, and such enormity that the Pyramid of Cheops could never again impress me." The Church of St. Michael the Archangel stands next to the administration building in the center of Yelets, the city where the future Nobel laureate spent his high school years. He often spoke warmly of the city of his youth.
On Red Square stands the colossal Ascension Cathedral. It claims to be the second largest Orthodox church in Russia after St. Isaac's Cathedral in St. Petersburg. The cathedral was designed by the renowned architect Konstantin Andreevich Ton (1794-1881), the architect of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior and the Grand Kremlin Palace. Approving the design, Tsar Nicholas I ordered the architect to be granted royal favor for the cathedral's beauty. The interior decoration was worked on by the Itinerant artists and academicians of painting, Alexei Ivanovich Korzukhin (1835-1894) and Klavdy Vasilyevich Lebedev (1852-1916).
Above the cathedral's left iconostasis is a painting of the "Mother of God of Yelets." The Virgin Mary and her heavenly host block the path of Tamerlane's invasion in 1395.
To commemorate the 500th anniversary of Rus''s miraculous deliverance from the invasion, the Church of Our Lady of Yelets was founded in Yelets. Its tented roof still dominates the modern architecture of the southern part of the city. People call it "the red church," either for the color of its brick or for the beauty of its unusual shapes.
Yelets has seen so many people within its walls over its thousand-year history. Presumably founded in 986 as the center of an appanage principality, the city was first mentioned in the Nikon Chronicle for 1146:
“Prince Svyatoslav Olgovich went to Rezan and visited Mchensk, and Tula, and Dubok on the Don, and Yelets, and Pronsk, and came to Rezan on the Oka...”
Its location on the southeastern outskirts of the Russian lands, bordering the "wild field," determined the city's fate for several centuries: "it was... the protector of the Russian lands." Polovtsian raids, Tatar-Mongol invasions, and attacks by Crimean and Golden Horde hordes repeatedly brought the city to desolation, but it was rebuilt and rose again.
"The city itself also boasted of its antiquity, and had every right to do so: it truly was one of the most ancient cities lying among the great black earth fields of the Substeppe, on that fateful line beyond which once stretched "wild, unknown lands," and in the times of the principalities of Suzdal and Ryazan, it belonged to those most important strongholds of Rus' that, according to the chroniclers, were the first to breathe in the storm, dust, and cold from under the menacing Asian clouds that continually passed over it, the first to see the glow of the terrible night and day fires ignited by them, the first to let Moscow know of the impending disaster and the first to lay down their lives for it..." (I. A. Bunin).
From the mid-17th century, Yelets developed as a city of artisans and traders. Livestock trading, tanneries, trade in grain, flour, and semolina, and the famous Yelets lace made the city prosperous and brought it fame.
Yelets's historical heritage includes approximately two hundred architectural monuments. The city itself is a monument to Russian urban planning. Narrow, straight streets running north to south and east to west, combined with low, two- and three-story buildings that are spacious enough to accommodate a person, create a uniquely cozy atmosphere. In Yelets, you don't feel lost, as you might in a larger city. Perhaps this is why the constant flow of tourists eager to see the green Russian city...
A small town, wandering its cozy streets, and visiting the church. Perhaps it's also because the Yelets region is the birthplace of writers Ivan Bunin and Mikhail Prishvin, philosopher Vasily Rozanov, composer Tikhon Khrennikov, and artists Vasily Meshkov, Nikolai Ulyanov, and Nikolai Zhukov. Yelets attracts visitors with its lacemaking industry, museums, art gallery, picturesque landscapes, and fascinating natural sites. It also draws visitors with its centuries-long, dramatic history, closely linked to the fate of Russia.
Many of Yelets' churches have suffered a tragic fate. Not all survived the destruction and hard times. Birch trees grow on the exposed domes of the Church of the Archangel Michael, which so captivated Ivan Bunin's youthful imagination. The traces of abandonment and neglect on many of the remaining churches speak to the hearts of the people. With Russia's rebirth comes a renaissance of its small and medium-sized towns, and Yelets is at the top of that list.
Will we restore its former beauty?
V. Gorlov.
I can't remember the precise whereabouts of this yard, belonging to ...or at least used by... Morris Bros of Swansea. I must have walked to it from Swansea Station but, looking at other photos taken on the same occasion, it seems to have been way out on the edge of the city. A pretty stiff walk, but I was young then and would have thought nothing of it. But how did I know where the yard was? No Google Maps satellite view in those days. It was Friday 6th July 1979. All is now lost in the mists of antiquity.
In those days, long before Health and Safety, or "security", nobody seemed to take any notice if you just walked in as though you owned the place and started taking photos. The yard, I observed, was used by local people as an unofficial short cut by which to reach their homes. The vehicle was not, as you might have thought, a "playbus" but, according to that roundel between the decks, the City of Swansea Exhibition Bus. No registration number on the front, but I must have taken notes. Details are preserved on the reverse of the print. The bus was an AEC Regent Mk V with Willowbrook bodywork, formerly South Wales Transport no. 561: 996 BCY.
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Some people live a lifetime in the shadows of reality, a shallow existence of treading water and going through the motions. The wheel is turning but the hamster is already dead. Some folk live life on the ragged edge and even at my tender age, with killing in my blood, I guess you could say that I fit neatly into the latter category. Ronnie was the sort of mentor that you never forget. A stickler for details, precise and meticulous to the highest degree, his legacy lives on in these bones as I wait patiently as the morning light invades the dark confines of Covent Garden's sleepy belly. There is a lot riding on this, and I'm only too aware of the pressure that I am under to succeed with aplomb, the array of hastily smoked cigarettes that lay spent and flattened beneath the pointed toes of my highly polished shoes is a testament to that very fact. I should really kick the habit, I know I should. It's just that with a life that involves death and carnage on a regular basis, a man needs a couple of vices to temper the mayhem and madness. Viewing life through the bottom of a Souther Comfort bottle is another one, and I don't see myself kicking that habit in the near future either.
Failure here is not an option.
It's all in the detail, as Ronnie would frequently remind me. I remember his tuition from the days before the cancer claimed him, and the look of glee and delight upon his pained and tortured face through the ravages of the disease when he saw in me the potential to take the reigns in his much lamented absence. I like to think that he's still watching me, looking down on each move that I make, raging at my schoolboy errors, applauding me when I actually get it right. I hope I make him proud.
Another cigarette butt hits the hard cement surface of the paving stones and my eyes survey the scene around the little clothes boutique where the mark will soon be arriving, just as she always does around seven thirty, eager to prepare her shop for the day ahead, proud of her achievements no doubt, a lone female businesswoman in a pit of vipers. It occurs to me that there must be such a sense of pride in being the sole proprietor of one's own establishment. The thrill of ownership, of being your own boss, of riding the roller-coaster to survival and success and hopefully seeing a profit at the end of the day, month, year even. I guess we all take pride in certain facets of our lives. Me, I'm a stickler for courtesy towards those who cross my path. Oh I know, they're dead so why bother, but behind each mark is a person, a story to tell, a family who will mourn and a succession of lives that will never come to terms with the actions of a cold blooded bastard such as I. Actions and consequences as Ronnie always used to say, waving around his semi automatic with a nonchalance and cavalier stance that belied his consummate skill as the hit man of choice for decades before I was even a twinkle in my daddy's winkle.
There are some like me who see the mark as no more than a piece of meat to use and abuse, destroy and discard. But myself, I have the utmost respect for those that fall prey to my craft. One moment enjoying a sunrise or sunset, a skinny latte in some rancid little corporate coffee house, dreaming in the king sized bed nestling in their private mansion, and the next, capow! They never knew what hit them. And I always close their eyes and try to leave the corpse that is still warm to the touch and flowing the last remnants of blood through it's myriad of veins and arteries, with a semblance of respectability, for who know the trauma of the first person on the scene to find them once I am gone. A son or daughter, a lover or husband, mother or father, the trauma of the sight that greets them will live on for an eternity. Only right and proper that I leave the scene as neat and user friendly as I can.
I check my watch once more, my iPod earpiece almost shooting it's tiny load with excitement at the pounding beat of Van Halen's 'Right now', a tour de force, seminal track in their long and rocky career if ever there was one. Made in the days when Sammy Hagar fronted the band and gave them some credibility before that long haired jerk, David Lee Roth returned for a second stint at the helm. The guitar riff has my toes tapping. Nothing like a heavy rock track to get my blood and adrenalin pumping, my senses alive and jangling and my mind focussed on the job in hand. Old Ronnie was more a Barry Manilow man though I find such shit simply makes me feel drowsy or suicidal. Each to his own I guess, but Barry-fucking-Manilow for chrissakes! I knew a guy a while back who played the tracks he most hated in the world, just to get himself angry and worked up before the kill, another who liked silence and could slow his heart and breathing down to such an extent that he was barely alive and trance like as he plunged the knife into his mark's unsuspecting flesh or placed the barrel of his silencer against their temple. Me, it's rock tracks, plain and simple. I reach down and gather up my cigarette butts, placing them neatly into a small plastic sandwich bag that nestles in my inner jacket pocket next to the cold steel of my gun. Placing on some transparent latex gloves, rise to my feet and stretch my muscles.
Time to go to work as Jenny Jameson, owner of 'Diva Designs' arrives with an arm full of door keys, paper coffee cup and American styled soft cookies as she always does. Her routine is the same each and every day, each detail studied and verified during my extensive surveillance. Her scent will permeate my nostrils as she passes me by, completely unaware of my presence. Hints of lemon and deliciously high summer tones that intoxicate with devilment, I'm thinking that she alternates between up to the minute Jade Goody Shh Eau de parfum and the classic notes of Chanel number five. She'll fumble for the alarm keys, hands tied up with debris before dropping them on the floor and banging her head as she bends. She'll set the alarms off and rush in, scattering her belongings all bar her coffee which she'll keep in her left hand as she punches in the code, three seven, two,two,nine, and then turn around to sigh with relief and grab her coffee cup to take in the caffeine hit. Only today she turns to the stranger who stands before her. I follow her in with stealthy steps, pulling my pistol from my jacket pocket and spinning on the silencer barrel with a few precise twists of my right wrist. Five foot five, piercing blue eyes and bleached blonde hair straight out of the bottle with those god awful dark roots peeking through, she jumps and yelps with shock as our eyes meet.
A single life, two tabby cats, a goldfish and a liking for working late, Indian takeaways and girls nights out with old acquaintances, she is just seconds away from the end of her existence as she begins to question my identity and reason for being in the boutique. I close the door gently behind me, raise the gun towards her forehead and smile, squeezing the trigger with my right index finger with the gentle touch of a lovers hands to his lovers nipples. The hole appears just like in those American blockbusters and she hits the deck before her eyes have truly registered what has happened. The coffee cup hits the deck before I can catch it, the contents splashing over my shoes..... Damn it, does she have any idea how much those suckers cost me! All life is ebbing away from her brain as I kneel beside her and fire two more shots into her heart with perhaps a little more venom and aggression that would normally be the case. Hey, spilt coffee on freshly polished Giorgio Le Couter patents can do that to a man you know! I never said I was perfect, just meticulous.Her scent fills my nostrils for the final time and the irony of the deliciously provocative smelling corpse that lies beneath me is not lost on this brain of mine.
Her tiny body raises and falls under the impact as I place my gloved fingers over her eyes and close her eyelids. One shell casing is a through and through, my gloved hand gathering up the spent cartridge and placing it into my bag with the cigarette butts, noting that both other shells remain inside her. No surveillance cameras in the area to bother me, no troublesome passers by who have witnessed the early morning shooting, my job is done here, as I slip the door latch and make my exit as though nothing has ever happened. Jenny's boutique will have a busy day ahead of it, but not relating to sales, and me, I'm content that Ronnie would approve of this hit. My future looks bright, my reputation growing in certain dark corners of the globe. Life is good again after just another day at the office.
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Written April 10th 2011
Photograph taken on March 17th 2011 in Covent Garden, Central London, England at 10:17am
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Nikon D700 116mm 1/40s f/6.3 iso200 -0.3EV
Nikkor AF-S 28-300mm f/3.5-6.3G ED IF VRII. UV filter
This is type! Pirated type, to be more precise. Many of the typefaces shown in this catalog are noted as “Similar to…” Transfertech was a Chicago-based transfer lettering producer who was known for copping the designs of Headliners, ITC, Phototype, VGC, and the fonts of Phil Martin, whose 2004 interview produced this comment from Joseph Treacy, current Headliners owner:
“The ‘Transfertech’ copies of Headliners designs that Mark refers to were copies stolen by a company, who, according to what I was told by Headliners’ management, actually bribed a livery driver and similar workers like office cleaners, to go in on weekends and surreptitiously make ‘bruning’ (brownline or blueline) copies of proofs.
The thefts apparently started about 1965, and at least in Headliners’ case, finally did at one point go to court, I believe in the Chicago area, around 1970.
The first round of determining the suspects occurred by investigating the pirated copies themselves.
After the thefts were uncovered, Headliners actually produced a range of different filmstrips for each type family, with some letters changed, and adding some other identifying marks to filmstrips, for different markets.
It worked. Suspects were detained, and lie detector tests were actually administered to get to the culprits.
Not a pretty picture, since some of the suspects were Headliners franchise operators.
That the copies were made from brunings explains why the letter quality suffered from so much ‘generation loss’ (a look similar to camera overexposure). They never, at least in the case of Headliners, got to the actual originals.”
I was immediately impressed by the remarkable diversity of the crowd that gathered in London's Parliament Square on 6 September 2025 to protest the proscription of Palestine Action. The protesters included the elderly and disabled activists, many of whom had never been arrested before.
The elegantly dressed woman's handmade sign displays the precise words that, under the Terrorism Act 2000, constituted a criminal offence carrying a potentially lengthy prison sentence. She is part of a cross-section of society who felt a moral imperative to act in response to the ongoing genocide in Gaza.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Protest and the Price of Dissent: Palestine Action and the Criminalisation of Conscience
Parliament Square on Saturday, 6 September 2025 was a scene of quiet, almost solemn defiance. The air, usually thick with the noise of London traffic and crowds of tourists, was instead filled with a palpable tension, a shared gravity that emanated from the quiet determination of hundreds of protesters, many of them over 60 years old, some sitting on steps or stools and others lying on the grass.
They held not professionally printed banners, but handwritten cardboard signs, their messages stark against the historic grandeur of their surroundings. This was not a march of chants and slogans, but a silent vigil of civil disobedience, a deliberate and calculated act of defiance against the state.
On that day, my task was to photograph the protest against the proscription of the direct-action group Palestine Action. While not always agreeing entirely with the group’s methods, I could not help but be struck by the profound dedication etched on the faces of the individual protesters.
As they sat in silence, contemplating both the horrific gravity of the situation in Gaza and the enormity of the personal risk they were taking — courting arrest under terror laws for holding a simple placard — their expressions took on a quality not dissimilar to what war photographers once called the “thousand-yard stare.” It was a look of weary but deep and determined resolve, a silent testament to their readiness to face life-changing prosecution in the name of a principle.
This scene poses a profound and unsettling question for modern Britain. How did the United Kingdom, a nation that prides itself on its democratic traditions and the right to protest, arrive at a point where hundreds of its citizens — clergy, doctors, veterans, and the elderly — could be arrested under counter-terrorism legislation for an act of silent, peaceful protest?
The events of that September afternoon were the culmination of a complex and contentious series of developments, but their significance extends far beyond a single organisation or demonstration. The proscription of Palestine Action has become a critical juncture in the nation’s relationship with dissent, a test of the elasticity of free expression, and a stark examination of its obligations under international law in the face of Israel deliberately engineering a catastrophic humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
To understand what is at stake, one must unravel the threads that led to that moment: the identity of the movement, the state’s legal machinery of proscription, the confrontation in Parliament Square, and the political context that compelled so many to risk their liberty.
Direct Action and the State’s Response
Palestine Action, established in 2020, has never hidden its approach. Unlike traditional lobbying groups, it rejected appeals to political elites in favour of disrupting the physical infrastructure of complicity: factories producing parts for Israeli weapons systems, offices of arms manufacturers, and — eventually — military installations themselves.
Its tactics, while non-violent, were disruptive and confrontational. Red paint sprayed across buildings to symbolise blood, occupations that halted production, chains and locks on factory gates. For supporters, these were acts of conscience against a system enabling atrocities in Gaza. For the state, they were criminal disruptions of commerce.
That clash escalated steadily. In Oldham, a persistent campaign against Elbit Systems, a key manufacturer in the Israeli arms supply chain, culminated in the company abandoning its Ferranti site. Later actions targeted suppliers for F-35 fighter jets and other arms manufacturers. These were no random acts of mindless vandalism but part of a deliberate strategy: to impose costs high enough that complicity in Israel’s war effort would become unsustainable.
The decisive rupture came in June 2025, when activists infiltrated RAF Brize Norton, Britain’s largest airbase, and sprayed red paint into the engines of refuelling aircraft linked to operations over Gaza. For the activists, it was a desperate attempt to interrupt a supply chain of surveillance and logistical support to a state commiting genocide. For the government, it crossed a line: military assets had been attacked.
Within days, the Home Secretary announced Palestine Action would be proscribed as a terrorist organisation.
Proscription and the Expansion of “Terrorism”
Here lies the heart of the controversy. The Terrorism Act 2000 defines terrorism with unusual breadth, encompassing not only threats to life but also “serious damage to property” carried out for political or ideological aims.
In this capacious definition, breaking a factory window or disabling a machine can be legally assimilated to mass murder. By invoking this law, the government placed Palestine Action on the same legal footing as al-Qaeda or ISIS. Supporting it — even symbolically — became a serious offence.
Since July 2025, merely expressing support for the organization can carry a maximum prison sentence of 14 years. This is based on Section 12 of the Terrorism Act 2000. The specific offense is "recklessly expressing support for a proscribed organisation". However, according to Section 13 of the Act, a lower-level offence for actions like displaying hand held placards in support of a proscribed group carries a maximum sentence of six months imprisonment or a fine of five thousand pounds or both.
Civil liberties groups and human rights bodies have denounced the proscription move as disproportionate. Their concern was not primarily whether Palestine Action’s tactics might violate existing criminal law. One might reasonably argue that they did unless they might sometimes be justified in the name of preventing a greater crime.
But reframing those actions as “terrorism” represented a dangerous category error. As many pointed out, terrorism has historically referred to violence against civilians. Expanding it to cover property damage risks draining the term of meaning. Worse, it arms the state with a stigma so powerful that it can delegitimise entire political positions without debate.
The implications go further. Proscription does not simply criminalise acts. It criminalises expressions of allegiance, conscience and even speech. To say “I support Palestine Action” is no longer an opinion but technically a serious crime.
The state has moved from punishing deeds to punishing expressions of solidarity — a move with chilling consequences for democratic life.
Parliament Square: Civil Disobedience on Trial
It was this transformation that brought nearly 1,500 people into Parliament Square on 6 September. They knew what awaited them. Organisers announced in advance that protesters would hold signs reading: “I oppose genocide. I support Palestine Action.” In doing so, they openly declared their intent to break the law.
The crowd was strikingly diverse. Retired doctors, clergy, war veterans, even an 83-year-old Anglican priest. Disabled activists came in wheelchairs; descendants of Holocaust survivors stood beside young students. This was not a hardened cadre of militants but a cross-section of society, many of whom had never before faced arrest.
At precisely 1 pm, the protesters all sat or lay down silently, cardboard signs raised. There was no chanting, no aggression — only a quiet insistence that they would not accept the criminalisation of conscience.The police response was equally predictable. Hundreds of officers moved systematically through the crowd, arresting anyone displaying a sign.
By the end of the day, nearly 900 people were detained under counter-terrorism law. It was one of the largest mass arrests in modern British history. Official statements later alleged police were met with violence — officers punched, spat on, objects thrown. Yet independent observers, including Amnesty International, contradicted this. They reported a peaceful assembly disrupted by aggressive policing: batons drawn, protesters shoved, some bloodied.
www.amnesty.org/zh-hans/documents/eur45/0273/2025/en/
Video footage supported at least some of Amnesty's report.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZQGFrqCf5U&t=1283s
The two narratives were irreconcilable, but only one carried the weight and authority of the state.The entire event unfolded as political theatre. The government proscribed a group, thereby creating a new crime. Protesters, convinced the law was unjust, announced their intent to commit that crime peacefully.
The police, forewarned, staged a vast operation. Each side acted out its script. The spectacle allowed the state to present itself as defending order against extremism — while in reality silencing dissent.
The Humanitarian Context: Why Protesters Risked All
To see the Parliament Square protest as a parochial dispute over free speech is to miss its driving force. The demonstrators were not there merely to defend abstract principles. They were responding to what they, and a growing body of international experts, describe as a genocide in Gaza.
By September 2025, Gaza had descended into almost total collapse. Over 63,000 Palestinians had been killed, the majority of them women and children. More than 150,000 had been injured, many maimed for life. Entire neighbourhoods had been flattened. Famine was confirmed in August, with Israel continuing to impose and even tighten deliberate restrictions on food, water, and fuel, a strategy condemned by human rights groups as a major war crime. Hospitals lay in ruins. Ninety percent of the population had been displaced.
It is in this context that the term genocide has been applied. Legal scholars point not only to mass killings but also to the deliberate infliction of life-destroying conditions, accompanied by rhetoric from Israeli officials dehumanising Palestinians as “human animals.” In September 2025, the International Association of Genocide Scholars declared that Israel’s actions met the legal definition of genocide.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cde3eyzdr63o
Major NGOs, UN experts, and even Israeli human rights groups such as B’Tselem echoed that conclusion. For the protesters, then, the question was not abstract but immediate: faced with what they saw as a genocide, could they in good conscience remain silent while their own government criminalised resistance to it? Their answer was to risk arrest, their placards making the moral connection explicit: opposing genocide meant supporting those who sought to stop it.
The Price of Dissent
The mass arrests in Parliament Square were not an isolated incident of law enforcement. They were the product of a broader trajectory: escalating tactics by a direct-action movement, a humanitarian catastrophe abroad, and a government determined to suppress dissent at home through the bluntest of instruments.
The official line insists that Palestine Action’s campaign constituted terrorism and thus warranted proscription. On this view, the arrests were simple enforcement of the law. Yet this account obscures the deeper reality: a precedent in which the state redefined non-lethal protest as terrorism, shifting from punishing actions to criminalising expressions of solidarity.
The cost is profound. Once speech and conscience themselves become suspect, dissent is no longer tolerated but pathologised. The chilling effect is already evident: individuals weigh not just whether to join a protest, but whether uttering support might expose them to years in prison. Terror laws, originally justified as a shield against mass violence, are recast as tools of political management.
The protesters understood this. That “thousand-yard stare” captured in their faces was not only the weight of potential arrest, but the knowledge of Gaza’s devastation, the famine and rubble, the deaths mounting daily. It was also the recognition that their own government had chosen to silence them rather than address its complicity.
In a functioning democracy, the question is not why citizens risk arrest for holding a handwritten cardboard sign. It is why a state finds it necessary to treat that act as a terror offence. The answer reveals a narrowing of democratic space, where conscience itself is deemed subversive. And that narrowing, history teaches, carries consequences not just for those arrested, but for the society that allows it.
photomanm.com/capturing-the-elegance-of-jewelry/
Grateful for another chance to capture jewelry products, I want to express my appreciation for the client's trust.
Despite the smaller scale of this shoot, it posed unique challenges. Apart from handling a specific quantity, the products were intricately designed, featuring various cuts and a blend of materials. Consequently, precise control of the lighting was essential to bring out the best presentation of the products.
Explore more: photomanm.com/commercial-photography/
Let's discuss your project & contact us today: photomanm.com/contact-us/
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再次有機會拍攝珠寶產品，非常感謝客戶的信任。這次雖然是小型拍攝，但亦有一定程度的挑戰。
除了有一定數量外，產品亦比較細小，有不同的切割面，加上混合材料，所以要控制好燈光，才能將產品最好的呈現出來。
探索更多作品：https://photomanm.com/commercial-photography/
現在就聯繫我們，一起討論您的項目：https://photomanm.com/contact-us/
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再び宝飾品の撮影の機会をいただき、お客様の信頼に感謝しています。
今回の撮影は規模は小さいですが、一定の難しさもありました。数量が一定以上であることに加え、製品は比較的小型で、異なる切り口があり、混合された素材も含まれています。したがって、光のコントロールを適切に行うことが重要で、製品を最良の形で表現するために努めました。
プロジェクト詳細：https://photomanm.com/commercial-photography/
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Precise use of the caves under the limestone outcrop are not known, but two theories predominate. One being the mummification of the dead - there is a consistent temperature and air flow and the second, sacrifice. The rock here has been sculpted to create a very well defined and accessible lying out area.
A fascinating trade brochure issued by Tube Products Ltd., of Oldbury - one of the Black Country towns then in Worcestershire. Tube Products Ltd was formed in 1929 by Tube Investments, the large industrial holding combine, but unusually this catalogue makes no mention of the parent company. Tube Products made use of several patents surrounding electrical welding fo tubes that TI had acquired in the 1920s. The company also incorporated H. Joyce & Co.). The booklet describes the Electrically Welded steel tube as being scientifically produced from the virgin strip leading to a more precise, accurate product than by older methods.
As can be seen from this stylish catalogue a wide range of uses were promoted for the company's products - ranging from bicycle frames, furniture, industrial products and display material. Several of the pages note other TI subsidiaries such as PEL who made furniture as well as specific designers including Wells Coates who made the most of the 'modern' looks afforded by the use of tubes.
Today's story and sketch "by me" we travel again to the Florida Keys, Night Key to be precise, were you see
Macrame Gofish piloting his intergalactic anion coupe, out front of his opulent Victorian mansion, which he
built himself many, many hundreds of years ago, after having a rather bad experience with a hurricane, while
looking over the area for a vacation home. Mac not ever having been in a storm of this kind, on his home moon
Lippo the Blue Moon. The rental (UFO) unearthly flying orbiter he had rented was not built to withstand a direct
hit from a flying Palmetto palm. And that was the Night, Mac become the first alien to be shipwrecked or (UFO) wrecked
in the Keys, But after the storm had passed, (in a couple days) Mac being a very optimistic Gofish, (later in life he
actually started the Optimists Club) but that is a story for another time.
Mac being the optimist, took stock of what he had going good for himself, and what was not, he first looked over his
transport, it was bent and non operational, he did have a good supply of moon pies, that would last a while,
but would need to find what was available to help him survive until Search and Rescue on Lippo responded to his (SOS),
Space Orbiter is Scrap signal. (which took many, many years for help to respond), Mac found he was the only life form
on the Island, except bugs, lots of bugs, and millions of good bugs, the bees that were making honey from the Sisal
plants. The Sisal plants numbered in the thousands, Mac began making Honey Moon Pies, and goods from the fiber to trade
with the many sailors, and pirates who began to stop by to trade for his beautiful Sisal Mats, Hammocks, Belts,
Dartboards, beautiful plant hangers, and of course the plant being a type of Agave, made a wonderful drink he named Tequila,
after his X wife, the beverage had a kick. Sailors loved the Tequila so much he built the Victorian mansion as a B&B
for his customers, who could not make it back to there ships after trading and sipping. As Mac traded for things
like empty bottles, Which (Mac as the first recyclers on Earth) he would refill with of course Tequila, and tins
for the tasty honey Moon Pies, and materials to repair his bent Coupe, which he did, but stayed and only returned
once to Lippo, to honeymoon with his bride "Norma" who had been a scullery maid on a pirate ship (the Black Swan),
Norma jumped ship and fell in love with Mac, and he with her. And they lived a very happy life on Night Key.
Taa ta the Rod Blog
Remember you do not need to know where you are, to know who You Are.
(Erithacus rubecula)
Le mâle et la femelle sont presque identiques, avec une couronne, des ailes, le dessus et la queue de couleur brune, une bande grise sur les côtés de la gorge, un ventre blanc et la fameuse « gorge rouge », plus précisément de couleur orange foncé tirant vers le rouge. L'identification des jeunes peut se révéler difficile, car il leur manque la tache rouge et ils présentent un plumage brun tacheté ressemblant fortement à celui du jeune d'un membre de la même famille, le rossignol philomèle. Le rouge-gorge est légèrement plus petit qu'un moineau avec une taille de 14 cm et un poids de 16 à 22 grammes, il est rondelet et haut sur pattes, ses yeux noirs sont également caractéristiques. L'âge maximal d'un rouge-gorge est de 12 ans.
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The adult European Robin is 12.5–14.0 cm (5.0–5.5 in) long and weighs 16–22 g (9/16–13/16 oz), with a wingspan of 20–22 cm (8–9 in). The male and female bear similar plumage; an orange breast and face (more strongly coloured in the otherwise similar British subspecies E. r. mesophilus), lined by a bluish grey on the sides of the neck and chest. The upperparts are brownish, or olive-tinged in British birds, and the belly whitish, while the legs and feet are brown. The bill and eyes are black. Juveniles are a spotted brown and white in colouration, with patches of orange gradually appearing.
Because of high mortality in the first year of life, a Robin has an average life expectancy of 1.1 years; however, once past its first year it can expect to live longer and one Robin has been recorded as reaching 12 years of age. A spell of very low temperatures in winter may also result in significant mortality. This species is parasitised by the moorhen flea, Dasypsyllus gallinulae.
CaméraSony DSLR-A850
Exposition0,008 sec (1/125)
Ouverturef/4.0
Longueur focale200 mm
Vitesse ISO800
Détection du degré d'exposition+0.7 EV
Clic ! - See it in large on black - Clic !
[My GETTY Images @] [My MOST FAVE on Flickriver] [My RECENT on Fluidr] [My STREAM on Darckr]
#FlickrFriday - #Precision
7DWF :Jueves: Blanco y negro / Thursdays: Black and White (Sepia or monochrome)
“Of all the means of expression, photography is the only one that fixes a precise moment in time.” – Henri Cartier-Bresson -
The precise objective was to make the coasters the coast. To make the impossible seem possible. If I could just drive up PCH, I'd be very happy, too. . .
Please!! NO Awards or Large Graphics...Buddy Icons are OK. Thank You!
Or to be precise the mess that's left of it. A few years ago a new entrance was added on the 34th street side. Some idiot in management thought it would be a good idea to decorate it with giant ceramic tile reliefs of parts of the destroyed Penn Station.
Part of Andrew Leicester's 'Ghost Series' that manages to show how craven and stupid business men can be and rub some salt in the wounds of those of us who knew the old station at the same time.
At that precise time, I was happy. That was my first photo session of fireworks. I was ideally positioned upstream of the Mirabeau Bridge. In front of me, the Grenelle bridge, and Statue of Liberty*.
I was surrounded by friendly people.
I can testify that nobody knew that blood had flown at Nice. The first report came on my smartphone about ten minutes after the fireworks.
I felt devastated.
These four pictures are dedicated to Nice victims.
A cette heure précise, j'étais heureux. C'était ma première session photo d'un feux d'artifice. J'étais idéalement positionné en amont du pont Mirabeau. En face de moi, le pont de Grenelle, et la statue de la liberté.
J'étais entouré de gens sympathiques.
Je peux témoigner qu'autour de moi, personne ne savait que le sang avait coulé à Nice. La première notification (le Figaro) est tombée sur mon smartphone environ 5 minutes après la fin du feux d'artifice.
J'ai été dévasté.
Ces quatre photos sont dédiées aux victimes de Nice.
* en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Replicas_of_the_Statue_of_Liberty#P...
Sony Alpha A7
RF Jupiter-9 2/85mm for Zorki camera (KMZ 1954) M/L39 adapter