For a while one of my photography goals has been to get accepted to the Alamy stock agency, I particularly wanted to get accepted as they are a proper agency, rather than microstock and they are pretty strict about who gets in, with your images having to pass a stringent QC test.
Browsing around Flickr I came across quite a few light trail images, which reminded me of a few images I took at Silverstone, when Ma5da Racing were supporting the Silverstone 500 in 2009, this one is my favourite.
When I’m visiting family in Perth, Scotland I usually take a trip over to the harbour town of Arbroath in Angus, mainly to get Arbroath Smokies (a very tasty local speciality of smoked haddock) but also because its really photogenic, it’s a small harbour surrounded by brightly coloured buildings, there are sea defences being battered by the waves and the subject of this shot – the signal tower museum, although this image is black and white the building is white with red details, which always seems to go down well in photographic competitions.
Every Flickr account seems to have a picture of a random door, so when I spotted this whilst out with my Dad (Bob Craik LRPS) in Rothwell the bright blue door on the orange brickwork really caught my eye. It’s just a shame about the flaking paint…
Something I have been meaning to do for a while is to get a rogues gallery in my office of people that I don’t really see enough, so after collecting some prints (at the same time as a processed roll of Velvia!) from the lab, some frames from Ikea and a few hours cutting/sticking I have the following 4 pictures on my office wall of some people who are important to me.
This picture was taken on a walk along the canal at Union Wharf in Market Harborough, Leicestershire, with an old friend from school, Dan, who has just bought himself and EVIL camera (EVIL as in Electronic Viewfinder Interchangeable Lens, rather than with a plan to take over the world). It was good to take a walk somewhere that I’ve not been since the days when I was still shooting film, although I did also finish off the roll of Velvia that’s been in my film body for a while.
I took the usual boat reflection pictures, but it was this image of the smoking chimney after the sun had gone that was my favourite from the shoot as it’s a bit different to my normal style.
I was down in London the other day and ventured over to Camden Lock for the first time, I didn’t have a DSLR with me, but took the following photo on my iPhone.
Camden Lock - iPhone 4 photo
I can’t wait to return to explore some more, enjoy the vast range of food they have and do a bit of street photography too!
Wow! The summer has flown by in a blur of Ma5da race cars and the large luxury saloons that I work on during the week! I promise I will try to write a Ma5da Racing season update blog soon, but in the mean time I’ll post a teaser for the next round at Rockingham Speedway on the bank holiday weekend:
In other news I have bought myself a Canon S90, so hopefully I will be able to post a few more images from the various trips that I have planned over the next few months.
The qualifying sessions for the second round of the Ma5da Racing 2010 season (and first round of the 2010 MX5 Cup), which had been delayed from the previous day were held under grey, but dry, Norfolk skies, on what had been touted as the warmest day of the year so far. The two sessions for the Ma5da Racing Championship went first and passed without any major incident, at least from where I was standing at The Esses. This corner gave me the chance to get out my wide angle lens, which I rarely get to use for motorsports, but usually gives some great images.
I stayed at The Esses for the MX5 Cup practice session which was my first chance to see multiple mk3 MX5 race cars on the track at the same time, again the session went without too much trouble, until Kevin Dengate had a moment on the second of the esses and left a lot of dirt on the track. Paul Sheard eneded the session fastest, so took the MX5 pole for both races.
On my way back from The Esses, the heavens opened, luckily I was able to duck into the Rob Boston Racing awning to avoid the worst of te downpour, but for the drivers in the first Ma5da Race of the day the damage had been done, the track was very wet and with all of the drivers having qualified in the dry the first corner was somewhat chaotic. Rob Boston managed to get a good start and left all the chaos behind him allowing him to pull out a big lead (4s) which he kept until the chequered flag.
Next up was the MX5 Cup race, the first race for the mk3 MX-5 race cars, the track had dried off a bit for this race, although the skies were still grey. The mk3 part of the race was won by Paul Sheard, again by about 4s. As there were only 5 mk3 cars the numbers were made up with a few mk1s, and it was good to see Nick Gilfillan winning the mk1 part of the race.
I stayed Russell Chicane for the next of the Ma5da Racing Championship races, which was a close battle between Tom Roche and newcomer Phil House (although he was in one of the Rob Boston Racing cars), Phil did lead most of the race, but Tom managed to overtake near the end of the race. Seeing as I’ve posted images of Tom Roche leading races, here’s my favourite shot from the race, with Phil leading.
By the time the second MX-5 Cup race came round the sun had come out (Yay!!!), I headed back to The Esses for the race as that was where all the action had been for the previous race. The race went much the same as the first, with Paul Sheard leading, although Kevin Middleton was a lot closer this time around.
Paul won the race, however Nick Gilfillan wasn’t quite so lucky, after having pulled out a fairly decent lead, he had a big moment right in front of me at The Esses and gifted the lead to Mark Pierpoint.
As per the first meeting at Brands Hatch the race of the day, featuring both Tom Roche and Rob Boston had been saved for the last race of the day and the race did not disappoint. Not only were Rob and Tom swapping places ate the front, the battle for 3rd was also very closely contested between Jonathan Greensmith, Phil House and Chris Dawkins (finishing in that order) and there was close racing all the way down the field.
