My photographic interests (no nude's, so don't even try to ask)

Aura, I'm no judge but your photos look very professional to me and you obviously have an artistic talent going on.

It's a pity you couldn't have become a professional photographer.

Hi

I have an interest in photography going back more than fifty years, when my father used to do lock himself in a cupboard with a film and come out with some prints an hour or so later!  I never forget that sulphury smell of the fixer.

So then I started helping him in his makeshift dark room, printing the pictures.  I thought it was help anyway!  Then when I was at College, I got a camera (a Russian camera called a Zorki) and got a couple of lenses for it.  I could then lock myself away creating what I thought were marvellous pictures.  However, as you suggest, photography is a brilliant way of recording the changing world.  And I used it to record the changing face of Cardiff at the time, when the shopping centre was being built.

Although I could probably talk someone to death about camera bodies and lenses, fstops and focal lengths, the pros and cons of this and that, my chief interest is in images.  Yes, I did graduate to an Olympus OM2, and later on went digital, now having a Canon.  But it is what they do that is the marvellous things for me.  And photography also fits in with such a lot of other interests too.  I did improve eventually getting my Associateship of the Royal Photographic Society.  Like so many other things I have a passion for the passion is then driven by an urge to do well, to get obsessed by it (it was fishing in my teenage years!)

Now I take a range of subjects, and yes, railways are a major part, but also like landscapes, the countryside, church architecture and history.  The interest in these is driven by the photography, I like to find out about the things I take pictures of so this also involves some research afterwards (or beforehand if possible).  And all these interests can be done while on my own, which is a bonus for me! 

Some of my pictures can be seen at

My Photographs

Hi

I indulge in photography too and helps me have a private hobby as all my hobbies have needed me to be out at time tabled events rather than something I do on my own basically for myself.

I go to church and love the hymns and combine the two last year by taking a hymn and photographing scenes to go along side each line.  I done one hymn and took me about 8 month to complete because of I wait till I see something.

So this year I am focusing on two hymns. It also deepens my understanding of the hymn I discovered because I want to know what it really means. What the author intended. Actually I did do two hymns last year but i like to produce it in a book and the priest told me I couldn't with the second hymn, colours of day, as the words are not 30 year old yet.  It has to be over 30 years old before I can publish it, though I still declare the author.

I started out by writing my own short verse poetry and taking a photo to represent it or rather the other way around. I take a photo with the intention of writing a short poem. I gave that to the priest at my last church when he left. I started another album but seemed to have dried up as I moved onto hymns.

Photography is a great personal hobby I think. I too not keen on people. I know I set myself a meeting up with the hospital chaplin for ideas about the first hymn I did. He looked through them and instantly said about the lack of people. I replied don't like people and abot that permission thing.... He told me most people be honoured. 

I am glad you find photography works for you. Last year too about this time of year I had asked a priest if I could write an Advent book and would he support it. He said yes. As the year went through and I did have ideas but putting them to paper, well... it didn't seem original enough. So the book changed to a project and each week in Advent I presented a photograph in postcard format. The theme of that week how I see it. Everyone in church got them.

But think it really great how we can use photography and don't actually need others to put our hobby into practice.

Am glad someone else likes photography too

Cheers

Most of my photography is out and about in the countryside, as I adore the natural world, and I've always been too self-conscious to get my camera out when there are too many people around.  When I'm feeling less able to get out and about, I concentrate more on macro photos.  I'm fascinated by making visible the beauty in the world's tiny details that are so easy to walk right past without ever noticing, and macros are easy to set up in a corner of my home when I'm wanting to stay in my 'sanctuary'.

I also would not want to do it as a career, though I have done a little commercial photography of products for my previous employer - only as an occasional side-project though.  The freedom to choose my own subjects and work at my own pace is part of the pleasure of it, for sure.

Hello thanks that's very kind of you.  The collie dog is getting on a bit now, I'm in it for the pleasure, not the money.  I have followed you on your flicker page, I'm on there.  I heard they are going to charge soon. 

What photography do you do?  I find it takes my mind off of mu autism as well :)

Hi, there,

You certainly have oodles of talent, both in your compositions and technical use of the camera.  Incredible variety too, which I appreciate a lot in any artist.  Hard to pick a favourite, but I particularly liked the stunning head-and-shoulders portrait of the collie dog - I reckon you could make a bob or two photographing people's pets if you wanted!

I totally agree with you about keeping a photographic record for future generations.  Even in the thirty years I've lived in Yorkshire, the urban landscape of the nearest town, Bradford, has changed beyond all recognition.  The remains of the old railways, coal mines, textile mills and waterworks are slowly being reclaimed by nature or replaced by new developments.  I think of recording those places as a tribute to the hardships and dedication of the people who built them and worked in them, as well as being a valuable historical archive.

I've been a keen photographer ever since my Mum gave me her old Kodak "Instamatic" to record my childhood holidays.  Besides being a rewarding hobby, I also find it to be a wonderful escape from the anxieties that living with autism sometimes brings about.

Here's a link to my old Flickr page.  I've not "curated" it for quite a while now, but it gives a good flavour of the kind of things I like to photograph. (NB - linked to the albums list as my close-ups of creepy-crawlies are a bit scary for arachnophobic people!)

Trog's Flickr Albums