HOG in the Glens

I attended the annual Harley Davidson rally in Aviemore this year.  It is 2 years since I last attended the rally and it has more than doubled in size.  For my style of photography it is a wonderful opportunity to follow the bikes around the countryside and capture what is a magical sight.  The atmosphere is infectious - a group of enthusiasts out there enjoying themselves in the way that only the HOG do. It is an opportunity to witness a group of mainly well to do people trying to confront their mid life crisis.  Within that there is a hard core of bikers who live the "life".  Like Jim (not his real name ;-)  who was worried about my putting his photo on the web in case the police saw it - so I have not.  Who lives as the HOG says it to RIDE  -----VROOOOOOOOOOOM.

The images hopefully tell the story.

Edinburgh Festival - Stand Up Photographer

Alasdair and I had a great three day trip to Edinburgh.  It was my first visit to the festival in 20 years.  Kinda guilty about this as it is perhaps the finest thing we do in Scotland.  Anyhow we visited a number of stand up comedians and short plays all of which without exception were enjoyable.  The plays of great note were Ian Dury "Hit Me" and Hamlet The Musical which was magnificent.  Performed on the floor in front of us behind moving partitions and puppets and singing and rapid costume changes all in an hour.

Anyhow it was  rich ground for street photography.  It felt like people had dressed up and  made up just for the photographers, which of course was not the case.  But in the backdrop of the old city it was wonderful.  Walking about and listening to street music and witnessing drama and circus acts and all the other sites and sounds.

Summer Moves to Autumn

It has been a challenging summer.  I continue to make the most of my photographic opportunities.  Whilst trying to keep up with a rapidly expanding database of images.  What do we define as "image bloat"?  I am sure it is when you cannot keep up with your rate of acquisition.  Sounds scientific?  Sounds familiar?  It is not with good reason in my case.  It is perhaps not something I am particularly proud of, but I returned from Nepal last November with 18000 images.  Ever since then I have had an overhang of unfinished business.  Not a good place to be.  Creatively stifling I would say :-)  

Well it was time to act and I have hopefully found the solution that works for me - and potentially for others.  Hence the diatribe.  I have bought a 27" iMac.  With 8GB Ram and a 2TB HD.  I have opted to run Aperture 3.0  as my tool of productivity choice.  And so far I am both mightily relieved and very impressed by it.  Many of the reviews focus in on the software, however the uplift you get comes as much from the quality and size of the screen.  Put another way you can look at a lot of images at a decent size that allow you to select the image you are looking for.  In a big image set like Nepal 2009 I have found that I can stand back and follow the progress of my journey with greater clarity - exciting?  Astounding really to me a year after to see the breadth and scope of my trip.

So to celebrate here is an image that has emerged from the depths of my hard drive.  Also a quick :homage" to Rick who made the first ascent of the North Face (behind)

Dhaulagiri NE Face at Sunrise