Thursday, July 05, 2007

Still raining - 55F - windy expected

Scientists have discovered in Greenland, by study of the Ice Cap, that 100,000 years ago it was 5C warmer than now yet the ice-cap remained, albeit thinner.

A cause was not suggested !

It is still chucking it down with rain here though, and no real signs of a let up. Poor garden-centres who stocked up on drought-resistant plants for people who wanted their gardens to be ready for the hottest and driest summer on record. Ah well !

Pictures 1 and 2 have been given the 'cut-out' filter treatment in PhotoShop Elements and I would welcome opinions as to its validity. The end result does not purport to be an original photograph. I think that my obections to most 'photoshoppery' is that photographers use it to make a picture that will fool people into thinking "thats how it was". The application of these filters however produce 'a picture based on a photograph' which has happened in the art-world since the 16th century, if you include the 'camera obscura' so freely used by Canaletto and Co.

I like the effect of simplifying great swathes of colour passages where perhaps before there was too much detail ! The effect seems much better than a blurred photograph.

And it fools no-one, nor does it try to. It simply translates a photograph into a 'picture' which either pleases the beholder, or it does not.

Re comments. Thanks Bungus for pointing out that my 'solecism' of 'bright shadows' was in fact an 'oxymoron', which was the word I was searching for but I was in one room, Roget was in another and idleness prevailed.

I noticed when I ventured out this morning that the 'Meadowsweet' is in flower. Such a heady and exotic scent !

I also noticed that the media seem to be ignoring the discovery in Herefordshire of a serpentine pavement estimated as the same age as Stone Henge i.e 2000yrs BC and unique in Europe. Please click In my opinion we are talking World Heritage site status and yet the mainline media coverage is zilch.

For Anon 1's benefit here is a piccy of Y's nails. The look she seeks is that it looks as if her nails are nice and well-cared for. She doesn't want them to look so dramatic that people immediately think Ha Hah! artificial nail extensions. And as Y says, she has now had them for so long they have actually become her nails.

I collected my pork hocks from the Butcher this morning and the production of 'pressed pork' is well under way. Also, neighbour Betty came round with 2 lbs of gooseberries. And she had 'topped and tailed' them. You can't beat that for neighbourliness can you ?

My bed calls. Catch you tomorrow.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Anon 1 - Thanks for the photo, they look very nice, very natural, I might go and get mine done...

Anonymous said...

You ask for views on the ‘cut-out’ filter treatment. I am not greatly enamoured, although I thought it suited the caravan picture. It reminds me rather of ‘painting by numbers’.
I can see a case for it where a photo is blurry or lacking contrast as it appears to sharpen up edges and eliminate detail. But without the untouched originals for comparison that could be a false impression.
There is also a similarity to paintings I recall of scenes in North Africa – I do not remember the name of the artist or artists. One of my 8th birthday presents was a jigsaw puzzle of a scene from Alexander Korda's Technicolour film 'The Drum' (the second film starring Sabu, the Elephant Boy. who was not like the son of the Elephant Man) which had the same sort of well defined patches of colour and shadow.

I suspect the big reason the media are not too blown away by the Herefordshire serpentine pavement is because it is not photogenic like Stonehenge or the Giants’ Causeway (which I know is not man made). The description given in your link does not create a mental picture either, so I think it could become a very esoteric ‘monument’ and therefore well worth remembering in order to drop into conversations.

Pork hock with gooseberries sounds good to me but I suspect not to your taste.
I found a ‘different’ recipe for a gooseberry pudding last year. It took a lot of preparation and tasted foul.
ي