decent exposure

Libraries are automated now which makes it easier for the borrower and, I assume, allows librarians to get on with better things. The best use of this system is when returning: no more waiting in queues to hand over armfuls of books; it's a five second job. I don't even mind when you have to put each returned book on the appropriate trolley. I mean, there's only the two trolleys and the machine assists with a bright green, flashing arrow. The bonus is, rather than recent returns disappearing behind the librarian's back, they can now be seen on the trolley. It's curious what some people borrow, rather like eyeing up the contents of supermarket trolleys. You can't tell a thing about a person that way but it doesn't stop you trying.

Anyway, to cut an unnecessarily long story short, I found a good book on photography amongst the returns last week; Understanding Exposure, by Bryan Peterson. Now I've gone through loads of these bibles and handbooks and for the intermediate photographer, which I am and I imagine most people are, they're mostly if not all hopeless. Either they're too basic or over technical and too dull to interest anyone but the technical fanatic.

Peterson's book is better because it cuts to the chase. It's the exposure, stupid. He makes it all so obvious, which it probably is but you couldn't be arsed to find it in the dry and lofty ''Advanced Photographer's Bible''. Instead, this one takes you directly to the nitty-gritty, enlightening you with such useful concepts as the holy triangle (shutter speed, aperture, and ISO); the 18% grey illusion; and the handy tricksters, Brother Sky and Mr. Green Jeans. If only they'd have printed a notebook sized edition, it would be a must. Nevertheless, get a copy from your automated librarian today!

I iGoogle.

It saves time, sometimes.
You never know what it might turn up.
Wiki-How is a feed.

How to Live with a Perfectionist
(do they mean me?)

How to be Active Before Work
(steady on, now!)

the funny thing was the image that greets you on the perfectionist page (see right), well, I'm sure it's by fellow Moleskine Exchanger Mike Kline! Small world.

iRack

It's high time I signed off my Mortuary Corners...

henry cooper is alive and well

Good to see our 'Enery in the papers. My foremost memory of Henry Cooper is watching him from the car while he served my Gran in his greengrocer's shop in Wembley. He was talking to her and she was laughing all the while. I don't know what he was telling her and neither did she, being profoundly deaf, but I've no doubt it was something charming. It's a better memory than him ''splashing it all over'' - I see he's going to be doing more of that hence the newspaper item - and probably slightly better than putting Cassius Clay (later to be Muhammad Ali) on his arse.

HC decries the demise of teaching the noble art of boxing in schools. I'm with him on that. I never had the opportunity; wish I had now. Instead I was offered Judo lessons, which I tried even winning a medal in an inter-school championship, but it's not the same I don't think. Anyway, the point to this post is Henry's pearl:

“Whenever something or someone upsets you, count to ten before responding. Losing your cool isn’t good for you.”

Sound advice, and I could have done with doing this the other day. Trouble is, it takes discipline and practice and, unless you deliberately go looking for altercations, you don't get the practice. I learned from training our pup that any such counter-measure has to be done at level 1 or 2, yet often you're at level 5 or 6 before you know what's going on and it's too late. Maybe we could try counting to ten during every meeting; that might work. Still, no one got harmed during the making of this episode.

go self-signify yourself

I expect most writers like to tell you something new. It isn't entirely necessary. Even when they tell us what we already knew, they usually tell it in a better way. That's their craft, assembling the right words and putting them in the best order. I admire writers.

I see Bryan Appleyard.com has written an introduction to his links explaining favourites and blogrolls. He says they are ''character attributes'' and ''self-signifiers''; we say we knew this all along; but he puts it a lot better.

He doesn't mention that it's a two-way process: knowing the compiler - or random collector - gives significance to the links. Normally, I would look down that list and think pah! (or uh?), but, no, I reckon they must be cool, despite appearances.

Like, New York?! This made me smile.
~

Btw, I like the idea of searching for images for this blog. On my other blogs I've been mindful to use my own images but as this blog isn't specifically for images, making appropriate images is a drag. Besides, searching for images is educational.

Helen Levitt's NY street scene is evocative of Cartier-Bresson and that's exactly why I was drawn to it. No surprise to find he was one of her influences. I don't know much about Helen Levitt. Finding out she died less than two months ago is strangely sad, almost as this blog began.

Btw2, I also found this ''reverse image search'' which is interesting. TinEye. You upload an image and it searches for identical (or near enough) images on the web. Good for telling who's using your images without permission.