Open Window
I can’t really use this one for this weeks photo-challenge as it’s had the lens distortion removed, and perspective altered in post production. I still like it though.
PaulSeward.com
Finding his photographic feet, one photo at a time
Rhubarb
This was shot at almost midday, but artificially lit with a couple of strobes to get the look I wanted. I’m quite pleased with the results as it pretty much looks like it did in my head. Hurrah!
With this post, I’m up to date. Almost.
I’m up to date apart from the stuff I shot today, which realistically I can’t be bothered to process until tomorrow.
Bits of countryside/themepark/shopping mall
Whatever you like to call “Center Parcs” – some of it is quite pretty, but then I’ve always been a sucker for a pine forrests, waterfalls and lakes.
This last one was just out the back of our portacabin luxury villa…
Still, it was a pleasant enough break, if a little expensive and J did hurt himself on a waterslide which slowed us down a little towards the end.
Top Tips for anyone else thinking of going – it’s cheaper to buy a bike rack to get your bikes there than it is to hire their bikes, and it’s probably cheaper to employ a personal cook to serve you caviar on golden crackers than it is to buy a sandwich in the on-site catering.
I’m too old…
…to be giggling at this sign found on the side of a steam engine.
I’m sorting my way through the photos I’ve taken over the week or so that I was away on Holiday. I took this next photo with the intention of entering it into the perspective photo challenge, although strictly speaking I took it after the deadline passed, and didn’t upload it in time, so it doesn’t count.
Boundary Conditions
We all like to congregate at boundary conditions.
Where land meets sea; where earth meets air; where body meets mind; where space meets time.
We like to be on one side and look at the other
- Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy
It’s rare that I take a photo with a quotation in mind, today was one of those times.
Bike
I’m trying out a new black and white post processing technique. It seems to have worked quite well and given lots of contrast without sacrificing detail. I think I like it!
In phone news:
- I’ve aquired some batteries from an old UPS to run the uniselector based exchange I’m designing and building.
- I’m soaking a couple of E1900 series phone bodies to remove the circuit diagrams which are pasted inside them, so that I can scan them before giving the bodies an intense clean and polish.
- I’m also working on some microcontroler code which plays back audio samples for my “siteswaphone” project (A project which uses a 746 phone as an IO device) – This isn’t as easy as I’d hoped, as the sample playback code I’ve got needs rewriting to work with 4 bit 6KHz samples, which is all I can fit in the 16K of storage I’ve got available!
That last one is the one which is causing the most head scratching, but the first one is the most interesting!
TxRx – PaD #7/7
I’ve spent the evening cleaning phones, and it struck me that I’ve got quite a large pile of transmitter and receiver elements. So here it is.
A more inspired service will resume when I star going for lunchtime photowalks again, probably tomorrow.
Chair Clips – PaD #6/7
I was at the DFR railway today helping out their telecoms team. I also had a bit of a wander around Lydney Junction station and took this shot a pile of clips used to hold the rails in place on the sleepers.
Comms wise, we terminated a couple of 10 pair cables in a cabinet some way down the line, got back to the Norchard exchange and tested them out – only to find a break. Further tests showed us roughly where the break was, so we went out to investigate and found rat damage to the conduit that stretch of cable lies in. Not a good sign! We considered moving the pair over to another pair, but found that one had a break in it as well, at a different place in the same conduit.
We’re going to have to go back to it with a tone generator so we can work out which section of conduit has which breaks in, and investigate further.
Also had a bit of a chat with John about how best to build an exchange out of uniselectors, and he showed us his exchange which does just that. Most impressive, yet the idea is begining to look achievable.
I might even be able to make it portable enough to take to a dorkbot meeting.
Console – PaD #5/7
Today I made a trip over to Cheltenham, to visit some chaps driveway as he was getting shot of a load of old telephone equipment. This is one of the (many) items I came back with.
I’m told it’s some kind of directory enquiries console, but I’m not 100% sure if that’s right. Still, I’m sure it’ll be useful for something!
I also came back with a couple of relay sets, and a bunch of uniselectors. I *should* have enough bits to build most of the guts of an electro mechanical telephone exchange now! I can have a phone exchange which clicks and whirs! Hurrah!
Light – PaD #4/7
I absolutely deny any accusations that this is the result of me thinking “crap, it’s 11:30pm” – I think it’s worked out quite pretty though.