Absolutely Steaming

Finding things to do over the Easter bank holiday was a bit of a challenge, given the freezing weather. On the Monday, we found our way to Westonzoyland pumping station, were there's a steam museum. The thinking was that its a steam museum, so it's bound to be warm, right?

Well, sort of. It was damned expensive to get in - £5 a head, although our five year old went free. And the place was basically a bunch of steam engines, which aren't really my thing, in an old shed. Who'd have thought?

But we set about the 'I Spy' quiz and whiled away a couple of hours. At three o'clock they fired up the main pumping engine and another half hour disappeared. Then tea and cake in the cafe, and off home to get warm.

The image above is of the main pump, taken using my Alpha 550 and Tamron super-zoom, which is really slooooow at the telephoto end. I'm inordinately proud of this photo, not because of the composition or the exposure, but because it was taken handheld at 1/10th. There's another image below, of the engine in operation, taken at the same shutter speed, just to prove that it wasn't a fluke.

Spring Fully Sprung

Back in Somerset and one last image from the Spring garden - a crocus open in some of the recent sunshine.

The Ancestral Pile Revisited

Another image from our visit to Sudley House. This is of a stained glass panel which is in the entrance porch on the North side of the house. Note that there's a chip under the central figure's chin with a radial crack running down and left onto the chest, which adds a nice touch in my view.

A should say that, in addition to the temporary exhibition of Bedford Lemere's photography, there are some very nice family photographs, dating from the early twentieth century, on display in the cafe. So, its a good afternoon out for photographers and entrance to museums is still free in the People's Republic of Liverpool.

The Ancestral Pile

We were in Liverpool during the weekend, trying to finish clearing out my father's house. Despite the fact that we should have been working, I made us visit Sudley House, which is a couple of miles from my father's place.

Sudley was gifted to the City of Liverpool when the last member of the Holt family died in 1946. It's now a museum. However, there is a family story, repeated to me by my father, that we were related to the Holts and that my father, as a young boy, was taken up to Sudley to be presented to "the old man".

Except that "the old man" would have to be Joseph Holt, who died in 1896. So that doesn't work, but the story may have been about my grandfather, although that doesn't work either because he wasn't born until 1905. And my father's memory could be flaky, so he could have been mistaken. 

Whatever, the point of the story is that we were something to do with those at the big house. So I took the wife to see our family seat.

The museum isn't anything to write home about, although it does hold a couple of original works by J M W Turner. Upstairs, there is an exhibition space which is currently hosting a display of architectural photography by Bedford Lemere & Co, which is worth seeing if you can get there before the end of April.

The image above is of the small cupola over the main entrance hall. Below is an exterior shot taken from the drive and looking at the north side of the house. I had my Alpha 77 with 50mm prime fitted, so I couldn't get a shot of the whole facade. 

I've a couple more images that are worth posting, which I'll do over the next few days.

There Where The Snowdrops, So Drop I...

Finally, finally, the Windows version of UFRaw has been updated to version 0.19. But all is not well, still. For some bizarre reason best know to the developer, they've decided to remove the GiMP integration.

Doh! Well done guys, you've managed to remove UFRaw's USP.

It's unclear to me if this odd choice has been inflicted on users of other operating systems, but given that the developers have real issues with Windows, I wouldn't be surprised if this is an MS only affair.

Whatever. At least I have a RAW converter that works on my antediluvian laptop. The image above is one that I converted using the new version of UFRaw and it is so much better than the Sony offering.

This image is intended to be a companion piece to a colourised image of a hyacinth that I posted back in October. This one is of a snowdrop, again from our garden. All the spring flowers - apart from the daffodils - are over now, so on to another subject for my next post, I guess.

Our Broken Workflow - Update

UFRaw has finally been updated to version 0.19! But a Windows build hasn't been posted yet, so my workflow remains broken. Its now a race against time as I'm about to buy myself a new laptop and abandon UFRaw for RAWTherapee.

Its frustrating. So come on guys, give us a Windows distribution!

Spring Has Sprung...(Reprise)

Another image from the same session as the previous post. This is better, I think, and I may not have posted that one if I'd processed this one first. But that's the pressure of front line journalism etc, etc.