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June 2006 Review

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1st June 2006 It's June! Which means it's the month of the great 24 Heures du Mans! I decided to get into the spirit of things and take a photo of two of the garments that would be going with me!

2nd June 2006 That Friday night I drove up to Rob's because we were going into Manchester to the Jongleurs Comedy Club to watch a bit of stand-up. Rob had got free tickets, and I think this was his last chance to use them! It was a good night actually. I stayed at his house that night so I could have a few beers and Rob's loft is converted to accomodate guests. These are the stairs of death to get up to the loft! Though I've stayed a few times now, so I've mastered getting up them without dying. Which is fortunate.

33rd June 2006 Saturday was a beautiful day, and we went into Winsford to check out the fair there, we did a couple of rides (one of which tried to shatter our spines) and got bored. It wasn't a particularly brilliant setting for photography either, so we decided to go for a drive to find something more interesting to shoot! Rob knew of some cool dishes at Jodrell Bank, but we were too tight to pay, so we pulled up, took a photo and buggered off again!

4th June 2006 Ever since the incident in April where I nearly forgot to take a photo, I'd had a reminder on my phone at 9pm to tell me to take a photo! I thought 9pm was a good time, it would give me enough time to sort something out before midnight, if I had forgotten. I never needed to be reminded though, and I got a new phone in September and never put a reminder on that one, so it wasn't really needed, I think the April incident was just because the project was still in its youth!

5th June 2006 It's funny how when you see something out of the window that you don't see every day, you instantly grab the camera. This is not a brilliant photo by a long shot, but I used it as the photo of the day because I knew that it was pretty likely I wouldn't see another one again for a while, so any other photos I had in mind could be kept and shot on different days. I did that quite a lot, when I was really stuck for inspiration I would dip into the "emergency photo" stock, and set something up that I'd had planned for a while!

6th June 2006 Another out-of-the-window shot, but those vapour trails and interesting colours in the sunset were just asking to be shot!

7th June 2006 This shot was used on a photography forum for a monthly close-up theme, where we were posting shots for other people to guess at what the items were. It amazed me how many people didn't know what this was! It's that side of a cheese grater that noone ever uses, you know? The side that  has a single purpose; to bugger up your tea-towels.

8th June 2006 The last day before I leave to go back down to Ipswich, mainly for the epic trip to Le Mans! This is a Newton's Cradle and I intended to capture it mid "flight". It was fairly dark in my room though, so it called for ISO 1600, which meant quite a lot of noise. It was extremely hard to photograph without any tilt aswell, because the metal frame is actually slightly twisted, so it always looks tilted!

9th June 2006 I decided that I'd find something to shoot once I was back in Ipswich, as a whole new "playground" would be able to give me loads of photo opportunities! Unfortunately this wasn't the case, and I arrived quite late, so it was dark by the time I got there, so I just went out into the garden and shot my shadow!

10th June 2006 Seeing as I was down that way (sort of), I thought I'd partake in CoasterForce's little trip to Margate, to check out the oldest operating wooden rollercoaster in the UK. It was a blistering hot day, and we had a fantastic water fight, and played about on the beach for most of the afternoon. The "park" itself only really kept us interested until lunchtime! This shot was a self portrait through Big John's sunglasss!

11th June 2006 Sunday involved a little photography trip to Orford, this cornfield looked rather interesting as the tips were just turning yellow. The depth of field was quite nice too!

12th June 2006 Monday was the day before Le Mans, so generally just packing and making last minute preparations and excitedly sitting around the house! A lighter is essential for Le Mans, as matches always get lost! And I'd remembered to pack one! Here's a long exposure of it being lit! I love the aggresiveness of the sparks!

13th June 2006 And finally, Le Mans is upon us! A rather eventful drive down, with thunder and lightning, some very heavy rain and a proper Le Mans style start out of a toilet stop! We managed to pitch the tents in the quickly dying light, but it was dark by the time we'd got around to the gazebos, here's a shot of the gazebo erection, lit only by gas powered lantern!

14th June 2006 Wednesday at Le Mans is the first day of qualifying, two sessions, one light and one dark. Both sessions were wet aswell, which was interesting! The grandstands are free for qualifying aswell, and you can get some interesting shots from the stand above the pitlane. Here's on of my favourites, the Creation Zytek in a panning shot at 10mm, a rather cool effect I thought! It took ages to perfect aswell! The rest of Wednesday's Le Mans photos can be found here.

15th June 2006 And Thursday brings the second qualifying session, same format again, just this time with less precipitation! We drove down to Arnage and wandered around Indianapolis and Mulsanne corners for this one, as it's somewhere none of the group had been before. It's quite cool seeing the cars coming off the straight and back into some corners. Naturally a shot of an Aston would make it into the photo of the day. The rest of Thursday's Le Mans photos can be found here.

16th June 2006 Mad Friday! No track action, just a lot of arsing around! The photo of the day is this Golf doing a rather large burnout! Lots more of Mad Friday's pictures can be found here.

17th June 2006 And of course, Saturday was the race! There's really not a lot of good spots to shoot from at Le Mans, so we just went to Tetre Rouge which has one of the few places you can shoot, without there being a fence in your way. This is the number 63 Corvette C6.R just turning onto the Mulsanne straight, probably to make a lot of noise! The Le Mans racedays pictures can be found here.

18th June 2006 I tried to be a bit different for Sunday's photo of the day, rather than just another shot of a car on the track, I thought I'd shoot some of the podium sessions. The crowds were huge though, and we were at a funny angle to the podium, plus 135mm wasn't really long enough. So I just decided to go a bit creative! I rather like it, though it would have been a bit better if it was a bit more obvious what was on the screen of the camcorder. Again, the rest of the raceday's pictures can be found here.

19th June 2006 Europe is full of wind turbines, and I love the things! I can't see why people see them as eyesores, I think they're really pretty and really add to a countryside view. Anyway, these ones were somewhere just outside Boulogne. The sunset was quite nice too!

20th June 2006 This Tuesday was a day of sitting about in Ipswich, trying to reset my body-clock back to normal time, I think I slept most of the morning, and got up at about 1pm, and took a photo of this fly on the windowsill. Very green!

21st June 2006 Wednesday was the drive back to Stafford. I arrived sometime in the afternoon and didn't really have any motivation to shoot anything, so I just took a picture of my new Corvette Racing hat. I love the skull logo, it's fantastic!

22nd June 2006 This was a secret Santa present in 2004, it's a carved wooden snake! It looks quite cool in mono.

23rd June 2006 Washing up on a Friday night, how interesting! Bubbles are interesting though!

24th June 2006 A trip into town on Saturday, and I saw this fire juggler, I did a fairly long exposure to try and get some fiery trails. It came out quite well, and the movement of the juggler is quite interesting. I would have shot him head on, but the background wasn't particularly interesting at all!

25th June 2006 It wasn't quite what I was expecting really, but I kept it anyway. The dark centre is so bland, I need to get a studio! Or at least a lightbox!

26th June 2006 Some flowers had appeared to have grown while I was away, so I went to shoot them. I love the colours but this photo always looks really soft to me, all of the photos I took of it did aswell. It was quite strange.

27th June 2006 Another time when that lightbox could have come in really handy. I don't like this picture at all, it's just so flat and boring. The pear tasted nice though!

28th June 2006 My boss decided to go for a bit more of a subtle approach to his car flag for supporting England in the world cup. Rather than the chavtastic flags clipped on at the windows, he made this one for his Mercedes badge! I just had to get a shot of it!

29th June 2006 I bought a bag of Haribo Tangfastics just so I could photograph them, honest. Note the cherry one in the most prominent position! I think these things through you know!.

30th June 2006 It had been a while since I'd been for walk down to the canal, and it was now officially summer, so I thought it might have changed a bit, and may look a bit more picturesque! It did, but you can't tell, because this post is the photo of the day!

© Martyn Hoyer