MERRY CHRISTMAS and a HAPPY NEW YEAR for 2016.

Hello everyone, and especially those from around the world.

I'm aware that some of my reader/viewers are from Islamic countries, so I wish you all the best for the following year.

This post is simply a Christmas card. Normal service will be resumed on this blog, once I have recovered from the festive season.

Below is a little card for you all. The photo was taken in York, (which is the capital of Yorkshire, for overseas readers). I took it in Coppergate, a couple of weeks ago, when my wife Anne and I were there for the Christmas Early music festival. Roughly speaking, Early Music could be thought of as Mediaeval music.

Some of you may remember that a few years ago ago, I played in a Mediaeval Music ensemble, for over two years. That was before I went back to being a solo, touring musician, singer, storyteller

Oh yes, we had a wonderful time when we were there, we always do. There is also a summer Early Music festival in York, which we go to.

Merry Christmas and a 

Happy New year.

Gordon.

Art from Insects Photography.

Hello everyone

This last month has been so full of things going on for me, some good and sadly some bad, including my wife Anne, breaking a bone in her foot. I felt I was struggling to keep my head above water sometimes. Still, I'm an old campaigner and a fighter, so here I am again.

One of the good things is that Anne and I have finished putting up all our Christmas decorations. We usually start about the 1st of November. We have a three floor house and decorate each room and both staircases, in a more-or-less Victorian style, in keeping with the age of the house. It takes a long time. I love Christmas.

On with the blog post anyway. Some weeks ago, my friend Darren suggested that I should be able create art from the photos of moths and other insects, which I take for the Freshwater Environmental Ecology Trust, Cromwell Bottom Local Nature Reserve and UK Flora and Fauna blogs, (see the blog links here). By the way, the FEET blog is a members only one, so there is no link for it. Darren had been looking back over my blog, at the Post Industrial Art photos of mine. A fer years years ago, I showed him my Urban Explorations shots. It was at Darren's suggestion that I changed the Urban Exploration photos into something a little less sad. The abandoned industrial photos reminded him of how much industry our country has lost, due to stupid, misguided actions on the part of our government. No sooner said than done, I came up with a range of suitable images. So now, again due to a prompt from Darren, (hi Darren) here is the Insect Art, for want of a better description.

If any reader/viewer here comes up with a better term, I'd love you to suggest it to me. Just put a comment in the comments section of the blog.

Below are the images I've so far created, 18 in all. I'm quite pleased with the way some of them have turned out. I do have visions of creating some more later.

Hippie Butterfly

1967

Blue Spot Ladybird

Butterfly Graffiti

Arabic Mosaic Tiles

Clouded Border Moth

Ghost

Camouflage

 Doodle Bug

Glass Snail

Hover Squad

Ladybird Circle Dance

B Movie Poster

 Moth in Amber

Twenty Plume

Oriental Silk

Psychedelic Moth

Summer Days

Well, I hope you enjoyed those, for the record, Oriental Silk was completed last night.

Don't forget, if anyone has a good idea for a name for this type of art, please leave it in the comments section. I will credit the person who's name I choose as the one I like best, unless they say they don't wish their name to be mentioned.

Be kind to each other.

Gordon

British Birds

Hello dear readers.

For a change, I've found the time to put my next post up in a reasonable time. Hello to my Russian readers too, I notice that I've had several from Russia dropping in to view the blog.

Two weeks ago I bought a Panasonic Lumix FZ72. I've had my Lumix FZ18 for seven years and although it is still working perfectly and looks as good as the day I bought it, I reaslised I needed to upgrade. The FZ72 has a 60x optical zoom and focuses down to 1 cm from the front of the lens,. in common with a lot of the other FZs. I fell in love with the new camera right away.

I thought I'd test the camera by taking it down to Cromwell Bottom Local Nature Reserve, where as some of you know I'm a volunteer for the Freshwater Environmental Ecology Trust (FEET), which is a green organisation. I sat in  the hide at the bird feeding station for about two hours and took the following photos. It seemed a good idea to post them here. I've already done a blog post of them for the FEET members site.

I shan't talk about the birds, just show the photos: So here we go...

Male Chaffinch

Male Chaffinch

Female Chaffinch

Female Chaffinch

Great Tit

Blue Tit

Great Tit (left)         Blue Tit (right)

Coal Tit

Goldfinch

Greater Spotted Woodpecker

Greater Spotted Woodpecker

Nuthatch

Magpie

And to finish off, a Grey Squirrel, they are resident at the site and I like them, hence including it here..

Grey Squirrel

With a little more practice, I'm hoping to get even better photos of the birds. 

So that's it for the moment.  I've not decided what the next post will be yet. It will be a surprise to me as well as you. Look after yourselves. Gordon.

Hello, assuming I still have readers and most of you haven't given me up as a lost cause. Life has been getting in the way of doing fun things like blogging. I'll not bore you with details but go on with the blog.

I've decided to broaden the scope of this post, from what I said I'd be doing in the last post, if you follow me. I think I'm lost. So, I'll be showing some art shots, abstract photos and CGI stuff. I may not make many notes about these, unless I feel an image needs information with it. Here we go...

Fluropipes

Pole Dance

Desert Fossil

Fennel Fence

Aspects of Viola

I think I'll change the emphasis here for a moment. I used to have a lady who modeled for me, until she and her husband moved abroad. I have quite a lot of shots of her, some very arty, with computer enhancement. I'll just put a few now.

That will do for now I think.

Art Gallery

Regular viewers may remember me stating that I was influenced by the sculptor Sir Anthony Caro. The photo below in an example of his influence. Can you work out what it is that I photographed. It's not one of Caro's works, it is an object in the front room of our house.

Caro's Mask

48

Meditation

Hermit's Chapel Norfolk UK.

Shades #2

The next photo is of my friend Maura, an extremely talented, beautiful woman. She is performing a Huron Dance. I think it was a fire dance, but I'm sure she will tell me if I'm wrong. Take a bow dear lady.

Huron Dance

Old Hunstanton Cliff Face

 Norfolk UK

The next image is of a partially built study. The man who was building it is an architect. He decided to place a tree in the exact centre of the building until he'd completed building it. I took the photo in colour at the time, it didn't look right. I spent a long time trying different things with the image, nothing worked. One day, I converted it to black and white, suddenly the image sprang to life.

Mr Pink's Tree

Wall Mirror

Wren's nest in a gate post

Autumn

Turkey Feathers

Water Lily

Wooden Valley

Welsh Poppy detail

And that's it for this time. I put one or two more in than I intended at first. I thought you deserved it, having waited so long. I MUST sort things out and post more often. Hmm, I'm sure I said that before...

Be good to each other,

Gordon.