Thursday 29 September 2011

Road-trip!

Where do I start?! I have had a mental week with work, haven't even updated from my 2nd college evening! I want to tell you about my road-trip first though. WARNING: this is going to be a long one

Ok, so Monday night down to Surrey for dinner with my very good friend and a sleepover so that I was nearer to work's London office for a 10am meeting on the Tuesday. Back to Northampton Tuesday. Wednesday in Wiltshire for work, followed by a drive to Portsmouth and another overnight stay for 9am meeting in Portsmouth and afternoon meeting in Southampton.... phew!

Like a good photography student I took the Canon with me in the hope I'd come across some inspiration, especially while I was on my lonesome on the Wednesday night. The one problem with being a Tog student and I'm sure it's even worse when you become Pro... is the missed opportunities! I travel a lot with work for my full time job... I'm a Video Conferencing Consultant... the irony is I sell VC to help reduce clients travel expenditure... however seeing as they don't have it yet I have to travel to them :)

Anyway, I thought I would share with you what my eye saw but camera missed as I found it all very interesting even if I couldn't get a shot. Firstly on the train in London on Tuesday I saw some fantastic graffiti, not only that below the dark grey bricked wall, bursting with coloured graffiti, was what looked like a VW campervan grave yard... all retro and rusty and certainly not looking like they were going anywhere, anytime soon. I had no idea of my location on the train as I had my nose stuck in my book for the most part.... if only I could get down there!

Wednesday in Wiltshire... this sunshine has been glorious, and certainly makes scenic country drives a lot more bearable. It was the morning so still misty in places, I am driving along in my car and spot a beautiful cottage being re-thatched, hindsight I could have stopped but was not long into my journey and didn't know what the traffic would be like. Harvesting farmers! another opportunity that I really SHOULD have stopped for was a tractor at the field gate and the farmer himself... would have been a great portrait. The sunshine had brought out hot air balloons and even a paraglider! Simply stunning sights over the golden fields... me in my car with the radio, some nuts and a bottle of evian! Portsmouth was a constant stream of glittering scenes... boats, ferries, tides, cranes... the list was endless, and that was just the drive into Portsmouth.

I arrived at the first site for my meeting in the middle of nowhere passing by some beautiful villages. I was going to 3 locations for work in total, all of which are MOD related, which is a massive shame as I was not allowed anything on site such as a camera, mobile phone, even my usb stick that had my college homework on! After the security procedure we walked across the site and I so desperately wished by some miracle we could take photos... the bunkers, satellites, trucks and aircraft were awesome! It all felt very X-files and with all the security etc I could have quite easily have been Skully! After we left and I drove back towards the next village I pulled up and took some photos from across the field...




I think there are aliens and a spaceship in here!

I then got back into my car and remembered the corn field I saw on the way through the village and decided to get a couple of shots here, the sun was still beaming, I was a bit sweaty (nice) so did a Wonderwoman style change in the driver seat into a skirt and flip flops ready for my long haul drive to Portsmouth.

I wouldn't be lying if I said I felt like a bit of a plum when I tried to capture some lovely corn field images... firstly I wasn't brave enough to get "in" there and didn't have time to faff about too much. So I took a couple then tried a self portrait with the tripod etc.... which low and behold was when a car full of boy-racer-esque lads drove past... tooting and whistling... then back again... after I'd finished, packed up and in the car they actually came back and were pulling up! I promptly pulled away Portsmouth bound!





Can you believe it's nearly October!

I'm going to have to apologise again for the amount of words and pictures of this post... I'm not finished yet haha!

PORTSMOUTH... wow the sun looked amazing sparkling off the sea! I wish I had some technical toy that meant I could photograph whilst driving. Even the next morning when the tide was out the boats all sitting waiting for the tide to return, all jutting out stranded by the sea... I was en-route to my meeting though alas I could only look on and smile :)

After I checked into my hotel and changed out of my work top (had already changed the bottom half a-la-Wonderman) I decided to take my camera out for an evening stroll, work up an appetite for dinner and make up for missing my boxing class! It was a long walk... over an hour and a half! So I'm afraid there are quite a few photographs I have whittled them down to my favourites... The Streets of Portsmouth from my perspective...

cool lines...

more lines!

oooh GRAFFITI hoorah!

Am I camouflage?



Brilliant :)

On my way home this afternoon from Southampton, I saw an army aircraft fly overhead, across the motorway and over the fields... then down floated 6 little action men with parachutes... they were real soldiers, but reminded me of those toys, you know the ones that get tangled up in the string after about 5 minutes and piss you off! Another missed opportunity, but I was happy with the turn of events of the week and my photographs :)

Well, that my friends.... is it! Marathon blog post completed... I hope you enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed everything I saw this week... Good meetings with work, should earn me some nice dollar for new camera toys! I missed my kiddies immensely though.


5 comments:

jake walker said...

the graffiti one are emence i love them there just so cool!
your getting so so so good at taking photos now.
they look so professional i can tell the difference from when you first started!!!

Hannah Walker said...

Ahhh, Jake, my Dude, I knew you would love these graffiti shots... you me and some graffiti have a date soon, need to get some super cool portraits of you! love you lots x x

Rose Clarke said...

You haven't said how college was this week? Which pictures did you submit for your Autumn theme? What was the feedback?

I love your 'lines' pictures.

Rosexx

Hannah Walker said...

I know, but I was desperate to share my new pics! Will blog about college tomorrow x x

Bobbi said...

I'm envious of you doing a course! I've always loved taking photographs and people have been kind enough to say some of them are good - so I've now got a better camera and I know what you mean about the obsession - I see pictures everywhere I go!
But isn't it annoying when you're on the road, you see a perfect picture - and there's nowhere to stop!

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