Kisses

I owe 3 Science Museum photos! And I will owe one more tomorrow. I now don't finish my placement until the 15th/16th, owing to the fact data collection took a lot longer than we were hoping. Darn visitors not doing what I wanted to interview them about. In the end we resorted recruiting some people for interviews, but you can't rely on that.

Photos will come. Swearz. My camera died on me and I didn't remember to charge it until today because I'm forgetful like that.

Anyhoo, for now, enjoy some pictures of me and Mikey!

My work placement, and working weekends, has kept me away from the yard for aaaages. Way too long. The one day I managed to get up there in the last few weeks (until this weekend) I arrived to fins Mikey had thrown a shoe!

But I forgive him. Because he gives kisses.

And it's cute.

But you have to be careful, because sometimes...

...you do end up with a faceful of pony-stubble.

Which is unpleasant.

But most of the time it's just cute.

And now Mikey has all 4 shoesies on so as soon as I finish my work placement he is back in regular work. AND we got our jumping paddock back last week and spent yesterday setting up a huge course of jumps.

Mikey's really excited for that.

(photos by Tim Wright)

Some Low-Quality Photos from the Yard Today

Any excuse to blog, huh? I'm trying to get myself in the habit of blogging what's actually happening right now, rather than just saying 'oh, I'll blog that some day' and then forgetting about it. That's my excuse anyway.

So, firstly, Mikey says 'Hi!'

He also hopes you will notice how brave he was to stand there so close to the deadly white plastic chairs as they were stacked and unstacked.

Mikey has a phobia of white plastic chairs. Really bad. But only when they're picked up off the ground and moved around. Chairs on the ground, fine. Not bothered. It's the flying plastic chairs that will eat you.

We discovered this when someone picked up a chair in front of him just after I'd mounted on the yard and he proceeded to freak out and bronk me all over the place while I frantically tried to steer him away from children and small ponies.

But he does have a nice tail, so we forgive. 

And spend more holding up white plastic chairs with apples on them than a really sane person would. But horse people are rarely sane people.

This is Ricki with his owner, and also Ricki's new flymask, which makes him look like a robot.

This is our new horse, Buddy, being 're-introduced' to Ricki with said flymask after Bud mistook the poor pony for a horse-eating robot and started a horsey campaign of terror against him.

And this is Pelé.

He is a cockapoo that has just been bought by the family of one of our clients/yard kids. He is 8 1/2 weeks old and not allowed to touch the ground until his vaccinations are done. This means he needs snuggling.

And we need to snuggle him. Just because.

Time for a Break: Pubs, Walks and Cooking

I don't know, I get back into blogging and Blogger dies on me! Hope it's not the universe trying to tell me something.

Anyhoo, I enjoyed my first couple of days without crazy amounts of work to do in an AGE this week. I do still have one report left, but the largest bulk of my MA work (if we don't count the dissertation) was finished on Tuesday. So that leaves time for some fun stuff - and blogging!

Of course, I started off slowly. Have to ease back into having down time, you know. Tim came to visit and we had a nice lazy time in a put beer garden on Wednesday. This pub, to be precise.

Check out the menu:

Tim & I had fun picking what we would eat if we didn't already have dinner at home planned.

We make our own fun.

We get this view of each other way too often. Such nerds. I believe I've covered this.

That's better.

I wasn't around to blog about my new Joules bag! Been wanting one for forever, actually, as I didn't have anything I could fit my A4 folders etc. in. Nothing fancy or expensive but it makes me smile.

Yesterday, we took a walk in Sarratt, along some new maintained paths we'd not explored before, and inadvertently discovered halfway along that I had been there before on the horses! Turns out my sense of direction/geography is not the hottest.

Then, I made a fish pie! 

Salmon and leek pie, actually.

Yes, I actually cook when not bogged down with work.

And today, I went riding! Mikey and I are practising a new game I call 'reinless steering' and he calls 'stupid'. But he puts up with me anyway, so that's ok.

I'm back - nobody panic!

I haven't totally neglected this blog, I swear. I've just been so busy lately!

As well as all essays, projects and reports we have to do, our project at the Geffrye Museum has kind of taken over our lives, as we were kind of warned it would. It hardly seems believable that it's almost finished - my got the last of our portfolio contributions in yesterday, our interactive map is going live on the website this week and we're finished off our digital story about tea on Tuesday. The exhibition itself goes up in the museum on the 16th of May and is well worth a look.

I still have an ethnography to write, as well as an individual report on our project. And then there's a 4 week work placement (at the Science Museum!) and a dissertation to write.

So, much work left to finish. But what can I say? I missed blogging too much.

Anyway, here's a few of photos from the time I've been missing.

As I was saying, the Geffrye project does kind of take over. Been spending an awful lot of time there, but it's an awesome place to be.

And the project team have been great to work with.

I've found myself spending far too much time on tea-related activities in the last few weeks.

No, making 'tea' out of tea leaves wasn't strictly necessary for the project but it looked like fun and it's ended up going in our slideshow!

Between working, I've been trying to make the most of summer. Fun times with the gang and such:

Riding Michael when I can.

Mikey and I have been trying to practice our jumping.

We need a lot of practice.

Hopefully the summer will see a lot more time for that!

Promise not to abandon this again - it's my new month's resolution!

Equine Anatomical

Speaking of loving anatomy, I've recently started to collect (via zootool) a little collection of equine anatomy images. Two loves in one.

For instance, this picture by Skinny Ships is just gorgeous:

The colours! I love it.

And then, yesterday I came across this:

Why did no one tell me Breyer made an anatomical model now?

I had quite a few Breyers when I was little (still do, in a box in he attic). I may have to rekindle this purchasing relationship...

PS Yup. Changed the background again. What can I say? Shabby have a new website up and I couldn't resist - not to mention I'm a bit tired of being reminded it's still winter!

I shall have to get round to adding a tumblr link too...

One Christmas down...

...still one to go.

We had our family 'fake' Christmas on Monday before I ran off to Memphis. Nothing like Christmas dinner the way you're used to it, of course. And it's only with your own parents that you can make such particular demands as which kind (or kinds, in my case) of stuffing there's going to be.

As much as I was sad to wave goodbye to the 100% chance of a white Christmas at home, I have to say I've kind of had enough of snow by now. For this year, anyway. I'm not sure if that means I'm old now, or just that I spend too much time having to break ice and defrost pipes for the ponies.

Ricki desperately wants to be an indoor pony right now.

Domino does not approve of the snow either.

Although he appreciates that it's good for his image.

We did, however, get out to Memphis without a hitch! Which is something of a miracle, if you ask me. Boyfriend's sister, who flew the day before us, had a 30 hour journey punctuated with a sleep on the floor of Minneapolis airport. You have no idea how grateful I am that Heathrow appeared to have its act together by Tuesday, or that we hadn't booked for the earlier flight that got cancelled. Luck was on our side!

Enjoy the new background - Merry Christmas!

It's only once essays are over I realise how much else I have going on right now.

Apologies for lack of posts, particularly so early in my blogging effort. My only defence is that I am terrible an concentrating on other things when I have coursework essays to write (I had 2) and not practised at all when it comes to coordinating blogging with 'real life'.

I'll get there. I promise. New year's resolution to blog at least once a week.

Anyway, Big News: it's snowing! No, not really.

I mean, yes, it is snowing - there is a considerable amount of snow - but that's not the Big News. Big News is I did go to Olympia despite the snow, which is all very well and good (and pretty) if you have nowhere to go, but otherwise a bit of a pain.

Olympia was awesome, as usual. I'd never been on Puissance night before, so that was a treat. I'm hoping I got myself a few decent photos (I haven't looked through them yet, given that the Canon raw codec will not work on my laptop but it's alright because I have Lightroom...that's another saga) since I got to borrow my lovely boyfriend's 100-400mm Canon L lens. Very exciting for me in my little 400d/50-250 ownership. I will get round to editing those now, along with some other things to get onto Flickr and subsequently here.

Did I mention I tend to neglect other things when coursework deadlines loom?

I was very pleased I did manage to get my first 2 MA coursework essays done in time for Olympia, actually, given my past track record of using every available minute until the deadline to finish such things. I've now done a report on a museum mission statement, a rather abstract and conceptual essay on 'living' and 'intangible' heritage (with liberal use of inverted commas) and a more grounded on the role of volunteers. I have Christmas off to start making moves toward organising my work placement next year (20 days minimum) and do some research on our exhibition project.

Ah, yes, exhibition project. This is the other Big News. Scary and exciting all at the same time. Our 'Museum and Site Interpretation' class are working with the Geffrye Museum in London to produce an exhibition as part of the Cultural Olympiad 'Stories of the World' project. Sounds very big and important, doesn't it? Supposedly it's tough, and will take over our lives, but it's also a fantastic opportunity to get some real experience of heritage sector work in a fabulous setting.
Two of us are assigned as the 'web resource development' team, I suspect mainly due to the fact we expressed a greater than normal familiarity with certain social networking sites and visual media. We did both feel the need to make completely sure the role didn't require any in depth technical knowledge - coding is not a strength I possess. I think it was enough we knew enough to ask if coding was required.
Our role is set out as:

To create an SOTW web resource inspired by the objects selected for the concourse case displays, this could be a digital story or podcast. The team will also be required to tweet and blog about the project, however they will need to have a corporate awareness about the content of the posts and what/where/when things are posted.

So, very exciting. And gives my blogging here another justification as 'work experience' I suppose. I find the new importance (or lack of importance, depending on your view) of digital aspects of heritage work and I'm quite looking forward to spending the holiday looking at the kinds of things we could bring to the project before we start really working on it next term.

So much to coordinate! But first, I am having 'fake' Christmas at home before flying to the states on Tuesday (weather permitting) for Christmas in Memphis with boyfriend's family.

Adventures!


I also think maybe I'm not cut out for Adventures. I'm currently lying in bed with a hot water bottle on my hip I have done indeterminate minor damage to, either related to hauling heavy stuff around in aid of looking after ponies in the snow all morning or to pushing a car up a frozen hill. One of the two.

A Flickr-Illustrated Thanksgiving

Ok, I'm not American. I know. Blog title makes it pretty obvious. But I do like the 'giving thanks' idea and there are plenty of things I am thankful for - I'm a very lucky girl, all considered.

So, besides all the many other things that are wonderful, my Flickr gallery makes me thankful for...

Robins.

Ours has just returned to our garden. He makes the bird feeders more cheerful.

Little girls and ponies.

They make the world go round.

My boyfriend.

He's lovely. And good to me. And plays snooker.

I can't play snooker. At all.

Ducks!

Everyone loves ducks.

Especially crispy ones wrapped in little pancakes and smothered in hoisin sauce...

Sorry that was uncalled for. Apologies to delicious aromatic ducks.

Teddy bears!

No, sorry, that's a cow. Hard to tell. They're cooler than teddy bears anyway.

Not that I'd rather someone give me a cow for Christmas than a teddy bear. Not sure the cat would appreciate the company.

Speaking of, I am also thankful for my cat.

My cat is called Domino. He believes you should be fetching toys for him, that the bottom end of the sofa is his domain and that he's entitled to multiple dinners if people arrive home at different times.

He left white hair all over my clothes tonight.

Lastly, I am thankful for lint brushes.

Equine Photography Tips by Nico Morgan

Just read a wonderful blog post by Nico Morgan: Ten ways to improve your photography of horses.

I think they're very much aimed at the commercial event photographer, not those taking more 'artistic' images: how to get the 'basic', more formal shots to fulfil what the owner or rider will want to buy. You might say you're not interested in commercial photography, and only shoot equestrian images for artistic/hobby reasons , but in my opinion these are the things you need to know before you can pull off more artistic shots consistently.

These are the basics, but they're important to get down. As you become more experienced, with horses and their photography or with both simultaneously, hopefully you come to realise ways you can photograph differently to these 'rules'. I for one already have different opinions about the correct moment to photograph horses in motion: I think a lot depends on the breed or the discipline you're photographing, for one (for example, Welsh Cob breeders may want a photo that shows off the action of their horse's trot) and my favourite moment for the canter will always be before the weight is shifted to the forehand.

I don't shoot horses as much as I should, or as much as I'd like to, for all that they are my favourite subject. I don't get our to equestrian events as often as I would like to and am usually put off taking the SLR to my own stableyard by the dirt. I can't be at the yard for 2 minutes, even if I mean to only go there to photograph, without getting somehow involved and last approximately 2 minutes and 5 seconds before getting surrounded by dust and absolutely filthy. I fear for my camera's well-being.

(No, seriously, I had to send my Ixus in for repairs the last time I used it while working at the yard. Dust particles wrecked the lens mechanism. Truth.)

Wonderful tips (and galleries) like Nico Morgans's inspire me to get out there more and photograph equines and all their surrounding glory! I have a ticket to Olympia this year (puissance night!) so that'll be the perfect opportunity. Although as an amateur I'm not sure how much I'll be able to get around the 'position' rule; pretty much have to work with the seat you get given!

That, and perhaps get round to editing some of those existing shots lying around Lightroom.



While I was writing this, Nico added me on Flickr.
What a nice man.

Making the Case for Watermarking

DPS recently ran a poll asking photographers whether they watermarked their images before posting them online. 43% of people said 'never'. I thought that was a rather high number.

I used to watermark everything, back when I posted on deviantART, a community known for people browsing pictures for use on online games and the like (post anything with a horse and you could guarantee that's where it'd end up) and even passing it off as their own work. In fact, sticking a subtle watermark on wasn't to say they wouldn't still be nicked, but at least, if it included your name, someone seeing its unauthorised use would be able to let your know about it.

Since I started posting on Flickr, I haven't really watermarked anything; I've mostly just been posting only small-sized images - 750x250 pixels - and thinking that was ok, but more recently I'm thinking of swapping that back to larger, watermarked versions. Not least because it's nice on Flickr, and especially Flickriver, to have the option to view a larger version. Gotta say, 750 pixels is not that big on my new HD screen.

There are lots of arguments against it: it detracts from the image, images still have exif data/digital watermarks, it looks pretentious. Honestly, that last one. That's a biggie. One of the main reasons I stopped watermarking was I wasn't convinced at all anyone would bother to do anything with my photos and it looked like I thought I was better than I was.

And really, as I've discovered, watermarking does not always stop people from taking an image. The majority of well-meaning people will at least be reminded that hey, maybe they shouldn't just be using someone else's photo however they wish after all, but there are always those that will just take what they can. Exif data and right-click bans count for nothing when there's print screen.

But the point truth is, if the image is appropriated by someone else, a) 99 times out of 100 they won't go further to obscure the watermark than cropping, and that's easy to point out, b) it's an awful lot easier to claim it back as your own work if there's a watermark present, and c) it's surprising how many people on the internets are happy to point out image 'theft' and let you know about it. I've had messages from 3 perfect strangers about by images being passed off as others' work. It's rather heart-warming to know perfect strangers do care about fellow photographers' image rights, and the online community is a powerful thing.

It's not all that hard to make a watermarking that is quite unobtrusive and, if you really put the effort in, not bad looking; they don't need to ruin the image completely to add some effective level of 'security'. I don't think the picture posted above is too hideous, and it has two watermarks. Count'em. I found that's an example of the best way to watermark: a name, or username (a username is often better), a website link where the original was posted, and the word 'copyright'. The first two are so someone can link it back to you. The latter is surprisingly effective at stopping most of those who assume it's just fine to take and use your photo in their tracks. It's like a badge that says 'hey, this image has an owner - think about it.'

And then you have things like this. Ok, not everyone is going to have an image this desirable, or a theft this ridiculous, but it does highlight the fact that if you do put an image on the web, even at a low resolution or small size, it can get out of your control without the recognition you deserve. Perhaps its even worse if you are not a well-known photographer, as there aren't many out there who will automatically recognise the image as yours!

You may not be making your living from your photos, but it's still damn annoying.