Time for a little colour from my archive. One of the many benefits of film photography is that we tend to file our negs in sheets of 36. We all have different systems of course, but the point is we tend keep them all. Sure there have been times when I’ve had a developing disaster or a short end, or used a 12 exposure – remember those! So I do have few filling sheets that have A,B, and C marked on them, but most are full sheets. What I am discovering is that my editing now, is quite different to my 20’s. Making a generalization, I tend to be wider, less tight cropping. Photo’s that I liked then, I sometimes find lacking now, and vice-versa. I hope that means there has been some personal development, it’s sure nice to have the choice. Digital I think tends to be a more knee-jerk reaction, and once it’s deleted, it’s gone – for good.
These images were made at the Weymouth Carnival in 1997. It was always one of the bigger carnivals in the area, and started at 9 in the morning with the crowing of the carnival queen, and ending after the evening fireworks about 10pm. There were events throughout the day. I think the 80’s may have been the highpoint. I was commissioned to make the official video the last year that the local round table organised it, sometime in the early 2000’s. As time went on, businesses got squeezed, health and safety, insurance costs, and not least a team of people prepared to organise it, seemed to make it more and more difficult. It dwindled and the last was in 2018. There are plans to try and resurrect it for 2024 – I wish them well!
Strange to think these young smurfs above, would now be 27 years older!!
S.H.O.U.T. 