Well as mentioned in my last post, I’m back from a long week-end “up north”! People in the north would call it the midlands! In today’s post – Warwick Castle. I visited on the first day, on my way to the hotel. I made some photo’s on both Kodak Tri-X and HP5, with my Canon EOS 30, and the excellent 40mm STM.
Warwick Castle is one of the best preserved, and oldest castles in the country. It’s history dates back to a wooden fort built by William the Conqueror in 1068, the stone structure dates from the 12th century. As usual, good old Wiki has a great page – and all the history you may wish to know, so rather than re-type a load of it, here is the link! Wiki – Warwick Castle.
I wanted to like the castle but it started badly. It was a very quiet day, not un-expected in January! Despite that, and the fact that there were more employees in the “ticket office” than visitors, I was still fobbed off towards a screen. It failed, so I did it again, the credit card approved, it failed again. I called a human, they couldn’t get it to work either, she called someone else, they disappeared for 5 minutes, and retuned with no certain news either. In the end I was given a business card, and told to proceed, with the news that the payment would “pause and fail”, in other words not go through, or it would go through, or it would go through twice, in which case I will have to contact them!! Fantastic! … and people worry about Ai taking over the world! ummm
Once inside, no map, no plan, no info. Not even a “Castle Entrance this way!” So there’s a castle. The first photo is the classic shot I guess – turns out it’s not the way in, but the route to the mill. Having found the way in, and up onto the battlements, the second image is of Ethelfleda’s Mound (right hand side) and the main part of the castle (left). Below Guy’s Tower.
The climb up is hard work but the view from the top worth it! Yes, that is a Trebuchet, a replacement for an earlier model that was decommissioned (quote: “due to safety concerns”) after it fired a flaming cannonball and burnt down the thatched boathouse! They should have aimed for the ticket office 🙂
All of these images were made on a roll of Kodak Tri-X rated at 400 iso, developed in D23 for 11.5 mins at 20°c. I’m pleased with the results, the light was pretty flat and dull, so the film performed well in giving some contrast!
As the visit progressed things got better. In the next post I shall proceed inside… now that couldn’t be difficult could it?
S.H.O.U.T. 