Fresh - Passion - Photography

A Conversation in Black and WhiteSteve and Simon discuss and share images

Frim

Issue 8 - February 2015

The Torrs, New MillsA fascinating and atmospheric riverside

Five Poems for the Winter’s End by Simon Corble

Fresh - Passion - Photography

FrimThe Monochrome Edition

A few months ago Steve mooted the idea of a black-and-white edition of Frim; I suggested we leave it until the middle or end of Winter, when all colours are muted in any case – so here it is! It turned out that we both really enjoy the challenge of shooting or processing in black-and-white and so we started a conversation, the gist of which makes up the opening article. Steve has selected images from our two portfolios.

We touched on the strength of architectural forms in our discussion and this reminded me of a place in New Mills that has fascinated me for years. This became the second feature, on The Torrs, with photography exclusively by Steve.

And, finally, the poems just keep on coming. I have written five new ones for the end of the season. I am definitely aiming for a book by the end of the year, charting a personal journey through a year in the White Peak. We have found that black-and-white images make the best illustrations to the poetry – colour can be too dominant. We share the photographic honours on this feature.

Inspired to explore for yourselves, you can turn to the “Nuts & Bolts” page which will list all the practical information you need for getting to the places featured, along with links to relevant websites.

Frim: Adjective - fresh with new grass growth, especially in the Spring. [As defined by F. Philip Holland in “Words of the White Peak”].

Simon Corble & Steve Wake.

A Conversation in Black and Whitewith photography by Steve Wake and Simon Corble

Si: So what is the attraction of shooting in black-and-white for you, Steve?

Steve: The attraction of shooting in black-and-white is in the striking results that can be achieved, converting a photo to black and white is the easy part, it is being able to see what will work well in black and white. easier said than done. I look for strong shapes, lost of contrast between objects.

Si: Oh, so do you choose a black-and-white setting on your camera, or always shoot in RAW and convert afterwards?

Steve: I always shoot in RAW and convert afterwards, but this in itself sometimes brings a dilemma. I will download the photo and be torn between working with it in colour, or converting to black and white. Of course I could do both, but I have a bit of a bizarre ‘trait’ in that I can only do one or the other.. Sounds odd, but I will have to delete one of them as I feel they both lose something by keeping one in colour and black-and-white.. Odd I know!

Si: Interesting. I am the opposite in that I choose whether an image is going to be a black-and-white shot before I shoot and set the camera for that. It shows what a fundamental decision it is from the way we approach this question. Do you sometimes feel, as I do, that colour can be a distraction in a photo?

Steve: Oh yes, to me the best black-and-white photos are striking and strong, taking away the colour means the subject has less distraction but also needs to be strong enough to make the photo work. Strong can mean many things...strong lines, shadows, shapes; in B&W you can really make a simple strong subject say so much. My ratio of B&W photos to colour is very low, this is not intentional, well I would like to think not, I don’t set out with the intention of shooting one way or another, but I do get a buzz when I get a cracking B&W shot, as they can really be emotive and powerful.

Si: Do you ever do anything to adjust the warmth of tone on your B&W images, or add colour tints?

Steve: Yes I do; the problem with having a powerful photo editor is the options. I try and do the minimum I can in B&W, but I do alter the brightness, contrast and detail/structure. I find noise can work well in B&W; it brings a grungy, grainy texture.

Si: So, you mean you add noise, (normally seen as a defect) as an enhancement, in your editor?

Steve: Yes, the great thing with dark colours is the ability to work with the noise, it makes the image have an aged effect and of course you can have a bit of fun - I took a photo of a fellow rambler once, and made it aged.. :)

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A Conversation in Black and Whitewith photography by Steve Wake and Simon Corble

Si: So what is the attraction of shooting in black-and-white for you, Steve?

Steve: The attraction of shooting in black-and-white is in the striking results that can be achieved, converting a photo to black and white is the easy part, it is being able to see what will work well in black and white. easier said than done. I look for strong shapes, lost of contrast between objects.

Si: Oh, so do you choose a black-and-white setting on your camera, or always shoot in RAW and convert afterwards?

Steve: I always shoot in RAW and convert afterwards, but this in itself sometimes brings a dilemma. I will download the photo and be torn between working with it in colour, or converting to black and white. Of course I could do both, but I have a bit of a bizarre ‘trait’ in that I can only do one or the other.. Sounds odd, but I will have to delete one of them as I feel they both lose something by keeping one in colour and black-and-white.. Odd I know!

Si: Interesting. I am the opposite in that I choose whether an image is going to be a black-and-white shot before I shoot and set the camera for that. It shows what a fundamental decision it is from the way we approach this question. Do you sometimes feel, as I do, that colour can be a distraction in a photo?

Steve: Oh yes, to me the best black-and-white photos are striking and strong, taking away the colour means the subject has less distraction but also needs to be strong enough to make the photo work. Strong can mean many things...strong lines, shadows, shapes; in B&W you can really make a simple strong subject say so much. My ratio of B&W photos to colour is very low, this is not intentional, well I would like to think not, I don’t set out with the intention of shooting one way or another, but I do get a buzz when I get a cracking B&W shot, as they can really be emotive and powerful.

Si: Do you ever do anything to adjust the warmth of tone on your B&W images, or add colour tints?

Steve: Yes I do; the problem with having a powerful photo editor is the options. I try and do the minimum I can in B&W, but I do alter the brightness, contrast and detail/structure. I find noise can work well in B&W; it brings a grungy, grainy texture.

Si: So, you mean you add noise, (normally seen as a defect) as an enhancement, in your editor?

Steve: Yes, the great thing with dark colours is the ability to work with the noise, it makes the image have an aged effect and of course you can have a bit of fun - I took a photo of a fellow rambler once, and made it aged.. :)

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Steve: In fact, I would say working in B&W is just as hard as colour when it comes to post editing, if not harder.

Si: It is all about making the right choices in the end. But the great thing, I find, with working in digital is that you can save any number of versions of the same image and always keep the original. As you could in the old days with a negative, of course, it’s just so much more touch-of-a-button these days. Shooting in RAW gives your original many more options, I suppose...I think I kid myself there is still a film in there! Are there any Peak District locations that are especially suited to monochrome shooting, would you say?

Steve: Old buildings work well, Throwley Hall is a good example.

Si: Ah yes, Throwley Hall. Is that just an “olde worlde” effect or is it to do with the strength of form there?

Steve: A bit of both, just being there takes you back in time, but the structure in its ruined state provides strong contrast to the surroundings. So, you know when you are shooting B&W and change the settings on your camera to suit, do you miss shots sometimes because of this?

Si: I don’t think so. I am more likely to find myself stuck in B&W, (when shooting a wildlife subject, especially) and unable to spare the time to switch back to colour, but I’ll run with it anyway. But this is rare: If the image really needed colour, (a Greenfinch, for example) I would not have started in B&W in the first place. A Mute Swan, by contrast, is an obvious example of a strong B&W wildlife subject.

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Steve: Do you have a favourite B&W subject that you lean towards?

Si: I like to shoot portraits in B&W; there is something very distracting about skin tones otherwise, when I want the viewer to see the strength of character, for example.

Steve: Do you find it easy to “see in black-and-white”? With me, it does depend on what mood I am in! Si: Oh, I am learning more and more to “see in black and white”. My mantra is that any really good photo should work in B&W. Though this is not always true, of course.

Steve: A good mantra. I find that I turn to black and white photos on dull days when, to most, the landscape may look dull and uninteresting; these are sometimes the best conditions to shoot B&W.

Si: Yes, I have taken some good shots in the fog, when I might have left the camera at home.

Steve: So,what advice would you give to someone new to photography to help them with taking a good B&W photo?

Si: Remember my other mantra: Photography means, literally, “drawing with light”. Light-and- shade is the very basis of all photography, so look for what the light is doing, see the bright and the shadow; find the interest there.

Steve: Two good mantras, then. So, if you were only ever able to take one type of photo again... would you go colour or monochrome?

Si: I think it would be monochrome - even though, like yourself, they currently make up maybe only 20% of my shots. I like the challenge and I also think of the photographers I admire from the past, many of whom were photo-journalists, working for exclusively B&W publications; they really knew their stuff and produced the iconic images of the twentieth century. Maybe I fantasise about being amongst their ranks!

Steve: It is a photographer’s burden, well mine, anyway, to want to constantly improve my skills, a better angle, a better subject; always in search of the perfect photo...

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The Torrs, New Mills

A fascinating and atmospheric riverside.

As small Peak District towns go, New Mills does not have anything special on its ordinary-looking surface. Venture just a few steps in a downwards direction and all of that changes…

It is like a super-hero hiding his amazing alter-ego beneath a work-a-day raincoat, hat and specs. Running right below the main shopping streets of the town is the natural feature of The Torrs, a seventy-five-foot-deep gorge cut clean through the sandstone by two rivers; the Goyt and the Sett.

Once you are heading downwards, you quickly leave the noise of the town behind and your ears are soothed by the constant tumble of water over rock and weir - so loud at times you can’t hear yourself talk, but the atmosphere is instantly refreshing. Sandstone cliffs and enormous, eerie viaducts loom overhead.

It is hard to imagine that, during the industrial revolution, the place might have resembled hell, once the initial attraction of water power, had given way to coal-driven steam. After the original corn mills, there were various mills for cotton, linen and paper, all taking advantage of the soft water for their processes. Eighteenth and early nineteenth century weavers’ cottages can still be found at the top of the gorge; the top floor of each of these three-storey dwellings would have been a mini factory, weaving

The gorge is so narrow that it scarcely seems credible that a fair number of works were built on the banks of the two rivers. Not only mills, but workers’ homes were created, wherever space would allow. At the point known as “Rock Cottages”, you can clearly see where houses had been built right into the rock face itself, just high enough above the river to be safe from flooding. These were still occupied up to the 1930’s - what dark interiors they must have had. So little sunlight reaches the floor of The Torrs, even today; imagine the added blanket of industrial smog that hung over the town in the nineteenth century, as well as the smoke from the mills themselves.

Close by Rock Cottages are the town’s two modern sources of pride and joy; the hydro-electric plant and the Millennium Walkway. The first is usually manned by a helpful guide, who will proudly tell you that this is Britain’s first community owned and run hydro-electric scheme, built on the site of a former mill. The output is not massive, but every little helps keep down our CO2 emissions. The screw-type turbine is really impressive and leaves you thinking “Why are there not more of these things? It is so obvious.”

The Millennium Walkway is a quite inspired solution to the problem of linking the main area of the The Torrs with Central Station and the former Torr Vale Mill - a vast old building, still there in all its glory, but now crumbling, rather gothically. Its long sweep of shining steel takes you over the biggest of the Goyt’s weirs, at a dizzying height. It is one of a few Millennium monuments which really look and feel like money well spent.

The Torrs must be a wonderful place to visit on a hot day; there is a spot to picnic beneath some birch trees at the confluence of the two rivers and for anyone interested in either industrial or natural history, (Kingfishers and Dippers are often seen here), the place is a wonder.

Words by Simon Corble, Photo’s by Steve Wake

Five Poems for the Winter’s Endby Simon Corble

A Walk With The Dog In The Snow?

“But you go too far andmy legs get too tired

walking uphill in the snow.”

“Your choice, butit might be really special -

look at that sun going downbehind the church...”

As it was,it was more than special,

it was a box of frosted confection,of pink, of purple, of blue unwrapped

on every side of sky andas soft as powdered coconut

the freeze-dried snow I shuffled throughsilent, alone.

I thought of your facein the dark at the top of the stair,

strawberry-angel-hair shining,indigo-innocent eyes

perhaps still pondering my invitation,but happy in your imagined world

and me ecstatic in mine asthe ring of pink-tinged hills

faded to grey around me andI kicked the rugby ball one more time into

satisfied spirals of flight...

and how you’d object to the pink,being nine.

A Work of Departure

It seems like weeks of nothing but clean white;the walls are rough-drawn pencil lines, the frame

on a sketch for someone’s bright idea.The days go by. We watch. All blank.

And then, one afternoon, some tufts of dirtygreen, a sober palette, long forgotten,punctuate the snow, like first mistakes.

It feels too cold to thaw. A stiff wind offthe hilltops, the ground still firm to tread.

Then comes a day of Mistle Thrushes singing;everything is etched, each crease, each fold

and hollow; the trace of a tractor’s summer path;the trees of hawthorn, scratched, cross-hatched

against the fibrous paper, smudged and torn.

The patterns of the heather-burn appearon moorland slopes beneath the higher topsof Kinder, distant and still crowned with snow.The marks of man are everywhere, his will,

his histories revealed as on a scrollof canvas filling up as fast as hands

unroll it through the landscape of a dream.

Now brown and blue are licensed once again;the artist, sensing freedom, longs to seethe work completed. She will not miss

these final, stubborn drifts, so pure,too precious, banked against the cold stone walls.

A fog rolls in and hovers at the margin;a shroud to veil the work of Winter’s end.

Mr. Hare in Snowy Form

The air is sharpthe nostrils sting

I try to make a snowballbut it’s too cold and crumbling

the touch to my handis hurtful.

And then I see you lying therenestled in your form

as if the grass beneath were furits snowy blanket

warm

I stalk towards youtrembling

I fasten up my hatyour nose is barely quivering

eyes closedears flat.

As I draw nearyou stretch out

and fondly hug the snowas if to put beyond all doubt the things we cannot know.

The Yaffle

A green arrow shotat the heart of Spring,

with elastic boundshe flies across the dale;Each bound the shapeof a bow drawn back,

again and againand again.

There is no stopping him.He moves by the will of tomorrow.His coat is the colour of rising sap;

his laughter breaks all sorrow.Blood-red he chose for his tight-fit cap

and a shirt of unearthly yellow.

Snowman Remains

Dark stones; they could be buttons, could be eyes;a shapeless lump of hapless, frozen slush;

a smaller one, toppled off, perhaps, now liesat rest here in the dull, green grass...

I feel the need to clean my boots of mudand, really, there is nothing quite like snow,

yet this feels wrong; it cannot bring me goodto scrape my soiled leather and to showsuch disrespect to friendly fallen flesh.

A childish bully would not baulk at this,demolishing a rival’s work with eager breath;

then what is it that troubles me to twistmy boot still deeper in his mortal trunk

who never breathed, or moved, or waved an arm?He never smoked, was never, ever, drunkand never wished a living creature harm.

My boots are clean. And so I head for home,the warmth of fire, the hoppy taste of beer;

I’ll pull the blinds down ‘gainst the night to comeand pray my dreams are cool, and free from fear.

Nuts and BoltsA Conversation in Black and White

Steve’s photographic work can be viewed at:- www.facebook/wakesworld

And Simon’s at:- www.flickr.com/photos/corble

The Torrs, New Mills

There are many directions from which to approach The Torrs:-By train, alight at one of two stations, depending on which line you are travelling on. New Mills Newtown is the stop for the Buxton to Manchester line. Out of the station, turn right on the main road and walk past the ancient mill housing the Swizzels sweet factory, (you’ll be stopped in your tracks on the pavement by the nostalgic smell of Refreshers and Love Hearts). After a short while take a left turn down Wirksmoor / Torr Vale roads and then over the Goyt to join the path down from the other station, New Mills Central.

New Mills Central is the stop on the line Sheffield - Manchester line, (Hope Valley).From here you can drop straight down into The Torrs and onto the space age Millennium Walkway.

Buses from many directions will stop at the little bus station in the centre of the town.

By car, you are best to park in the small car park at the top end of Market Street and follow your nose to-wards the river, continuing downstream.

Or, you might arrive straight into the Torrs on foot, by either the Goyt Valley Way, or the Sett Valley Trail, (a couple of miles from Hayfield.) The Midshires Way also passes close by, following the Peak Forest Ca-nal..

Five Poems for the Winter’s End

All of this feature’s poems are, once again, inspired by walks and experiences in the country around Mon-yash and Lathkill Dale (except for the hint of Kinder Scout in one).

The village of Monyash is on the B5055, off the A515 which runs between Buxton and Ashbourne. The nearest town is Bakewell, on the A6. Postcode for the centre of the village is DE45 1JH.

There is a bus service from Bakewell several times a day, the 177 run by Hulleys http://www.naturalen-gland.org.uk/ourwork/conservation/designations/nnr/1006046.aspx

for details of the Derbyshire Dales National Nature Reserve, including Lathkill Dale.

Who are We?Simon Corble www.corble.co.uk

I am a playwright and a theatre director – or, as I like to put it, a Creator of Dramatic Works. My most celebrated creation, in collaboration with North Country Theatre’s Nobby Dimon, is the stage version of The 39 Steps, still running in London’s West End, winning an Olivier Award for Best New Comedy 2007. Perhaps I am most proud of my adaptation of The Hound of the Baskervilles which been produced many times and is now published by MX Publishing. www. mxpublishing.co.uk .

It is also available on Amazon: amazon/Hound-Baskervilles-Sherlock-Holmes-Play

Having a deep interest in all things natural and rural, I have received a number of commissions to write drama on environmental themes, including SWARD! – the story of a meadow, for Blaize as well as a number of imaginative audio trails for the Peak District National Park and The Na-tional Trust. Sample Win Hill Voices at:- moorsforthefuture.org.uk

Throughout the 1990’s with my company, Midsommer, I pioneered open-air promenade theatre in atmospheric settings, right across the North of England, including Hilbre Island, in the Dee estuary and Brimham Rocks, North Yorkshire. I won a Manchester Evening News Theatre

Award in 1997 for my work in this field. You can view a photographic archive of these plays at: www.flickr.com/photos/midsommer

I have had an interest in photography ever since my teenage years when I joined the photography club at Lymm Grammar School, Cheshire. I have been exploring the Peak District, mostly on foot, since those days also, and took the life-enhancing decision to move into a Peak village with my wife and family in 2007. My photos of the Peak District and beyond can be viewed at www.flickr.com/photos/corble , where I go under the name Tragopodaros – Greek for “goat-footed-one”. I have a good working knowledge of Greek and I undertake translation work into English.

Originally from Sheffield, we moved to the Peak DIstrict to get away from the busy city life and this is when my passion for photography grew and grew. Photography and the Peak DIstrict are an ideal mix; I am addicted to exploring new places, looking for that next great shot.

We recently moved from Monyash to Quarnford and although I loved Monyash and met some wonderful people there, (Simon being one) moving to an even more rural setting has given me renewed energy to take my photography even further and explore more.

I have, with my business partner, for the last several years run a busy website for the Peak Dis-trict; www.peakdistrictonline.co.uk . This is still a big part of my business life, but it also means that I could use my photography to help promote the Peak District National Park.

Photography has grown from my passion to my work. I have been lucky that with my business-es; I have been able to involve and evlove my photography.

My Facebook Page is a place where I share my daily photos and I am pleased that it has had a great response; I have a great set of people who like to see my photos and comment, so why not come and take a look www.facebook.com/wakesworld

We are looking to convert an empty barn into a studio where I can take on more photography work and we are converting part of the farmhouse into holiday accommodation, so you can come and see where I get my inspiration from.

Steve Wake www.facebook.com/wakesworld