In my meanderings around the web I came across various articles about infrasound, the world of sound below ~19 Hz (cycles per second) and how it can affect the animal world. Experimental pieces of music, laced with infrasound, have been presented to audiences who have related experiences of nausea, anxiety, fear and dislocation. It has also been suggested that animals can predict catastrophic events from ultrasound vibrations they can sense. For example, animals were seen to flee before the Tsunami hit in 2004, perhaps sensing the infrasound travelling through the earth heralding the catastrophe. Whether this is myth or fact, I don’t know, but interesting nevertheless. The resonant frequency of the human eye is around 18 Hz, and reports of visions and ghosts have been accounted for by the presence of low frequency sound interacting with the eye giving rise to visions.
As this year draws to a close it’s time to be thankful for 3 Things in no particular order (I should have made it to 10 but I ran out of time:
1. Ten days in Ethiopia
Through a blind mix of serendipity, hard work and persistence, I had my first ever trip to Africa, ten days in Ethiopia on a film making exercise in the company of a group of students and teachers; more specifically with Tara McGrath about whom we were making a documentary. I was substantially outside my comfort zone in that I was location sound recordist, something I’d never done before and I’m indebted to Cathal O’Mealoid for his crash course. Those ten days have affected me in multiple ways, they have opened my eyes both inwardly and outwardly. I’ve made new friends, I’ve helped people in a small way and I think I’m bigger for it.
I’ve traveled through southern Ethiopia in the back of a Landcruiser, across unpaved roads, though desert and scrub, being greeted by some of the warmest, friendliest people on the planet. The work we did was tough, hot and very rewarding. Especially out in rural Ethiopia, beyond Sodo where we were the first white visitors to one village. A major day.
2. My Family
This is my youngest child, one of three children who, along with my wife and our extended families, make up a pretty solid basis from which I lead my life. I’m not particularly religious so family stability and support is a great crutch. The kids keep me reasonably honest, reasonably young and definitely on my toes. We continue to enjoy life.
3. Square pictures
I picked up an old medium format camera at the start of this year and discovered the joys of square photography. The picture above is from Glendalough in Wicklow, using Velvia film. I’ve been getting a lot of enjoyment out of photography for the last few years and thankfully it is being enjoyed by a few other people as well. I also spread my wings body-wise and upgraded my digital camera to something which really stretches me – a good thing – a Nikon D300. I can use it to make square pictures too.
I can’t remember when I first read about the Coelacanth, but I was smallish, maybe 9 or ten. I remember being fascinated and horrified by the thoughts of this monstrous, Cretaceous fish being dragged up from the deep, confounding both fishermen and scientists with its antiquity. It’s ugly, it’s big and it’s blue. Mr. E’s image of the coelacanth above has brought me back to when I was a kid and reminded me of that fascination once again.
I suppose this has got me thinking about what a Lazarus Taxon is. Officially it’s a species which was presumed extinct, only to show up again sometime more recently. These fish reappeared in 1938 after being missing for, uh, about 65 million years. That’s quite a gap. There are pretty rational arguments why this gap exists, mostly to do with the fish dying out in shallow waters and being happiest in deeper waters where fossil records are like hens’ teeth. Maybe that’s not the best analogy (simile?)
Is there a modern equivalent in the shorter term? I wonder if Lord Lucan is a Lazarus all of his own, after all he’d only be 73 if still alive. Maybe some of those people who have skedaddled off into the sunset never to be seen again will one day do their own Taxon Thing and regale us all with tales of murky waters deep.
I may have to expand this to the Elvis and Zombie Taxons.
The fantastic Dave G Kelly has posted this video on his flickr, I’m getting pretty worked up about it now, looks great! If you look really carefully, there are 2 of my pictures in there …
Call in if you get the chance. For more details, visit dublinr.
Dublin is a city that, photographically at least, can be reduced to a set of clichés, but a new exhibition offers a fresh, vibrant perspective of the Irish Capital. Dublinr is organised by a group of photographers that came together through the photo sharing website flickr.
The exhibition opens at 6.00pm on Wednesday 5 November, and runs until Sunday 9, 11:00am – 6:30pm daily and admission is free.
So, I’ve just come back from a trek up Kilimanjaro and have enjoyed it hugely. I’ve written about it over on another blog called kili.intercuts.com – enjoy!
It hadn’t always been the plan to go out and shoot a horse. Not the gun kind of shooting you understand, with a camera. I’d taken a detour from Brittas after the Wednesday night and headed circuitously to Carlow, down through parts of Wexford, through places where drenched crops stand in the field waiting for the merest glimmer of sun to dry out and be harvested. My heart goes out to farmers who have been hammered by the increasing rain. Apparently we should all be rearing kangaroos, because they don’t have the same emission problems as sheep and cattle, which belch and fart their way into CO² nirvana. Something to do with the construction of their upper stomachs.
My job was to find a perch above Carlow, a vantage point to make a timelapse film of that town for an upcoming project at work. So, mapless and clueless I headed for Carlow and saw a hill in the distance. And I navigated my way there via a flooded Barrow and through a series of lanes and boreens to the spot you’re seeing below.
The way I do timelapse is to use the dSLR with a tripod Shona gave me last year, frame up a shot and then exercise a lot of patience, click off an exposure (everything switched to manual) once every while and whistle. Or think, or whatever you do when you’ve a lot of time on your hands. Except I’m not very good at keeping time in my head, and since this exercise was only a test and I wasn’t taking it as seriously as I should, the interval between my clicks wasn’t even, with the effect that the clouds stumble across the sky like so many drunken ghosts instead of a nice orderly procession. Ah well.
So after an hour in the sun, I decided to pack up, head for the car and find some lunch. On the way though I heard a whinny and lo there was a horse standing by a gate, looking melancholy. Naturally I went over and looked at it up close. What you don’t realise (if you’re like me and unhorsed) is that horses heads are huge, I mean massive. Which immediately got me thinking about The Godfather and that scene. Anyway, out came the camera again, stuck on the stubby 50 and squeezed me off some shots. One of which you see above. This brought me by a commodius vicus to Cormac McCarthy and one of his trilogy: All the Pretty Horses. A book I read but didn’t enjoy too much because of its Spanish content and my lack of understanding of it. In contrast The Road brought a lump to my throat and No Country … left me breathless. I could go on but probably shouldn’t.
