“The price is too high. Less liberty does not imply greater security. It never has.”

Jeremy Dear, General Scretary, NUJ

Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.

Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania, 1759
US author, diplomat, inventor, physicist, politician, & printer (1706 - 1790)

The festival of Rathayatra celebrated in Birmingham , United Kingdom 10 August.
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Said to be the oldest continuously celebrated festival in the world, Rathayatra was first celebrated several millennia ago in the town of Jagannath Puri in the Bay of Bengal. Today over two thousand descendents of those first followers still serve in the large temple there, and the Rathayatra procession can take several days to complete. The festival was first celebrated in the West in San Francisco in 1967.

Rath Yatra consists of two words: rath, meaning a chariot; and yatra, which means a pilgrimage, a journey or a procession. Accordingly, rath yatra describes a procession of chariots, generally drawn by horses. Vedic scripture speaks of Rath in various contexts, and in the epic wars of the Mahabarath, Rathas formed a major means of movement of warriors. There were many famous Rath Yatras in Hindu legend.

The English word Juggernaut also originates from the Jaganath Rath Yatra.

Purchase images here

The BIRMINGHAM Eid Mela was enlivened this year by a Kabbadi match. A totally wonderful event and really great to photograph. Some of my pictures taken are linked here. I have successfully sold a couple to Asian newspapers.

Purchase photos here

The BIRMINGHAM Eid Mela was enlivened this year by a Kabbadi match. A totally wonderful event and really great to photograph. Some of my pictures taken are linked here. I have successfully sold a couple to Asian newspapers.

Photographing the event was great fun, although it was as dangerous as Bull Fighting!

Everybody should buy this months edition of the “Ecologist” magazine, be the best. Read my rather wonderful article!

Hi Pete,

Received your press release on your book. It is too late for our June edition but may be an interesting photo feature for July/August? Who else is running it?

All best

Pat

Pat Thomas
Editor
The Ecologist

Going to offer first rights for pictures and a story for sensible payment. Magazine has a circulation of over 30,000 and is just the audience I am seeking. Don’t expect much in the way of payment, but would be a great opportunity.
Got my cheque today for the Faroes piece (took a reminder letter, the pains of freelance!) but all helps.

I have been considering a documentary about Eigg for several years since my first visits. I didn’t want to just start photographing the people until I had got to know them and become accepted; the islanders have had a considerable amount of press interest in recent years and haven’t always been happy with the results. Also many tourists behave in a very intrusive manner with their cameras. I therefore stuck to landscapes and wildlife whilst getting to know the place well through regular visits.

I have been interested in land rights issues for many years, arising out of my experiences as a climber and mountaineer. I also love the poetry of John Clare who has been a fixed point in my thinking about the British countryside for a very long time.

I finally decided to start working on what I hope will become a long term project recording the life on the island. A project I have provisionally called “Land without a Laird” and “incomers” is just the first stage of this.
I want to involve the islanders as much as possible in the process very much in the way that “Raised by Wolves“ was produced. I started this with Dean and Berni. I have lent Berni a small compact Canon G5 camera, which I was able to buy second hand for

I have been considering a documentary about Eigg for several years since my first visits. I didn’t want to just start photographing the people until I had got to know them and become accepted; the islanders have had a considerable amount of press interest in recent years and haven’t always been happy with the results. Also many tourists behave in a very intrusive manner with their cameras. I therefore stuck to landscapes and wildlife whilst getting to know the place well through regular visits.

I have been interested in land rights issues for many years, arising out of my experiences as a climber and mountaineer. I also love the poetry of John Clare who has been a fixed point in my thinking about the British countryside for a very long time.

I finally decided to start working on what I hope will become a long term project recording the life on the island. A project I have provisionally called “Land without a Laird” and “incomers” is just the first stage of this.
I want to involve the islanders as much as possible in the process very much in the way that “Raised by Wolves“ was produced. I started this with Dean and Berni. I have lent Berni a small compact Canon G5 camera, which I was able to buy second hand for

I have been considering a documentary about Eigg for several years since my first visits. I didn’t want to just start photographing the people until I had got to know them and become accepted; the islanders have had a considerable amount of press interest in recent years and haven’t always been happy with the results. Also many tourists behave in a very intrusive manner with their cameras. I therefore stuck to landscapes and wildlife whilst getting to know the place well through regular visits.

I have been interested in land rights issues for many years, arising out of my experiences as a climber and mountaineer. I also love the poetry of John Clare who has been a fixed point in my thinking about the British countryside for a very long time.

I finally decided to start working on what I hope will become a long term project recording the life on the island. A project I have provisionally called “Land without a Laird” and “incomers” is just the first stage of this.
I want to involve the islanders as much as possible in the process very much in the way that “Raised by Wolves“ was produced. I started this with Dean and Berni. I have lent Berni a small compact Canon G5 camera, which I was able to buy second hand for

This is a set of images that go together to make my book.

svgallery=incomers_book

Here is the details of how they were made.
All the photographs were taken on my last two visits to Eigg. The were taken on a Canon 1D mk II camera using either a 28-70mm f2.8 or a 70 - 200mm f2.8 lens. Occasional use of a 580 Canon Speedlight was made as appropriate. A polarizing filter was also occasionally used.
The shots were taken in RAW. Initial processing, selection, key wording etc. was carried out in Lightroom. One image (the woods) was an HDR image created from 3 exposures in Photoshop due to the large dynamic range of light present. The images were made into B&W and all final processing carried out in Lightzone.
All images were exported as 16 bit tiffs, resized as appropriate using LR/Mogrify and then placed on the page in In Design. Text was also added in In Design.
The pages were exported as sRGB 8 bit JPEGS and placed in the Blurb software to make a final book. This was exported for printing.
Prints of images were prepared using Qimage and printed by Peak imaging on Fuji Crystal Archival paper.
The prints for college display were mounted on polar white, museum grade board and framed in black 50cm X 50cm frames by myself. The prints for display on Eigg were mounted on foamboard by myself.