Essay on colour - # 92/2011

Stay with me a while. I snapped this playing with camera settings to try things out. But I got something unexpected.

I grew up with this scene, and at that time, at low tide the beach would often yield unexploded war-time munitions and patches of fuel oil, some of which had seeped from ships and aircraft sunk in battle.

My memory is happy but the predominant colour in mind is grey. The ships that habitually anchored here to wait for the storm winds to pass had black hulls and white topwork and grey hatch coverers. Life boats on the ships were white and frankly very primitive. Metal marker posts were rusting and one wondered how anyone ever saw them or made use of them. The sea was grey or blue. The concrete was grey. A photo was always black and white.

Today we have a world of colour.  The ships that still anchor for shelter are multicoloured often with blue hulls and red or vermillion cargo hatches, the topwork is still white but brilliant orange breaks out and lifeboats are high-tech and brilliantly visible. The marker posts are multicoloured red and white and clearly in business to be seen. And the sea has acquired unexpected colourfulness, thanks to the polarizing filter on a camera that a mere childish lad of the 1940s/50s never dreamt could ever exist.

This is just a snap, trying something out. But it is in fact much, much more as I stand, watch, and remember. 

On the mud at Margate - # 91/2011

The tide's going out and the fishing boat is resting on the mud at Margate Harbour.  As you can see the usual brisk north-easterly wind is livening things up.  These old seaside towns like Margate once had great charm, but air-travel and sunseeking abroad have brought them to their knees and they now struggle, and cope with dereliction, trying to find a way to revive themselves.

Tough at the seaside - # 90/2011

This is typical for a day out on the English coast facing the North Sea. Bright sun, and a good north-easterly wind to make it nice and fresh (that's code for - "A bit chilly; I think I'll wear a woolly jumper").  However, the wind-sailor at Kingsgate Bay near Margate is having a good time.  But notice the coastal cargo vessel: she's anchored waiting for the strong winds to die down before she dashes across to Rotterdam. It was ever thus, since Dutchmen and Englishmen and Viking Norsemen took to ships.