The Digital Economy Bill is on the cards in parliament at the moment. They’re hoping to rush it through while there’s the excitement of general election in the air. However, it’s a very dangerous bill.

Firstly, it allows your ISP to disconnect you if they think you’re illegally downloading copyright works. That’s a little harsh, but fair enough.

BUT and it’s a big BUT… it also introduces powers to steal your photos from you. If someone finds your photo and likes it, and can’t trace you through a “diligent search”, they can pay the government a licensing fee and use the photo. Worse than that, even if they can find you, they can opt to go to the government’s licensing board instead of finding out what your fee would have been – pay that fee and it’s theirs to use.

So they’re protecting the copyright of the massive media corporations, while taking a bite of the money that independent media creators could be earning in license fees (for their hard work, I should add – a license fee for usage isn’t free money).

This bill has to be stopped. Seriously. Or at the very least given due debate and consideration in parliament instead of being rushed through.

Full details here.

And 38 degrees has made it simple to write to your MP right here.

This week’s Photo Challenge topic was Old and New. My first plan (actually, I think it was H’s idea) was to stick a SatNav on the dashboard of my stepdad’s 1927 car, but I never seemed to manage to bring the SatNav, the car and the camera together at the same time. Then a thought struck me… I noticed a new logo on a can of Pepsi a few weeks ago (and decided to use a similar one for my blog titles). I had immediately rushed out to buy an old can so that at some point I could have some comparison photos.

That was two or three weeks ago. It seems I didn’t have to rush because when looking for a new-logo can for the challenge, I had to search far and wide. I didn’t realise how few shops sell cans now – it’s all bottles. Then if you find a shop that sells cans, they do Coke but not Pepsi. Then if you find a shop that does sell Pepsi, they still have the old-logo cans.

Eventually, though, I found one.

And that’s all after doing a great corporate photo shoot this morning using no lighting other than a single on-camera flash, along with a big white sheet over a backdrop stand to bounce the flash off… a nice portable 6×6-foot softbox without the problem of trailing wires and bags of kit.

It’s one of those projects that definitely falls under the “Dare to Dream” category.

Amateur Pictures of Earth From Space.

Well done, Mr. Harrison!

If you’re not aware of Ignite, it’s a series of very short talks on a whole range of topics – each speaker is given 5 minutes with 20 slides (which auto-advance every 15 seconds). There was recently held a Photographer’s Ignite, and the videos have just been released. I watched Scott Bourne’s presentation on Previsualisation as I know this is an area I have to work on. Or do I? Read on…

What I learnt from Scott’s talk is that Previsualisation and Patience can pay off. It took him over 12 years to turn his visualisation into a finished photo, requiring weather conditions, location, the whim of two particular birds, along with thousands of others to fall into place. Amazing stuff.

Go see!

If you have $395 spare, I strongly recommend you go and buy that print. If you don’t like it, I will very gladly take it off your hands as a favour.

Anyway… what I have realised, is that my previsualisation is not lacking – it’s just too ambitious for my current resources. I have an idea and then say to myself “Where am I going to find a water buffalo, wooded area, mist and a naked young lady at this time of day?” (* go check Drew Gardner’s “Epic Fashion” work if you have no idea what I’m on about).

What I should be doing, instead of rejecting the idea as impossible, is writing the ideas down in a Big Book of Inspiration™

And that is what I shall do henceforth. Maybe in 12 years, I’ll have some suitable results!

I’ve been having some fun and games with the passport agency.

A friend recently asked if I would countersign her daughter’s passport application since I’m apparantly qualified to do so being a “Photographer (Professional)”. No problem, I said, went round, signed the application and thought nothing of it.

A phone call from the friend a week later alerted me to the fact that the Identity and Passport Service decided that my address looked “a little bit too much like a residential address” and therefore my profession was brought into question and my countersignature invalid. Given a VAT registration number, they would happily accept the signature.

I don’t have a VAT registration number. That’s because I’m not VAT registered. That’s because my turnover is below the threshold that requires me to be VAT registered. I did, however, give my friend all the details of the BIPP of which I am a member – my membership number, the BIPP’s contact details and so on.

I thought nothing further of it.

Yesterday I received a letter from the Identity and Passport Service.

Dear Stu

RE: PASSPORT APPLICATION FOR [Jeannette Thomspon]

You recently signed a passport application for the person named above.

Please:

- confirm your company’s full name, business address and phone number. Also give your profession and professional qualifications.

- say whether your company is a limited business, whether it is a registered charity or whether it is registered for VAT. Please quote the company, charity and VAT registration numbers in your reply.

Your reply should cover each point we have mentioned. Please then sign and date it. It is important that you sign your reply personally rather than allow someone else to reply on your behalf.

I would be grateful for a prompt reply.

Please reply on business headed paper using the enclosed prepaid label. The information provided will be treated with the strictest confidence.

Yours sincerely,

ppsquiggle

Mr. A Hitler

I’ve done them a reply. I don’t think they’ll like it. Their systems don’t seem to want to accept a sole trader, working from home who doesn’t yet have his professional qualification (but is working on it). I bet my friend wishes she’d just given the family doctor a tenner to countersign!

And while they’re making it nigh-on-impossible for the man/lady/baby in the street to get a passport, the professional forgeries continue. Seems the key to being a successful criminal is to be rich and well-connected.

Someone is either very confused or being rather ironic. I’d love to have been present at the meeting where this new product development was approved.

Mum offered to do our garden as a wedding present. Unfortunately, due to a really bad winter, it’s quite far behind schedule – but we don’t mind, we’re quite relaxed about it all. But today, spurred by the good weather, while Helen painted the remaining wall (and touched up the frost-damaged bits), I rearranged the rocks and made a little rake for my patch of zen…

Spring is here, and right on cue too! Hurrah!

We had just discussed in the week that the garden can be ignored until after the wedding (running a business, planning a wedding and trying to pass a GCSE in Japanese is starting to become a bit of a burden). But the lovely weather today was too good to pass up.

New underpants, please!

To quote Arclid Transport’s website:

Our service is our strength. We have developed an unsurpassed reputation for delivery where you want it, when you want it – swiftly and safely….

Swiftly, yes. Safely? Not quite so sure.

For years now, there have been reports in the papers of “Record Exam Grades”. Those with half a brain tend to think “I wonder if the exams are becoming easier in any way?”. Well, I have in front of me this morning, sample papers for writing part of the Japanese GCSE. The syllabus has changed so the ‘old’ paper runs until this year, the ‘new’ paper begins next summer. Let’s have a look…

Old: 1 hour 15 minutes
New: 1 hour

Not a major issue to start on. Although percentage-wise it’s a big difference, it’s only 15 minutes. In fact, if the paper is just as difficult, the shortened time will make things harder.

Old: 4 tasks
New: 2 tasks

The old paper has a couple of simple exercises to get you going before launching into the short and then long writing tests. No major issue again – it depends on the rest of the paper.

Let’s look at the two main writing tasks in detail, beginning with the short task:

Old: Up to 190 characters on a single subject. Suggested: “about 165 characters”.
New: Up to 190 characters on a choice from four subjects. Suggested: “75-180 characters”.

I guess this means you can learn limited vocabulary and still ace the new exam. You rely on luck (or actually knowing all of the subject) for the old.

The long task:

Old: Up to 400 characters on a choice from two subjects. No suggested number of characters. Instructions written entirely in Japanese.
New: Up to 380 characters on a choice from four subjects. Suggested “minimum 300 characters”. Instructions written in English apart from titles for two of the essays. Those are written in Japanese with English translations in parentheses.

It really is starting to sound easier. But let’s see if there’s any real clincher. Something that really gives away the reduction in standards…

Oh… here it is… let’s look at the front of the exam paper…

Old: You may NOT use a dictionary.
New: The use of an appropriate bilingual dictionary is permitted in both Tasks 1 and 2.

I need say no more.

I’ve been playing with more on-camera flash techniques and combined them with advice gleaned from Joe McNally’s The Moment it Clicks

This picture came straight out of the camera like this – no post-production:

It still all needs refinement, but I’m really enjoying this single on-camera light lark!