I’ve been playing around with ProShow Producer, which is an excellent way of creating photo movies to display collections of shots. It can be used to create movies of all types really, not just static images although it’s described as “slideshow & presentation software”.

I created a short movie of more of the shots taken at the Remembrance Day Service & put it up on YouTube. It lasts just short of 3 minutes (enough time for the Last Post to play twice) and has had over 300 views so far.

Unfortunately the quality of YouTube videos is not great but you get the picture.

I was able to attend my local Remembrance Day Service at Letchworth Garden City again this year. The last time I was able to do so was in 2005. That last time was one of the first occasions I’d used my Canon 20D & the very first outing of my Canon 100-400mm L IS; I only bought the camera & lens at the start of November 2005.

Ironically, this year’s parade will be one of the last full shoots with the Canon 20D as I plan to replace it after Christmas.

There is usually a good turn out at Letchworth & this year was no exception. The local Army & Air Cadets head the procession and there is always a good turn out of Beavers, Brownies, Cubs, Scouts & Guides.

The service was led by Roger, curate at St George’s in Letchworth who recently provided some support to my wife Jane during our recent bereavement. It was all the more poignant for us this year as Jane’s dad, Tom, died in September & was a war veteran himself.

I had two cameras with me, the 20D sporting the Sigma 50-500mm with which most shots were taken, and the Canon 300D which had my Sigma 18-55mm lens fixed.

Most of the shots taken concentrate on individuals. I stayed perched at the side of the War Memorial so didn’t get any shots from the crowd-line, but I think I was best placed for some nice shots of the people taking part.

It was hard to make a small selection of shots from this event as I was really pleased with the vast majority of them. I don’t know if that’s more a comment on the amount I shoot or the quality I shoot at.

I got asked to take a couple of shots for a budding actor’s agency profile recently.

Young Fred is 7 years old & keen to get off to an early career in adverts & filming. He attended my ’studio’ with his mother.

The setup was two 180W studio lamps at about 45degrees fired by radio-trigger from the camera. The setup was metered with my Sekonic Flashmeter.

Unfortunately, I seem to have a problem with the radio trigger which fails to fire quite often, but we got there in the end.

You can see Fred’s profile & picture at the A & J Management website.

This post is a flashback to 2007.

In July 2007 I was taken out for the day by Digital Camera Magazine for a day’s photoshoot at Mallory Park racetrack in Leicestershire for some motor sport photography. The resulting article was published in the October 2007 issue.

I met up with two staff from DC Mag, Ben & Rachael. We had an ‘access all areas’ press pass for the day, which meant we got to take our shots trackside.

The published article was spread over 8 pages & included over 30 of my motorsport photos. This turned out to be just a small proportion as I took around 1,400 shots during the day. There were also several shots of my good self. You can see photos of the article here.

I plan to upgrade my equipment in January. A new camera and some high-end lenses are on the wish list.

Just when I thought I’d decided what to get Canon go & release the new 5D MkII. This has kind of set the cat amongst the pigeons as far as my new camera goes. I’d planned on replacing the 20D with either the 1D Mk III or even the 1Ds Mk III. The 5D has upped the ante with its new 21mp full-frame sensor, expanded ISO rating up to 25,600 & HD video recording mode. It now equals the 1Ds MK III in terms of resolution & is over two grand cheaper.

The dilemma now is that the 1D Mk III is being left behind, Sony have just released the Alpha 900 with 24mega pixels. If I get the 1D Mk III, am I buying in to old technology?

Visit any of the camera forums & they are rife with rumour & suggestion that Canon will be replacing the Mk IIIs in 2009. Anything from 16mp up to 34 are being suggested with further rumours that Canon may release a 50mp DSLR. Some suggestions are leaning towards a February release, they say Canon will need to release a replacement for the Mk IIIs as they are already getting left behind by the Nikon D3, among others.

So, do I go with a Mk III or hold off on the basis of these rumours for the replacement which may not even come next year?

I suppose I could get a 5D Mk II in the meantime & then see whatever replaces the Mk IIIs. You can read more on the Canon replacements at Northlight Images’ Rumour Section.

Three weeks ago I was fortunate enough to get a ride along with the Chopper Coppers of the Chiltern Air Support Unit from their base at RAF Henlow in Bedfordshire, and I got to take my camera!

The Chiltern Air Support Unit is a consortium of Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire & Thames Valley Police which share two helicopters to provide air support for police operations across the three police districts.

The unit came to fruition in 1992 when the three forces came together to share helicopter facilities. In 1996 a second helicopter was purchased. The two helicopters are currently based at RAF Benson in Oxfordshire & RAF Henlow, although the unit has been at Henlow less than a year having been previously based at Luton Airport.

I went with the crew on a day shift from 8am to 4pm & spent my time with a Hertfordshire PC, a Bedfordshire PC who form the unit’s observers & a civilian pilot provided to the unit by a private company. The weather was pretty poor & it even looked like we might have to be grounded for the day, the cloud cover was so heavy.

Unfortunately, as luck would have it, I managed to get the crew on a particularly quiet shift. We only got to lift for two jobs during the whole ten hour shift. Total flying time was around 90 minutes.

We flew down to Hertford to assist local police officers who were searching for a male who had run off from police in a busy housing estate. We circled about the houses & schools for some time using the chopper’s camera system to try & track down the offender. He managed to escape for another day so we returned to the base in Bedfordshire taking a direct flight path from Hertford, across Stevenage & into the unit’s new purpose-built facilities at RAF Henlow.

Our second shout came only a few minutes later when we were called to Luton to assist in the search for a male who had made off from police on a scooter. It was suspected that the scooter may have been stolen.

Unfortunately, we were again unable to track the rider or scooter down & returned to base. This was to be the last flight of the day.

The Eurocopter EC-135T-1 comes equipped with the latest thermal imaging camera, skyshout loud-haler system & powerful spotlighting unit. It has up-to-date mapping which can guide the pilot direct to an individual address anywhere in the three force areas. Crewed by two police officers who act as observers & work the complicated radio, mapping & camera systems. Several of the private pilots are ex-military. There is space for a stretcher for med-evac duties.

Although it would have been great to have got some more flying in, I really I enjoyed my time with the unit. It’s always great to take photos in a completely different, & exciting setting!

On Saturday 4th October I spent the morning at the Cat Survival Trust in Welwyn, Hertfordshire.

The trust occupies 11 acres of land behind a pet food store just outside Welwyn Village on the B656 to Hitchin. It’s not open to the public but members of the trust can visit by arrangement. I visited with fellow Letchworth photographer, mark Tiller, who has been associated with the trust for the last couple of years & organises photo shoots for other photographers.

They have over 30 cats of various protected species from around the world. Most of them are rescued from other organisations in danger of being put down due to old age, lack of space or the closing of the organisation.

The Caracal, above, is often known as the desert lynx. It comes from Africa & the Middle East. The Trust currently has two males & two females.

The Bobcat is found almost exclusively in the USA & looks much like a very large domestic cat.

One of the most beautiful examples of the big cats has to be the Snow Leopard. Unfortunately, while I was there the snow leopards were engaged in a heavy bout of sleeping, we were treated to only a brief period of open eyes, their curiosity in our presence very short-lived.

The Trust provides opportunities for photographers on group trips during which they can have access to the inner sanctum of some of the pens. Most of then pens have a single cage and you can, with care, shoot through the bars. Other pens have a double cage with a path between the inner & outer. It’s impossible to eliminate the inner bars photographing through the double cages. With a group session a member of staff can allow photographers in to the inner section.

Unfortunately, two people pulled out of our visit at the last moment so as there were only two of us we couldn’t shoot some of the cats (photographically!) as the trust has to provide a member of staff to accompany the group.

The Cat Survival Trust is run entirely by volunteers; they have no paid staff. Part of their work & fund-raising goes to support their reserve in Argentina.

Their website (which is currently quite old & being redeveloped) can be found at www.catsurvivaltrust.org.

I should be at Duxford today for the Autumn Airshow. Unfortunately, not for the first time this year, the appalling weather has put paid to my plans. I got up at 8 and it was pouring with rain so rather than make the journey, pay £25 & stand in the rain all day hoping for some kind of show I decided to knock it on the head.

Military aviation is one of my favourite photographic subjects & it’s really disappointing that three of the shows I would normally attend have been unavailable; I couldn’t attend the summer Duxford show because it was on the same day as the Royal International Air Tattoo - which was also cancelled.

Still, there’s always next year.

The Lakeside & Haverthwaite Railway is a small railway line running between Haverthwaite in Cumbria, a few miles up the line to Lakeside which is at the southern tip of Lake Windemere. They have Furness Railway Number 20, Britain’s oldest working standard gauge steam locomotive.

We took a trip on the railway during our summer hols. They run steam trains & diesels on the single track line. Our carriages were pulled by the Austerity 0-6-0ST “Cumbria”, a steam train.

The trip doesn’t take long and pulls into the only other station on the line at Lakeside. We took a cruise up Windermere to Ambleside & back again, in time to catch a train back to Haverthwaite.

Once the train pulls into Haverthwaite, they have to unhook it, drive it round to the front of the cariages & then hook it up again for the return journey. They unhooked the train & replensihed it with water. I took several shots during the process, then went up to the footbridge to take a pic of the engine going to the front. On this particular occasion, the engine went into the siding & was replaced by a diesel.

As it pulled its new group of passngers out of the station again I realised my rucksack containging my Canon 100-400mm L IS, my Sigma 10-20mm & my Canon 300D was still on the luggage rack in the last but one carriage!

We jumped in the car & drove the few miles up to Lakeside, beating the train by about 5 minutes. As it pulled in I jumped aboard but the rucksack was no longer in the carriage. Fortunately, the guard had rescued it intact with photography gear, lucky!

My father-in-law Tom Sharp died on 9th September aged 92. He was cremated yesterday in Leicester.

For the funeral reception we wanted to display some photographs of him from his earlier life. Using window light, I put the old photos on the living room floor and, using a tripod, took photos of them.

I imported the photographs into Lightroom, made some adjustments & saved them out into Photoshop. I then tidied them up, removed hundreds of dust particles & sorted out some scratches & tears, converted them info black & white (originals were B&W but photographed in colour).

I printed them out on my Epson R220 & then mounted them onto boards for display at his service.

Tom was born in 1916 during the Battle of Verdun. As a result, he was named ‘Thomas Verdun Sharp’. As he grew up, ‘Verdun’ developed into the nickname ‘Vod’.

He married Gladys during the War, managing to get leave for the wedding but having to go back to the Navy the very next day. He was married to Gladys until her death in 2002.

The original wedding photo was color retouched, as was the tradition in those days before colour photography was widely available for everyone.

He served on 4 ships during his time in the Navy from 1940 to 1946. In the crew shot below, Tom is 2nd from the left in the back row.

Although Tom was 92 years old when he died, his death came suddenly & unexpectedly.

He was a loving father, father-in-law & grandad to three. He was a truly lovely man & will be sadly missed.

Rest in peace, Dad.