I had little expectation of a bumper weekend’s photography on Saturday morning, when it was bucketing down with rain and there was no sign of a let up by lunch time (standard British summer day in other words!). But when the weather improved it do so with a vengeance, and Sunday morning was perfect for a long walk in the sun.
With the new camera being so powerful, the tough decisions were over which of my as yet undisplayed pictures I was going to give publicity to. One of these pictures was taken in Norwich on Thursday, but otherwise they are all locations that are within walking distance of central King’s Lynn.
The process of imaging lots for the June sale continues. The catalogue has gone to the printers (proof read and corrected by me first), and should be available for distribution by Wednesday at latest. I did a very varied lot of imaging of today, using both scanner and camera. One of my images shows two sheets of stamps of different sizes, which were imaged by different methods. The scanned sheet of stamps were penny rose reds, while the larger photographed sheet were penny red browns.
At this auction I will be running the auction side of my database live for the first time, thus moving a step closer to the time when my system does everything.
I took possession of my new camera last night, and this morning had a training session with the man who runs the King’s Lynn photography club. As well as teaching me plenty about photography, this chap very kindly gave me a tripod he no longer needs. I have some very fine pictures as a result. I have been doing some practice photography relating to auction lots – selecting various items of mine that either were or could be auction lots and photographing them.
I have just spent the entire day imaging at James and Sons, having attended to a large number of lots, including all the coins and all the stamps for the June auction. As a result I have a large number of quality images to share, to the extent that I am holding some of them over until tomorrow.
I have had confirmation that my new camera has arrived, and I will be picking it up from my aunt’s house this evening.
The day began with some very intriguing stuff – three large exhibiting boxes full of ribbons and rosettes, before moving to the slightly more workaday.
Yesterday being the first Monday of the month saw a group meeting of the King’s Lynn Asperger Support Society, at which among other things arrangements were made for next month. Every summer we try to hold one group meeting in the open air, and previously it has always been as a “Picnic in the Park”, meeting at the Bandstand near the Broadwalk. The only issue with this spot is that it is rather too far for comfort from decent cover should the weather turn bad very quickly (not unknown in King’s Lynn). Thus at my suggestion we have decided to meet up on the quayside instead and have our meeting overlooking the Great Ouse. There are various outside seating areas along the quayside near the Purfleet, and for the cost of a drink apiece we can take shelter in Marriott’s Warehouse should the weather decline to cooperate.
I came up with this idea for an alfresco meeting at a location where cover was available while taking a long and scenic route to the Lattice House where we had this month’s meeting. I refused to allow the fact that it was spotting with rain when I set off to deflect me, although I did defer to the weather to the extent of donning my bush hat, which has a very broad brim offering almost as good protection against rain as an umbrella without the danger of it being blown inside out. As a result of this little excursion I have some photos, which are the last non-work related photos I will take with this camera. Almost certainly, my work at James and Sons Auctioneers today will require the use of the camera, hence the caveat.
Although it has not yet arrived I now know what my principal 39th birthday present is going to be – a new, sophisticated camera to replace the old point and click I have been using. It will arrive tomorrow, after I have left for work, so I will pick it up tomorrow evening, and my aunt has already arranged for me to spend some time with a neighbour of hers who is an expert on photography on Wednesday morning. This means that the pictures in this post, from a walk I took yesterday morning, are among the last that I shall take with the old camera.
Today started with the discovery that the sword which will be a subject of press releases in the near future was not the one I imaged yesterday for the June sale, but one which I imaged today and which will be going under the hammer in the Great Centenary Auction on September 21st and Raynham Hall. There are signs that Archant having become a sponsor are really getting into gear, with an article, reproduced here, that appeared in yesterday’s Fakenham and Dereham Times. I have already as Great Auction publicly thanked both the publication and the journalist, Chris Hill. If you have not already liked http://www.fgacebook.com/GreatAuction and/or followed http://www.twitter.com/great_auction please do so.
Having taken many images of this old and very ornate sword, and kept those that were good enough to be usable I then finished the stamp imaging from yesterday and did most of the postal history, leaving fifteen lots of that, plus whatever new comes up for Tuesday.
As usual I have a highlights package of images from today for you….
Another interesting and varied day at James and Sons. My first activity of the day was to image and prepare a press release (needs further discussion tomorrow) about an old and very ornate sword that will be in our June auction, at the Maids Head Hotel in Norwich on the 21st. The sword is in a leather scabbard, has a very ornate pommel featuring among other things a crown and a sconce horn and also has some very ornate decoration on the blade. Most of the sword images will be displayed just once on this blog, tomorrow, but I will whet your appetite with one image today.
The other imaging I did today was almost entirely of stamps, which usually come out fairly well, and I have some highlights from there as well.
aspiblog 