Rainbow Journeyman’s diary

As a young lad, (Pre-Rainbowjourneyman lifestyle by a few weeks, which shows I have a good memory), I used to go around Art exhibitions with a cultured Lady friend called Penny. Penny was doing her Art student apprenticeship with Bromley College of Art and to me, was the goddess of her class.

Penny taught me to “see” with the inner eye of shape, character, and form. Not just to look at something; a church or a ploughed field. But to really feel the ageing of the structure or the furrows of the field. If you are serious or dedicated to photography and only when you have this feeling in your mind should you focus a camera to try to bring to discerning people like you, the images that Journeymen strive to capture. Penny was, and I hope, still is, a great teacher (They do say that love is blind and whilst learning I tried not to upset her guide dog!.)

Under her knowlegable guidance we toured many of the Art Galleries around London; The Tate, National Portrait Gallery and so on; down to the smaller, one window observatories, in Curzon Street and Soho. At that time, I disliked Picasso having seen his earlier classical work of the Girl with the Chair. In my opinion, anything after that was a deterioration. The later works where an eye saw only its bum left me a bit nonplussed. In fact minus plussed. That was until later when I got behind a camera and saw some of the works done by people with incredible talents, both with Photography and Painting.

Time and education in whatever form develops the mind. Eventually you stop, or reduce the time spent, looking at chocolate box images and going “Wow”. You then see shape and pattern for what it is, and you realise, or at least I did, that there is a place in this convoluted grey mass that we call a brain for more images than you could ever dream about.

Later, meeting with other photographic journeymen I saw the results of other people talent. Julian Busselle for one. Following his Father’s footsteps, he told at a meeting recently of the time that he took to “see” an image. He would retun to a shoot, time and again looking for the light and the effect. From our life long experiences we now know what exactly what he means.

Here I refer back to an old friend Lou Brodigan who said. “There’s none so blind as those who see nowt!” By training ourselves to see we hope to bring you pictures that will, like good wine, show their appreciation of your company by giving you pleasure.

Some of the Sunsets that we have captured did not just happen. For every one you see there were five that turned out to be none events. The rock formations s on the beach too. They have taken milions of years for nature to create the beautiful banding in colours that make them unique to the area and to their formation.

The sea too plays its part. Every time we go to a beach we are mindful of the tides and what they have done ot the sands on the beach. The ever flowing power of the sea paints with sand. Exposing darker shales and lighter crushed shell bars. When we have enlarged these to A1 size they draw small crowds looking intently at the pattterns and shapes that emerge.

The Road goes forever on.

Enjoy!