I decided I'd been featuring too much 'picturesque Cambridge' and took Monty off in search of a bit of street grit this morning. I headed off for an obvious stretch of Cambridge graffiti on one of the busiest and ugliest roads in Cambridge (locals will know where I mean!) but it was hard to get an interesting shot. I took a slight diversion home and my eye was caught by a funky painted bike with a big arrow overhead and a hint of some graffiti down a side street. Further investigation revealed some amazing artwork and a whole forest of old bikes. I found the person in charge and asked for permission to photograph his wall and he agreed (despite the presence of a great big no photography sign!) It turns out that the workshop is open to the public various times a week and you can take along your broken bike, borrow the tools, get some free advice and fix your bike. On other days they fix up old bikes and run workshops teaching the long term unemployed bike maintenance skills. It was a really funky place and it made me finally take the plunge and start a blog (I'll let you all know when I've said something remotely interesting in it!) If I can get a decent number of followers I'd like to interview people like him and publicise their good work a bit more widely.
Meanwhile a HUGE thanks for all the favs and comments on my picturesque pictures!!
Its amazing how those bikes just appear for you ready to photo! Great find and composition. I thought of you while I was away when I saw 2 bikes against a sea wall with good backgfround, I thought a JudithG shot, and took it.
This was made for you Judith & I bet your heart sang when you saw the bikes propped up in front of this graffiti ! This is a very ''edgy '' shot & you must have had great fun with your presentation or is it just as seen perhaps? It is surprising what jewels you can find off the usual paths.
@happypat Actually it's barely tweaked Pat - it was pretty good all on its own! I'm really a novice at that blog business. Adam is helping (sort off between criticising!) I think it's a confidence thing - it's like starting 365 - you feel like an idiot talking to nobody. I need to press on and use some of the 365 'stories' to get started I think and then I'll start featuring a few of my talented friends and then work on strangers!
@judithg Sounds quite exciting & Adam will love to help with anything technical like that no doubt ! I had a thought after I had written about the tweaking that it might be as seen because the graffiti is bright to start with & the bikes looked normal !
@fueast Well plenty of people trying to sell me solar panels - and the Co-op gave our school some free ones! There must be something else - we've got plenty of eccentrics riding lawn mowers down the streets but I'm sure we must also have sane people - I'll research!!
@happypat I did try tweaking Pat (can't resist!!) - I went through all the effects but in the end just added a little bit of grittiness - probably shouldn't have done that really!
Argh!!! Exactly the kind of grit I need for an idea of got!!! Even this is beautiful so stop trying to fob off Cambridge as being street and gritty!! ;) lol
Actually a great gritty shot, graffiti does publish well. Look forward to the blog, I don't think you'll be short of followers :-)