..got your number !!

Its great when a plan comes together, but even better when it doesn't but you get something better.

This is actually half of a pic I took of 3 band members standing on a bridge in Glasgow at night, they were all looking rather serious and cool as you do, but what made the pic was my fill in flash picking up the passing car, so we dive into photoshop, take out the guys and bridge etc etc (sorry guys, no offense) and bingo, a pic just as planned...ok....yea right !!

Who cares, planned or accident, its the result that counts..

Its been a while...


I had a plan to publish a picture of the day, thats every day but social domestic and business stuff has taken front of house.
This is an old pic taken inside an abandoned Crofters cottage in the highlands, apart from part of the roof having fallen in its all intact inside, even a few bits of furniture left behind, and a really fantastic old cooker/fire, its great that its not been ransacked (yet!) but that seems to be the way things are in this part of the world.
Reminds me of a talk I went to and the photographers book I have on Montanna, its called Ghosts in the Wilderness and its about all these fantastic old 60's Timber houses that were just left by their occupants back in the 70's, they left furniture, telephones, calenders on the wall and sometimes their cars and appart from dust and decay they are still preserved due to the dry climate.

Half past midnight light...

This is as dark as it gets this time of year - ok its taken with a 25 second exposure but its still bright !!

..so where is the new PurpleCoo ?

We have all been beavering away in the garden sheds in between all our other duties to build a new and better web site for us all, trips to BnQ for tins of colourful jpegs, timber planks 600 pixels wide x 400 megabits long and screws compliant with web code html version W0192887344.009 (they are so hard to find !). We have drafted in the expertise of architect Penguin P who is doing a great job trying to keep up with all the ideas we throw at him.

So, the new site will have a main common room posting area to replace the existing CCW post/chat/common room page and also the 'I have blogged' page. There is one aspect that we are not sure how will work, Today we all have our own blogspot page which folk can keep to save moving house again, or have their own new wizzy pad on the new site, or have both ! We want to have the benefit of one big building, but are aware that some might rather stay in their blog home that they have decorated and become settled in and might not wish to move everything - again.

Also planned is a Forum for threaded posts, photo gallery, and some skool notice boards for all sorts of fascinating info.

Some bits will be here at the opening and some will be finished on when the other builders get their van back out the ditch and sober up.

Please be patient, we wanted to let the existing site settle to see how the whole place works but feel the time is right to give the old haunt a decent facelift.

Ideas are always welcome but bear in mind resources are limited, if we do not act on ideas its more probable that we are busy building other bits or have run out of those damn web screws and the last new extension has just fallen down....again ! We are also looking for some form of backing or sponsorship to give the old place a decent future, but do not want to be controlled by a 'focused' commercially driven corporate enterprise.

Timescale - don't be daft, when was a building extension ever done on time.."sorry guv, the weather in Africa was the wrong sort of rain for the plumber to drive in" or "yeah, I know a said a week but didn't say which one, honestly, I do have 15 other unfinished jobs to laugh..sorry, worry about"

The architect says we should be getting the keys to take a look round in a week or so, we will keep you posted.

what I love about this new job is the diversity...

One day having fun with a great family, 2 days later being all creative and arty outdoors on a windy shore with a young lass wanting some model portfolio pics. For someone who has only been modeling for a few weeks she was great - planning a second shoot already.

Anyway in the midst of all this rather serious and creative stuff was an unexpacted side show, 2 lasses were hitting the bottle big time (and probably other mood enhancers) - right were we wanted to soot - no problem, we just toddle off to our other location then they will be gone when we get back - WRONG - there they are, now totally out of it but were crashed out round behind a wall so just ignore them. So, we start shooting and all sorts of coastguards, medics and then the police turn up following reports of drunks falling off castle walls ???? - but like tru pro's we just carried on while the poor brave services tried to move them on to the body menders (I would have left them get on with it, wot a waste of taxpayers money but don't get me started) - this has to be the most bizarre photo shoot I have ever done.
Now, in this pic are 2 lases in the archway - no competition needed to guess who was the model !

..and they call this work !

Did family photo shoot in the week but this time with a difference - actually advertised for a willing ..dare I say gunea pig family to spend half a day rather than cramming fun frollicks and creativity into a 1hour studio session... needless to day I had a laugh, so did the kids.. and the parents - thanks guys. The best bit was getting the kids to jump around and do all the things they are not normally allowed to do at home but the grown ups were so cool about it and from what they have seen love the pics so a small sacrifice... phew, got away with it again - they havnt seen the full set of pics yet so until then only a publishing a wee taster - wouldn't be fair now would it...

Dogs at play...