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I'm not too sure what remains to be said about decay, entropy and old cars, or relevant poetry for that matter, but I thought I'd put this one up anyway. What interests me about this shot, other than all the things we discussed yesterday, is that this shot 'feels' quite different to yesterday's. I could be a bit more precise about what I mean, and talk about why I think it's different, but I'd be interested to hear what other people think first.

As for this car: it's 'parked' six inches to the right of yesterday's entry, and I would imagine that it was abandoned at much the same time. My guess, and this is pure speculation on my part, is that these cars, the overgrown garden they nestle in, and the crumbling house that lurks behind both, are owned by the widow of a man who died some considerable number of years ago. And everything has remained untouched and uncared for since that point.

On a more mundane note: I've made some code changes to the way that links are opened from this comment popup. Prior to today all links opened in a new window, mostly because there's not much point in them opening in a non-resizable popup. The downside of this though, if you clicked a few links, was that your screen ended up littered with new windows. I've now changed things so that all the links open in the window you started out from; e.g. if you visit the index page and click the comments link it opens the popup. If you then click one of the links it will open the page in the original window. The change probably wasn't entirely necessary but I did think the previous solution was a bit untidy. One useful thing this has allowed me to implement is that if you click on the small image that accompanies this text it now opens the individual entry (i.e. the one that contains the full-size image) in the original window. This isn't so useful if you started out on that page, but if you've used the navigation at the top of the popup to work back through the comments you can now open the associated image much more easily. I think there may well be some problems with this, but I'll leave things as they are for a few days. Let me know what you think.

camera
capture date
aperture
shutter speed
shooting mode
exposure bias
metering mode
ISO
focal length
image quality
white balance
cropped?
Canon G5
3.23pm on 18/6/04
f3.2
1/125
aperture priority
+0.0
evaluative
50
9.1mm
RAW
auto
no
 
4x3
comment by Emily at 10:58 AM (GMT) on 25 June, 2004

i love photos of delapidation and decay. this is especially good. very quaint.

comment by darragh at 10:59 AM (GMT) on 25 June, 2004

i liked yerterdays but i think i prefer todays.. same subject but a very different feel as you mention.. the colours are very relaxing in this one... great photo.. would be curious to see a photo of the 2 cars together

comment by darragh at 11:12 AM (GMT) on 25 June, 2004

forgot to mention that i think opening the links from this comments popup in a new window, like it was originally, wasn't a problem.. i guess it's more of a pain with a browser that doesn't have tabbed, multi-page browsing like IE

comment by myla at 11:16 AM (GMT) on 25 June, 2004

This is just stunning. And sad, somehow, that she let her husband's beloved cars get into this state. . .and you feel that sadness in this image after reading your story. I'll bet once upon a time this was a gorgeous car. Something about the way you shot this makes it almost look like a face. Well done. =) (PS -- how's the move going?)

comment by Yamel (spectrum) at 02:45 PM (GMT) on 25 June, 2004

Yesterday's and today's entries evoke such a nostalgic feeling. It's almost as if the automobile has life left in it, but it's stuck in decay. Everything about this shot is well done!

comment by Jason Wall at 04:38 PM (GMT) on 25 June, 2004

These two car pictures remind me of the movie, Sunset Boulevard. This car has a much more elegant look about it. It seems to need a proper butler to drive it, like Alfred Pennyworth or Jeeves.

comment by Zero at 04:55 PM (GMT) on 25 June, 2004

Oh my goodness... I f*ckin' love this shot!!! I didn't read your description of it because I didn't want to know anything about it. I thought it might taint my opinion. I just wanted to impose my own feelings on it. It's heavy.

comment by Jeremy Wright at 06:50 PM (GMT) on 25 June, 2004

The coloration and lighting are so unique and the state of the car is so defined, nicely done.

comment by Jay at 07:49 PM (GMT) on 25 June, 2004

What a great find and an even better capture.

Perfect colour and perfect composition.

Awesome!

comment by pixpop at 10:39 PM (GMT) on 25 June, 2004

Dave, after reading your speculations about the widow, I was reminded of Miss Havisham's wedding cake.

Re the difference between yesterday's and today's images, I think that today's is much more generic. By generic, I mean that it adheres more closely to the genre. And by implication, the more you confine yourself to the bounds of the genre, the less you show us of yourself.

comment by djn1 at 01:38 AM (GMT) on 26 June, 2004

pixpop: yep, that's what I think too. To my mind yesterday's shot has a somewhat surreal edginess, it isn't a 'comfortable' image - the colours and lighting are sufficiently off beam to render the image challenging in a way that today's shot simply doesn't manage. I do like today's, but I don't think it's in quite the same league as yesterday's.

comment by Russ at 01:44 AM (GMT) on 26 June, 2004

Thanks for the link back to the larger version of the images, that was vexing me to no end!

comment by djn1 at 09:02 AM (GMT) on 26 June, 2004

Thanks everyone.

comment by Christophe at 07:12 PM (GMT) on 18 December, 2006

Interesting....I posted a shot of this same vehicle on my blog earlier this year (october/november 2006). the other old car you mention is no longer there. the one thing that strikes me about your shot is something I read in a photography book that talked about how a professional will narrow/ focus on the subject while the amateur or newbie (as I am) would tend towards capturing more background.