Some days, even though the wind is howling, you're chilled to the bone, and have a headache and a cold, it's worth dragging yourself out. And I'm glad I did today: the light was fantastic.

I've been in Eindhoven for the last couple of days, and haven't had a chance to shoot any new images, so here's one from last weekend: shot while wandering around with Neil Sandbach during a 1-2-1 training day. Neil has posted some great shots from the day so check them out on 500px.com.

First of all, thanks for all the thoughtful comments on my previous image – they're much appreciated – but there are a couple of points I'd like to pick up on one of them.

Garry and YETi both commented to the effect that they don't feel they should comment unless it will have some constructive impact. And clearly, from my perspective, constructive criticism is great – it helps me to move on – but I wouldn't want people to feel that that's all they should offer. Chromasia has been around for a long time, and as I write this there are 39722 comments containing over 1.3 million words – some of these are constructive, some are not, but all of them carry the various conversations forward.

There were also a number of interesting comments regarding the future of blogs, images on the web, and so on, but I need to think about these before I reply.

Anyway, on with the show :-)

The last few images I've posted were taken on a trip last week and, what with one thing and another I haven't been out since. So, I'm posting this one, a) because I don't have anything else worth putting up, and b) because I think it raises an interesting point. Personally, I really like this one – for reasons I'll come to in a minute – but I have to say that I don't think it works all that well at this resolution.

The things I like are the feathery detail of the structures on the pier, the couple walking arm-in-arm atop the new sea wall, the lone woman taking her dog for a walk, and a whole host of other small details – most of which are barely visible at this resolution. But what's the point in posting it if you can't see the things that make the shot?

My main reason (other than having nothing else to post) is that I wonder how acclimatized we have become to expecting an image to be eye-catching at the resolution we typically see on the web? Clearly, most photographs will look better when printed rather than previewed at a fraction of their original resolution, but does the fact that we spend most of our time looking at photographs on the web mean we have changed the way we see a photograph? I'm not sure I know the answer, but I do know that I very rarely post anything that doesn't work at this size.

Anyway, if you're interested, I posted another version of this image here:

.../archives/a_question_of_scale/index.html

As you can see, there's a lot more detail in the original image, and while you might not agree that "it makes the image", it does make for more interesting viewing.

Here's another one from the archives – taken just over three years ago – and I have no idea why I didn't post this one at the time.

I have two more shots from my trip to Germany that I'll put up, but I thought I'd post this one first. It was taken this morning and is a view of Blackpool's South Pier taken from Central Pier.

You may remember this view from this shot.

Given that yesterday's bee probably wasn't one of my better efforts, I thought I'd post today's shot a bit early. As you'll probably be able to guess, I'm a lot happier with this one ;-)

This is a shot of Peter, who John and I met last Thursday, and is one of several portraits that we were invited to take. But before I tell you more about the shot though I thought it would be interesting to hear your thoughts on what story you think it tells. I'm going to tell you – below the EXIF data – but thought you might like to think about it before I spilled the beans. For me, it tells the story that I intended, but without the background information as to who Peter is and what he does ... maybe it tells a different story entirely.

Oh, and if you want to post your comment before reading my explanation just click this link.

3.57pm on 18/5/05

Canon 20D

EF 70-200 f/4L USM

84mm (134mm equiv.)

f/5.6

1/500

aperture priority

+0.0 (-2/3 FEC)

evaluative

100

580EX

RAW

C1 Pro

minor

Ok, so here's the story ...

Peter owns the rides on the South pier, the one in the background to this shot, so I guess this was an attempt to locate Peter in the centre of his world, his working world at least, and in that sense I think it's successful. I do suspect though, without that information, that it may just seem like some guy on the beach in an old Jeep ;-)

This is the first of four shots that I took yesterday while walking along our windswept beach. Two were taken walking south (of which this is the second, hence the title), two are colour, and two are toned. This is probably my least favourite of the four, tomorrow's my next least favourite, the day after is my favourite, and the final shot is my wife's favourite (which, on past experience, probably means it's the best of the four ;-), but there isn't really a great deal to choose from in terms of my view of their quality. One of the things I was trying to show, though not so much with this one, was some indication as to how windy it was – there was a steady 40-45mph wind blowing in off the sea – but I'm not sure that I managed it all that successfully. Oh well, as landscapes go I'm quite pleased with all of them.

And I know that I said I was going to do more portraits, and I will, but having got these shots yesterday I do want to put them up. Besides which, this gives me four days to take some decent portraits which, I have to confess, I find much more difficult than landscapes.

Let me know what you think.

Oh, and I found out how to export my usage statistics to make them publicly available. I don't know if this will be of interest to anyone, but it's the sort of geeky thing that I find quite intriguing when I see it on other sites so thought I'd include it ;-) I've also included a link on the sidebar of my main archive page. Correction: Following quis's comment I checked out the referrer section on other sites that do this and lo and behold they're full of spurious sites that probably used a false referrer. So it's back to the drawing board with this one.

And finally, many thanks to everyone who's been voting for chromasia in the Best Photo/Art/Poetry Blog category in the Best of Blogs Awards 2004 – it's much appreciated and I'm currently in a respectable second place. If you'd still like to vote you can do so every day between now and the 14th :-)