North Wales as a Holiday destination

I can recommend renting a holiday cottage in Wales; we fell on our feet when booking through the Snowdonia Toursit Services and found a small cottage tucked away in the small hamlet of Soar, near Talsarnau, just north of Harlech.

1 Ysgodly, Soar was fitted out comfortably for our group of three and boasted several advantages - a roof over your head for the rainy day in, a fireplace, and lots of electric sockets for all those phone and camera charges and laptops you may be unable not to bring along.

The location gives unparalleled access to the historic towns from Barmouth to Pwllheli. There are lovely beaches, such as at Porthmadog and for the steam fanatic, TWO narrow gauge railways, the Blaenau Ffestiniog Railway and the Welsh Highland Railway are there for the ride.

The main coastal railway line is also a beautiful way to view the scenery in comfort and has the added delight of being boardable from request stops and is much cheaper if you get a day's roving ticket.

The wonderfully surreal village of Portmeirion is visible just across the Estuary from Talsarnau and readily accessed via the Toll bridge, which saves a considerable round tour and is worth the 40p crossing (ticket valid both directions)

Inland, there is breathtaking scenery from gentle rolling mountains to the loftier heights of the Snowdonian peaks. Snowdon and Cader Idris being visible on clear days. Beddgelert is also a good place for a walk, either along the river on a circular easy path (seemed suitable for disabled access) or further down into the gorge for the sound of rushing water as you take a more adventurous route.

On the rainy day, we visited the Llechwedd Slate Caverns for the deep mine trip (there is another trip as well), and the romantically inclined might like the underground lake boat trip at another slate mine.

You could eat out at any budget but looking around was worth it to find excellent eateries at your price level; I recommend the Yr Fen Hecws Restaurant just off from the main road in Porthmadoc who gave attentive service and excellent food at a reasonable price for our lunch.

For self catering, there was a Spar in Harlech or the Tesco's in Porthmadog, both about a quarter of an hours drive away.

Driving is an interesting experience on some of the narrower roads, with unforgiving walls or rock on one side, so take care and enjoy the scenery rather than rushing around.

Other articles from the break in Wales are:
Creative Steps to filming Welsh water (see what heavy rain is really like!)
Bones over Mallwydd Church most likely to be from a whale (on the homeward journey)
Some Wildlife in Wales (YouTube video)

What holiday destinations do you recommend?

From UAVs to novel lighter-than-air craft

My friend and business colleague Richard Wishart came back from the Farnborough Airshow 2010 enthused by the future of UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles).

We moved on to discussing the advances in solar powered flight that would allow these UAV's to stay airborne for weeks at a time, demonstration vehicles such as the Helios shown above and the manned Solar Impulse are already in existence.

Back home my mind was churning over other developments that would assist in this area.

Ultralight materials would be a definite benefit, and there are currently solids such as silica aerogels of ultra light density. Amazingly an evacuated version, the silica nanofoam, apparently has a density equal to or even lighter than that of air. I suspect there are structural problems with it at the moment!

We could of course also look to lighter-than-air aircraft, something I would love to see commercially done again. Currently either Helium airships or hot air balloons are available options.

The ideal would be a vacuum buoyed airship, as conceived by Francesco Lana de Terzi in 1670 - but we do not have materials light yet strong enough to hold large volumes of vacuum without collapsing under air pressure.

There is another option, replacing hot air with steam - this can give twice as much lift as hot air at the same temperature; the  Flying Kettle project and the German Heidas have done feasibility testing, with the latter achieving a 30 minute flight with a 5kg payload!
What thought experiments or ideas have you played with recently?

Perseid meteors and a Jupiter rising in Milton

Thank heavens for the clear skies between the showers of the day and the promised torrential downpours tomorrow. We wandered down beyond the last streetlight in Milton to the open fields by Fen road to look out for the promised Perseid meteor shower.
We were not disappointed, with five or six bright meteors and a number of fainter ones, often just registering as a hint on the eye.
Naturally, my camera never seemed to be pointing in the right direction, and always hit the quiet period whilst undergoing the minute long exposures! Added to that was the strong light from cars and trains at inopportune moments as I also tried to record the rise of Jupiter- it was as if fate was aligned against me!
Fortunately light banter by partner and daughter, and then later by the Coston's kept me sane through these interruptions.
Imagine therefore my delight when screening the photos to find two with clear, if faint, meteors racing through the sky against a backdrop of star streaks due to the long exposures.
What unexpected delights have you found on your photos when you looked at them on a larger screen?

How I improved my blog after Ann Hawkins' seminar

From Wordle-images

Ann Hawkins of the Inspired Group gave an excellent seminar on Blogging, with items for everyone; from the novice to the active blogger, at the Huntingdonshire Business Network monthly seminar last Friday. I left with my mind buzzing with ideas on how to change my blog.

Here's how I improved my blog in six steps

1. Updated my Blogger Template


Blogger has included some additional user friendly design features  to the blogger dashboard since I first set up my blog in 2007. I therefore had to update my blog to a newer template to be able to use these. Fairly straightforward, though I did have to reintroduce my Google Analytics tracking code.

The real benefit is that the Blogger dashboard then has a tab called "Design", which makes changing the layout and adding elements very simple by adding "Gadgets" that you desire!


2. Adding Labels/Categories to organise my articles.


My overall interests are wide and varied, under the umbrella of helping businesses communicate in Print, Pictures and Person. I can equally be active facilitating transnational company meetings, doing a local photoshoot or publishing a book for a local author. By adding the "Labels" gadget to my blog design, I was able to categorise my blogs into subject areas and present them in a Tag Cloud form in the right column.

3. Adding a search bar

Another useful addition was a search bar so people could search by keyword. Oh Bliss, it was so simple to set up compared to what I would have had to do a couple of years ago!

4. Social Media Links

Since many people are now on a variety of social media, it only seemed appropriate to add links to my locations in Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn to the blog template. This was a little more complicated as I had to obtain HTML code snippets and logo images from each social network. Fortunately, I was able to copy this from my Newsletter template. Blogger provided a gadget that permitted the introduction of  your own HTML or Java code blocks.

5. Newsletter subscription invitation

Another key element was to introduce some code that would allow people to subscribe to my Newsletter for updates. I use Aweber for managing my newsletters and mailings and provided a short javascript code that  I could just copy and paste into a new Blogger gadget field. (I spent more time ensuring that the opt-in responses did contain links to the free gifts offered).

6. Including Key text elements in the blog

Ann's talk was a timely reminder to be

• interesting and useful
• use attractive headlines
• think about recurring themes for the search engine optimisation of the blog
• Finish with a Question to invIte responses

Well, I certainly think my blog has been dramatically improved after following some of Ann's tips in her excellent Seminar! 

But what do YOU think? What would you have done differently?

Creative Steps to Filming Welsh Water

Developing a story using clips from existing videos in your collection is a great creative way to generate new material. Here is the process I used to create the video above.

1. Collecting Material
During my holiday in Wales, I recorded a whole series of shorter video scenes (over 30) with a wide variety of subjects, including some of the most dismal rainy day we encountered!

2. Looking for connecting threads
Reviewing the clips, I was struck by overlapping groups of clips that contained

• Walking/feet
• Water (rain, sea, rivers, faucets)
• Weather

3. First Story Board
Initially, I used a video editing program (Corel Video Studio 12) to simply arrange all the selected clips in these themes in chronological order, e.g.

• Standing in stream on Porthmadoc beach
• Walking out of stream into sea
• walking along in sea
• walking on dry sand
• Walking up to Watertank
• River Mawddach at Ty'n-yGroes
• Glaslyn River in Beddgelert gorge
• Walk in torrential rain back to cottage watertank

Total run time nearly 20 minutes


4. Edited Story Board
I then looked to see if I could rearrange the video clips to get a consistent story. The watercycle emerged as the main theme, walking as a connecting thread and the dripping water tank as the beginning and end. Superfluous clips were removed, resulting in:

• Walk in torrential rain back to cottage watertank
• Glaslyn River in Beddgelert gorge
• Walking out of stream into sea
• Walking up to dripping watertank

Total run time 9 minutes

5. Completion
Trimming of final clips, insertion of transitions and addition of title and end.

Final run time 3 minutes and 29 seconds


Other combinations and different stories are possible from the original collection of 30+ video clips.

What's your story?

Bones over Mallwyd Church most likely to be from a whale!

The porch of Mallwyd Church in Gwynedd, Wales, just off the A470, displays two large bones which were apparently dug up nearby. They have been variously described as Dinosaur bones, Mammoth tusks and Whale bones! As a former biologist, I could see that one bone is clearly a rib.

This was a real conundrum as my search suggested that the local geology does not favour the dinosaur bone theory. Mammoths did survive until about 14000 years ago in Shropshire (see Daily Mail article), so were a possibility, and Welsh sailors did work in whale rich regions (did you know that the word Penguin probably comes from the Welsh for pen= head and gwyn=white?).

The question was niggling at the back of my mind so I sent an enquiry with the photos above to the experts at the National Museum of Wales, Cardiff.

I received an almost instant response from Tom Sharpe, Curator (Paleaontology and Archives)
"Thanks for sending the picture. The bones are not dinosaur and they are not tusks, and from their fresh appearance they don't look like mammoth. One of the bones is most likely a modern whale rib while the rounded element looks like the end of a limb bone, but it's hard to say without seeing a view of the rest of it. But again, it's probably modern whale. If we are talking about Mallwyd near Dinas Mawddwy in Gwynedd, then the bones are not local. I would guess they were brought back by some seafarer from the village. They may well have ended up in a garden or field and were subsequently dug up. I hope this helps"

Brilliant and very helpful! Demonstrating the value and expertise that is available in Museums, not just in Wales but near where you live too.

Have you seen any strange objects and been curious enough to try and find out what they were? let me know in the comments box below!

Viewing Photos in 3D for Cambridge Open Studios

3D films have been all the rage this year and 3D television is also promised soon. I was therefore inspired to return to taking photographs of subjects, so that they could be used in 3D images for my Cambridge Open Studios 2010.

The process is quite simple:

• Photograph a subject, then
• move 6 or 7 centimeters to the left and photograph it again
• Display the pictures next to each other, with the Right photograph on the left, and the Left photograph on the right.
• Stand at a distance from the photos and allow your eyes to cross slightly
• If successful, you will suddenly see three images, with the central one in 3D and the two flanking it in 2D
• This process is called "cross viewing" and can adapted to images of any size.

Can you cross view the images in the Picasa slideshow (follow the link in the slideshow above)? please give it a try and comment!

My experience was that about 30% of people could cross view images easily, so I had to rapidly readjust my intention to make the whole of my Cambridge Open Studios exhibition 3D this year! However, I have also set up some images with mirrors that can be seen in 3D for over 95% of people.

Perhaps the most intriguing 3D picture for me was the aerial view from my low flying Air Berlin flight from Stuttgart to Duesseldorf.

I photographed some cooling towers at a Power station. Because I was using a pocket camera with a slow response time, the plane had traveled a few hundred meters before I took the second of the two pictures. The result is a definite 3D image, demonstrating Hyperdimensionality (it is more 3 D than you would normally observe).

Taking photos fro 3D images has a long history after its invention by Sir Charles Wheatstone in 1838, with 3D peepshow machines (with saucy images) being set up in the early part of the 20th century and of course with aerial reconnaissance flights, where the images could be used to determine the heights of buildings for both civilian and military purposes. Wikipedia gives an excellent review of all the different forms and viewing methods at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereoscopy.

So, please do have a go and comment on whether you are able (or not) to see the images and what you think!

Lancaster photo walk - Evening (and Morning)

The air took on a golden hue as I set off from Kelsey Street in Lancaster with camera and tripod in hand, letting chance lead me to photo opportunities.

At the station, the taxi drivers briefly broke off their discussion  (I-phones v Blackberrys) with good humoured advice where to go to take photos and where I would more likely have my camera nicked from me.

So it was across the bridge behind the station along West Road, to find the stone wall on the right having doors at strange angles. At the top was the castle (and prison), its top turrets still hit by the evening sun, so through to the Priory Gardens where three students were celebrating their end of year with a barbecue. The backlit figures glowed against the green of the trees as they soaked the remaining warmth of the day in relaxed conversation.

On their advice, I headed past the headless reclining tombstone muse to take the path down towards the river. The threeway Millenium Bridge provided some challenges in the fading light and I promised to return in the morning (which I fortunately did).

I headed for the city centre which was awash with celebrants out on the town at various stage of alcoholic assisted merriment. Turning into Marketgate out of curiosity, I bumped into a party of four out to celebrate a birthday and it seemed a good idea all round to try and take some pictures.

Avoiding flash, long exposures were indicated, which required posing still for a few seconds - something we had difficulty achieving amongst the joking around. Success came eventually and we parted, with my cheek blushed with lipstick from a parting kiss by the belle of the quartet!

Light was fading fast as I trudged back uphill  - where a major teenage birthday party was underway, with guests spilling out onto the road and into the park in front of the castle. Another quartet was taking a break from the party and there was just enough light to photograph a tableau and an accidental motion blurred exposure of the couple's passionate kiss!

Back in Kelsey Street, I reflected that chance had indeed been in my favour, as had the overall friendly nature of people across three different generations in Lancaster.

High flying women - Role Models I know

Last Friday was the first time (in 5 decades) that my flight was flown by a woman. And it was a surprise to feel surprised, because between a third and half of my business contacts are women.

Whilst gender segregation in occupations does still exist, with stereotyping current even in preschool children (GENDER EQUALITY IN ACTION), equality legislation has at least made entry into all occupations possible. The key change is the self confidence and belief of girls and young women that they are equally, if not more, capable to do anything they put their minds to!

Indeed, both the decorator/painter in the Gold Leaf Hotel in Zuffenhausen and the Air Berlin co-pilot expressed surprise at the concept of being positive role models. Yet Dr Linda Papadopoulos' study in 2010 for the Home Office on The Sexualisation of Young People suggested that positive role models were particularly required for both genders at this time, especially with the media & music trends to apparently diminishing the role and respect for women, reversing equality gains made over the past century.

Furthermore, equality is currently still the prerogative of women in a restricted number of countries (see the suffrage link below) and we in the west should remember that, even just a century ago, women had few rights themselves let alone the vote. If seen walking unaccompanied in Victorian London or US cities they would be approached by men on the immediate assumption they were streetwalkers (i.e. were immoral, available for sex etc.) - perhaps a corollary of the fact that practically the only way a woman could become an independent high earner was as a courtesan (from SuperFreakonomics by Levitt & Dubner).

So here is my contribution and celebration of progress to date, in the form of just a small selection of female role models that I know and admire professionally or whom I have encountered as fore-runners into previously gender segregated occupations!

Some interesting links are:
Women in Aviation - Organisation
Timeline for Women in Aviation - starts in 1784!
Women in Rural Enterprise - a network
Women in Science and Engineering & Construction
Women in Business Network - franchise
Women's suffrage or rights to equality and voting by country
Womens liberation from early beginnings to the current 3rd wave
Women's status in the 19th Century

Phototour: The Gypsy Roma Traveller History Month comes to Milton

If you went down to the woods today, you were in for a big surprise - in Milton Country Park that is, where I came across the first old Gypsy caravan close to the entrance. Milton Country Park was home to Gypsies, Roma, Travellers - by invitation, as part of the Gypsy Roma Traveller History Month.

Proud owner Bill Goodman was happy to chat and let me have a closer look at his small caravan dating back to the 1910-1920 period, lovingly painted and with doors open so you could see the interior. An almost delicately cast lovely old stove on the left, the raised bunk bed at the back which we laughed would be a problem for a six footer like myself, and the ceiling which was covered in padded patterned fabric for insulation.

I had to return home to get my camera as the photographic opportunities were fantastic. Candy Sheridan who had organised the event told me "We wanted to have a meeting going back to the old values!" And consequently the fields of the Country park now housed an assortment of caravans and vehicles that shouted out the pride of their owners through the lovingly and highly decorated and furnished interiors of the painted caravans to the gleaming spaceships of the road in chrome and steel of the seventies, with their cut crystal glass windows.

My impromptu stay extended to nearly three hours as I not only photographed the sights (see slideshow above) but also talked to the open and generally very friendly travellers there. As a long term camper (with tents), I recognised the relaxed air in which the plots are settled and the neighbours getting together to help each other out.

By six pm, a small open wood fire was on the go with three men tending a pot of bubbling water and adding the vegetables, whilst the young woman from a nearby caravan came across to start off the lamb mint burgers in a pan on the fire.

The event was the brainchild of Candy Sheridan, a Gypsy councillor from Norfolk, two months ago - when it became apparent that previous venues (e.g. Strawberry Fair) were not available. With the help of  Sarah Baylis they found Milton Country Park willing to host the event.

Candy's caravan had a constant stream of visitors and friends as she cheerfully chatted with me and expressed her delight, that for once this was a wholly community organised event without agencies and other charities, that had fulfilled her desire for a family day out for both visitors and exhibiting travellers.

She introduced me to others from the Gypsy community actively involved whether politically (such as herself and Richard Sheridan - President of the Gypsy Council and regular advisor to local and national government) or culturally such as broadcaster, photographer and film maker Simon Evans - also author of "Stopping Places: A Gypsy History of South London and Kent". Patricia Knight, the National Coordinator for Gypsy Roma Traveller History Month,  also turned up later, resplendent in a lovely golden orange shawl.

The pleasant leisurely afternoon with camera and conversation provided a gentle antidote of extensive business traveling with clients in the past week (though that too had its pleasures) and was a welcome start to the weekend.

If you missed the event this year, look out for the next one in 2011!

Helping the next generation find out what makes us tick!

I was approached by Mervyn Foster, friend, HBN member and Toastmaster (also see Nordic Walking), asking if we UK business people could assist a master's student at Radboud University Nijmegen.

Kimberley den Brok is a Communication and Information Science student at the Radboud
University (the Netherlands), and is currently conducting research for
her master's thesis among Dutch and British people - on the effectiveness of
TV commercials!

Kelly is specifically looking for British respondents, and asked if we could help her by completing her questionnaire on the impact of different adverts.

I've had a go and it is not too onerous, so please do also join in by going to:
http://bit.ly/aeouiN

Quarry Mill to Sudbury Hall to Windsor with FIWA Glass

Glass is that most wonderful of materials, a clear window to the outside world that protects you from the elements, or a light that can be transformed by colour as it shines inward.
Modern technology has taken glass further, as I found out on my tour to UK prospects with Rüdiger Danders (CEO) and Claudia Thiele (International Sales) of FIWA, a German glass company specialising in double glazed units of modern glass.
Coatings can not only minimise heat loss, they can also be used now to create reactive glass that will darken at the touch of a button; you can protect against damage by toughening or laminating with the consequence that if, like many a filmstar, you try to dive through it, you are more likely to bounce than shatter the pane.
Our travels took us up north to Manchester and then back down to London over 3 days, with the odd couple of hours in-between where I introduced them to some of the more delightful stops on the way.
Quarry Mill nr Manchester was supposed to be a lunchtime stop for food but we ended up wandering around and up the magical garden that had been lovingly recreated there with the help of National Trust volunteers.
Our trip south began with a slight detour through the fantastic scenery of Derbyshire and onwards with a stop for evening tea at Sudbury Hall. After an overnight stop and a meeting in Banbury, we headed for a brief stop in Windsor before our final appointment and trip back to the airport.
Glass has been a recurring theme and it was only a couple of days later, in Lincoln Castle, that I came across a medieval reenactment; like a Brueghel painting, workers were clustered around, making a clay oven which was to be used for making stained glass the next day!
For more historic glass also see
Stained Glass by Alfred Manessier
The Park Hotel Preston
The windows of St Mawes Church

From Trafalgar Square to the UK's Supreme Court

Accompanying Mirko Kisser of Celloon in April to various clients in London (also see article on QR Codes), we had the opportunity for a walkabout, starting at Trafalgar Square, where I have fond memories of taking part on the Fourth Plinth as part of Anthony Gormleys One & Other and we ended up at the Supreme Court of the UK, which had only been in existence at its new location since moving out of the House of Lords in October 2009.

Entrepreneurs on the move – Connected Cambridge Event Review

From Milton Dec 2009

Peter Hiscocks gave an insight into the prizes and perils of being an Entrepreneur in an entertaining and informative talk at the Connected Cambridge meeting last night, sponsored by Anglia Ruskin University

This was an event organised by Peter Hewkin’s newest successful brain child, Connected Cambridge, a high tech network of entrepreneurs, financiers and generally bright people interested in the cutting edge of business in the Cambridge UK area with links to sister networks in Shanghai and Oxford.

The venue, the CB2 restaurant and bistro gave the appearance of a student meeting place and you wandered upstairs into the friendly informality of a relaxed networking meeting, the air buzzing with conversation. The projection screen was an impromptu affair of bed sheet on one wall and for the talk, the audience stood or sat in a casual circle as Peter Hiscocks delivered his presentation.

An outsider glancing in would have been misled by the informal environment until beginning to overhear conversations on new company start-ups, ideas in inception and in progress, of funding opportunities beginning in the tens of thousands of pounds and expected turnovers or company sales in the millions.

Peter Hiscocks talked frankly about three companies he had been involved in as an entrepreneur, where one had been a loss, a second a break even and the third a very profitable sale. It was this view of being an entrepreneur, with its peaks and troughs that was fascinating for the audience; here are a few of the impressions and titbits of information we gleaned about being an Entrepreneur.

Three key points were:

1. If you are going to do something, do it really well, recruit only the best and throw yourself into the project
2. Charge high margins – that way you are never distracted by running after money just to keep you going
3. Sell the business at the right time!

But how do you find the right area? You create your own opportunities by looking for new growth areas with financial potential and finding ideas that fill an up and coming need. This means keeping an open eye for any trends and ideas as well as brainstorming with equally minded people.

Your business plan should be able to excite the investor as well as being realistic – the latter meaning that you should expect it to cost twice as much as originally budgeted and take three times as long.

Your assembled team is critical – a factor seriously undervalued by many new startups. Make your business exciting so that you attract the best who have consequently a burning desire to be involved – especially as the early phases will be hard work with the rewards on or just beyond the horizon, some time away!

And how do you know if things are going pear shaped in your market? Here’s Peter’s tip from London’s financial industry: If taxi drivers experience a sudden drop in fares in the area, its time to sell your company!

Apart from the excellent talk, there was also the enjoyable networking afterwards and I met bright minds from Jordan, from the creative network in our area, a venture capitalist and fellow communicators for B2B, just to name a few.

I reflected on an excellent meeting with a warm glow as I followed the silver ribbon of the Cam river path, cycling home in the gloaming on my traffic busting bicycle in true Cambridge fashion.

Look out for future Connected Cambridge meetings, I know I will.

Making my QR code more human

Ever since I was introduced to QR codes, they have been in the forefront of my thoughts, from an artistic angle.

QR codes are 2D codes that have the capability of storing data that can be retrieved, providing links and even ticketing and couponing solutions, as I learnt from Mirko kisser of Celloon. Indeed, they can be combined with a powerful online tracking system to convert a print product into a remarkable market analysis tool.

The problem is their sterility. Celloon have a solution of combining icons with the code, The Japanese design company Set has taken the QR codes and also made art out of them.

Simplistically, I wanted to understand if I could do the same.

I created my business card information as a QR code using a freely available QR code Generator at www.the2Dcode.com.

The image of the QR code was then printed at about A4 size and I spent an enjoyable hour at the Television, idly doodling a more curvy tracing of the barcode elements, making sure that there were little separate islands too.

I scanned the black and white tracing into my PC and converted it into a vector trace using CorelDraw, allowing smoothing of lines.

It was now possible to colour the individual islands in a random pattern to achieve a much more user friendly QR code - see the slide show above or go to Picasa.

Playing with colours and contrasts showed that you just needed a suitable contrast from the background and not too great a difference between the colours in their contrast if viewed as a greyscale. corners of pixels could be rounded, especially if you created a QR code with some error correction, as is possible.

Most modern mobile phones (cell phones) with cameras can take apps that allow you to read QR codes - www.i-nigma.mobi provided mine for a Nokia.

So if you are new to QR codes, have a play creating some and seeing how much you can bend the rules before the colouring or distortion becomes unreadable!

Songs from the musicals in the spotlight! A First show Review

From Wordle-images

I've just thoroughly enjoyed the first show in Lincoln, based on songs from musicals old and new, with a talented cast that appealed to an audience across the generations!

My initial response to my daughter's suggestion, that we visit a show based on musicals during our visit from Cambridge, was less than enthusiastic – until she mentioned that it featured Faye Tozer (ex Steps)!

Daughter, parents and grandparent thus sat down in the Drill Hall in Lincoln with the expectation of seeing “In the Spotlight: Songs from the musicals” featuring Faye with a supporting cast. It was with increasing surprise and delight that I found myself enjoying new talent sharing the stage as justifiably equal partners.

The show really gelled for me by the time it reached “Seventeen” from “Slice of Saturday Night” with assured performances by what I initially thought were clear male and female leads of the troupe. Christopher Finn shone as a vocalist with a sense of comedic acting and petite Rebecca Wicking consistently displayed an excellent voice and exuberance that gave her a much larger stage presence.

Only to find that later numbers showcased an equally talented Annabel King who tugged at the heart with the more wistful and melancholic solos and duets and Mark Daley and Tom Garner completed the primary vocalist talent and attracted the attention of the female audience.

Dancing was an integral part of the show and the further six dancers/vocalists not only enhanced the overall performance, they also entertained as pairs in Act II; with Ellie Cobb and David Kemp (I believe) performing a sizzling tongue in cheek Cha Cha Cha.

Music was professionally provided by the live band, on a raised dais at the back of the stage, such that it provided the reassuring constant and excellent support for the performers and the continuing thread for the audience.

With this being the very first time performers, lighting, sound system and band performed together, there were the inevitable glitches. Future shows will be spared the late or absent microphone fade-ins which did injustice to the voices of both Lindsay Shaw and Charlotte Gayle during their solos; the spotlights occasionally not reaching the artists at the very front of the stage; and the tap dancing by the whole group awaiting that final last percent of synchronization to make it brilliant. However, whilst possibly terminal for the sound and lighting teams if not addressed, these elements only marginally impinged on the overall enjoyment of the show.

But what about my initial reason for coming, Faye Tozer? Faye impressed me on two accounts.

First, her vocal range and delivery were excellent - and the acting experience in the years since I'd seen her in Steps was obvious in the different roles she played. She exuded the subtle aura of an experienced professional performer at ease in the show she was playing in.

Second, she refrained from using these advantages to dominate the show to the detriment of the new talent, allowing them to shine too. Faye thereby ensured that this was a true company presentation. Her confidence and ease with herself and her partners appeared to me to be a key part of the success and nature of this company; one that could have been equally represented on the fliers, posters and program covers.

Leaving the theater late, we unexpectedly met Faye Tozer relaxing with her son outside and exchanged a few friendly words. These reinforced my impression of a professional artist and person at ease with herself and the world. I'd come with a two dimensional memory of a 1990's manufactured pop star and discovered a 2010 likable professional artist and human being; I'll be looking out for her in future productions.

Our family enjoyed the very first performance of “In the Spotlight: Songs from the musicals” and I would recommend it as entertainment for musical song lovers of all ages. Get your tickets now if they are coming to somewhere near you!

Information and booking available at www.spotlightontheuk.com.

Arising from the Ashes 2010

It is hard to believe that it was seven days ago, on a Thursday morning, that I was on a train to London with the first reverberations of the Icelandic volcanic eruption and its cloud of ash.

Would visiting Celloon CEO Mirko Kisser actually arrive in the UK on a flight fom Berlin? My arrival in London was matched with the confirmation of his landing.

Then the ash shut down the airspace.

To us, the sun shone in a clear blue sky.

Yet the invisible ash shut down airspace with a finality that was to last for nearly a week.

In a semblance of normality, Mirko's meetings went well with several positive connections made. Then his flight too was affected and uncertainty prevailed.

Mark had had a successful Grundtvig program with delegates from 12 different countries across Europe. When it ended on Friday, here too the ash held sway. For one night, Fitzwilliam College generously helped out by allowing a further nights stay for a tenner each. Then some began their individual adventurous journeys to find their way home.

Five others were offered a haven in Mark's house as the uncertainty continued.

On Tuesday, stranded Irma Jona from Iceland came with Mark for our Cambridge admin meeting.The car, cleaned in the morning, had a thin almost invisible layer of ash by the end of the day - carefully collected for future microscope viewing!
 
And the sun shone in a blue sky whilst the invisible ash still kept planes from flying.

Suddenly, yesterday - Wednesday, six days after the flight ban started, the airspace sprang into life again. Mirko escaped back to Germany in the morning and soon Marks house would be empty too.

The sun shone in a blue sky and planes were flying.

EU exploration of Life Skills and Confidence in Cambridge

 

A grey Cambridge day turned sunny as I cycled the short stretch from Milton to the St John's Innovation Centre. I had not visited for a while and was delighted to see Jeanette, the restaurant manager looking well as I sat down with a very reasonably priced Brie and Cranberry baguette and some tea and looked out over the water feature.

I was joined for coffee by four delegates participating in the Grundtvig Program. This is a non vocational EU lifelong learning programme, aiming to build addtional life skills and confidence. Not that we needed the latter as the five of us soon got chatting.

John Falkner was a sociology graduate from Germany who listened before making thoughtful contributions; David Gallego came from Spain and oozed a certain Clooneyesque air - a temporary victim of the downturn in the small construction industry; Barbara Pononutti fom Italy was currently working in a telephone call centre, but lit up with animation when talking about a children's book she had written: and finally but not least Nora Aguirre, who had extensive experience within travel agencies, seen the Americas and now lived in Italy. Nora was good at the open ended questions to get people talking.

For some reason, the four had foregone the opportunities of setting up Barn Owl nesting boxes or Indian Cookery and expressed an interest in the development of businesses in the Cambridge area and the general way business functioned in the UK.

We were of course sitting in one of the incubators for the region. The St John's Innovation Centre is one of the places providing facilities and a nurturing environment for start-ups and micro-businesses. Whether high tech or "conventional", most businesses (over 90%) have only 1-5 employees and are the unsung heroes of any economy, despite lacking the glamour of larger branded corporations.

It hardly seems possible, but in the brief hour we covered a range of topics from book publishing (digitally and print, how to work out your charges as a business, and of course my favourite topics of the benefits of going out networking as well as finding like-minded people or companies with complementary skills to create new opportunities of your own. The role of serendipity in which way your business eventually developed was inevitably identified!

Too soon, the hour had passed and it was time for them to leave for the Chesterfield Science Park - a location for companies that had grown, established and required more space. The bright conversation leaving a warm memory as I returned to the mundane realities of work at the PC.

Meeting Ulrich at the Wonders of the Solar System Exhibition

I'd met Ulrich Heker as part of the NRW visit to the British Dental Association Exhibition in Glasgow (see Album) in 2009. He was part of a group looking at opportunities for German dental technicians in the the UK. He realised there was a gap in the UK knowledge of the precision methods for dental attachments used routinely in Germany and followed this up with a collaboration with Milton Contact Ltd. This went ahead in the form of educational articles for a number of UK and Irish dental trade magazines such as the GDP, the Technologist and Private Dentistry (see Publications).

Ulrich and I had been frequently corresponding via phone and e-mail but had not seen each other since last year. Therefore, when he heard that I was visiting NRW on holiday, he promptly invited me to meet up with him and Andrea, wife and business partner with Teeth 'R' Us. We opted for a day out with the option of cover as the April weather was thoroughly unpredictable; the Gasometer Oberhausen was hosting an exhibition of the wonders of the solar system that proved an ideal venue.

We met in glorious sunshine and promptly took the opportunity to ride in a glass elevator to the dizzy height of 110m, to the top of the converted gasometer, for some glorious views! Returning inside to the exhibition proper, we were initially blind in the near darkness until our eyes adapted to the excellent displays. Unfortunately for our partners, we had both come armed with cameras and were battling with the low light conditions as we vied for best place at the exhibits. We did return to socialise over a well earned meal at the nearby CentrO and avoided talking too much shop for most of the time. When you go there, do follow Andrea's tip to visit the Mövenpick icecream stand.

I've included some of my pictures here in a friendly attempt to beat Ulrich to it and am now looking forward to his excellent and different photo interpretations of our successful and very enjoyable meeting.

Digital Video Resolution is different to digital photography resolution

Oh, how naive I was, when as a photographer I thought that image resolution of my camcorder in 4:3 and in 16:9 aspect ratios would be as simple as with digital photos; after all wasn't it just x pixels wide by y pixels high? Apparently not.

Digital video has taken over conventions from analogue video so that the whole industry could have a seamless transition, with interesting consequences.

My camcorder produces PAL compatible videos according to the 625/50i system. 625 refers to the number of horizontal lines in an analogue image. However the images are created by first scanning the odd numbered horizontal lines at 25 frames per second and then the even numbered ones at 25 frames per second, and interlacing them (25 +25 = 50 and i stands for interlacing - hence the 50i).

Of the 625 analogue TV lines, a number are not part of the image itself, 576 lines are used for the actual image. In a digital system this means the image recorded by my camcorder is 576 pixels high.

Finding the width is a bit more complicated.  In a conventional analogue TV system, the width of each line (and therefore the image) is defined by a squiggly wave that lasts 52 micro seconds. To translate this into pixels, you have to take discrete samples at regular intervals along the line. An industry standard is to sample 702 times; digitally, this is therefore equivalent to a width of 702 pixels. Actually, in real life, the sampling is often 704 or 720 pixels.
(Note, 52 micro seconds divided by 702 equals 74.1 nano seconds. In TV and radio physics, people like to express things in frequencies; we obtain the sampling frequency in Hertz by dividing 1 second by 74.1 nanoseconds = 13500000 Hz or 13.5 MHz - the way in which the industry standard is expressed)


Next comes a piece of strange news for a photographer - a pixel does not have to be a fixed square. in fact, with video, pixels are not square and can have a variety of different aspect ratios!

So, when I record a video in a conventional 4:3 aspect ratio, it is 704 x 576 pixels in size. However, when I record in a 16:9 aspect ratio, it is still 704 x 576 pixels in size, it's just that the video pixels are wider!

Even worse, if you use an on-screen ruler, you will find that none of the formats actually precisely fit the 4:3 or 16:9 image ratios!

So, when I record my video and display it on a screen, it should be 576 pixels high; however, the width of my video on screen will vary, depending on the  width of the 704 video pixels!

If you want to have more detailed information, see the references below!

References:
Wikipedia on Camcorders
The 625/50 PAL Video Signal and TV Compatible Graphics Modes
A Quick Guide to Digital Video Resolution and Aspect Ratio Conversions