Huw in the club - and other great pictures

Huw in the club - Cardiff
Originally uploaded by Maciej Dakowicz

I found this set of pictures using the marvelous http://fffflckr.com/
 application which lets you search flickr using your favourites and those of your favourites (if you see what I mean) .

It threw up this  fascinating series of pictures from The Glamorgan County Council Staff Club in Cardiff, Wales sadly now closed by Maciej Dakowicz.

I love the shots of people having fun and enjoying their weekend.
It's a cliche to say peoples lives are written on their faces but it's a true cliche.

It does raise a slight issue that's been in my mind for a while. I love pictures like this and those of the famous series Martin Parr took in New Brighton. I take if not similar ones  in a similar areas ie. in around Deptford and Barnsley etc and I have nagging fear that they could be seen  put it bluntly as "laughing at poor people".

I hope I'm not I just find these subjects fascinating, refreshing and surprising. We live in an increasingly
homogeneous world and these sparks of humanity, these unguarded moments and the individual acts of creativity are heartening. Of course the distance between the aspiration of some the signs etc and the reality of the shop or the pub they are attached to is ironic but also hopeful and very human.
One last defence whenever I'm somewhere posh I take picture there too

It’s a small world

Model Citizens:

Here's my latest craze tilt-shift photographs mainly because my flickr and real friend C pointed me in the direction of the website that quickly does them for you. Don't worry about the theory just enjoy thes of pictures of real life made to look like a model village. I hope you like my train set pic. Here's a proper example

Like most people of I always liked miniature worlds, I had rail layout as kid and part of the joy of it was the tiny people and getting down and looking at the trains from close up. Most people have imagined walking round a dolls house or driving a toy matchbox car. One of my favourite daydreams as a kid was imaging climbing up a pile of sand or broken concrete wall but at the scale of tiny airfix toy solider (1.72 kit fans).

It's also the fascination of what we always called snowstorms but seem to be now called snowglobes. Here's my film of my Anthony Gormley's snowstorm that someone on youtube wanted to buy the cheeky bugger.

Which leads to BLBW getting me this excellent book "Little People in the City: The Street Art of Slinkachu" for Christmas (I got him a space rocket and big war comic book) which is full funny and touching little scenes made with I suspect of model railway characters in tiny scenes on London streets, have a look at his site for the more. The book has a foreword by Will Self which is his usual windy arse.