Frustrations.

I found some of those commercial postcards I thought I’d lost, and scanned a selection. The problem I’m finding is that, whatever scanner setting I use, most of them are producing poor results, having various types of optical aberrations spoiling the image. This is a typical example:

What are all those pink bars going diagonally across it? Maybe some knowledgeable person might enlighten me. I assume it has something to do with the method by which different publishers have them printed, but I have little knowledge of commercial printing methods and how they might cause conflicts with scanner technology. Some are worse than others and have been discarded, but these are a few that aren’t too bad.

  Alnwick Castle, Northumberland.

It was used in the first season of Blackadder, 

and I believe some scenes in the Harry Potter

movies were filmed there. And there's that water

prominent in the foreground again, as noted in

an earlier post.

Tynemouth Castle, Tyne & Wear. There's a

ruined abbey behind it which is probably even

more impressive.

Hadrian's Wall in the snow. Shortly after taking

this picture I sank up to my thighs in deep snow.

I think I found it funny at the time, but it was

still a struggle to get out.

One of the classic views of Ullswater in the 

Lake District. The Lake District has a compelling

sense of something in the air which I've never felt

anywhere else. Oddly, I always felt that sunshine

tended to dissipate it.

Not a postcard at all, but one of

those greetings cards you get with 

gift vouchers. I'm including it

because I think it's the only time I

ever took a picture at sunrise. I've

always been a night owl, and I 

wasn't about to break the habit of 

a lifetime merely for the sake of

taking pictures. My loss I suppose.