Almost Eight Years Later

Recently, a friend told me over a couple of Saturday afternoon pints that he loved my blog. I was grateful to receive any form of feedback, however, as I gulped down a large sip of the local tipple and the surrounding din of voices rose and fell - as pub noise does - I realised with a sinking feeling that I wasn't currently keeping a personal blog. I'd written professionally for more than five years, but it was unlikely he was interested in the emergency lighting system of Wembley Stadium, or even the career path laid out in front of those wanting to become a project manager. Both of which were freelance commissions that I thoroughly enjoyed researching.

No, he spoke with amused interest about the demolition of Richborough Power Station and the running of the Olympic torch through the town of Deal. Both of which events occurred in 2012 and are documented on this blog - albeit explored through the eyes and bad grammar of 16-year-old me.

It occurred to me in that moment that this blog may be visited in the future by friends, family and potential employers; those who have this site bookmarked on their old computer, stumbled across it on Google or those directed here from my website.

Whoever you are, I say welcome. It is a window into my life between September 2011 and September 2012, and I hope that it offers you as much joy as it gave me writing each of the posts.

Until the next time,

William Inglis

Day #365

It's finally here, one whole year of continuous photos and embarrassing moments. The time has come to say goodbye but we have had our laughs. No, don't cry. I will be back. I promise. 

Today I woke up at half five in the morning to get a photo of sunrise. I got down to the front, set my tripod up and waited...

Just as the sun was coming up over the clouds, I turned the camera on and then, suddenly, up on the screen comes every photographer's worst nightmare:

 'Please insert memory card.'

I had left the card in my laptop.

Cue me running through the streets of Deal and back again to get photos number one and two. Photo number one is HDR and photo number two is a very long exposure using my neutral density filter. After I had gotten in, slept for another 4 hours, I woke up and watched 'The Bill'

It was a pretty uneventful but hey. Afterwards, I headed to meet my friend Beanie who took the third photo, abstract. The fourth photo was taken this evening, just some sharpie on a stone. 

So, after a whole year of this, it has to come to an end. This year has been so momentous, eventful and pretty damn awesome. There was highs, lows and boredom, but we made it. 

There was a charity walk in Spain where my brother, my dad and I raised over £2000 for cancer research, there was my holiday in Scotland, water photos, HDR, long exposures, short exposures, colour splash photos, colourful photos, photos on the streets, photos in my room, photos from Ipswich and photos from London. We had music, we had laughs and we had photography, but most of all, I had you. Whether you are reading this as a very late come-er, a dedicated follower, or just a random Russian person who has stumbled across my blog, thank you so much for taking the time to read it. I am not sure what my future blogging plans are but I am definitely taking a break for a bit. 

I will give you one bit of advice here: don't take life too seriously, you never get out alive.

Until whenever, my friends

Will Inglis :)

Day #364

Today I lost a hero of mine; a man you wouldn't recognise in the street, a man who did not sing, did not act and wasn't rich, he was my Grandad. Today I was woken by my mum who told me that he had passed away last night.

I was devastated. Only a month ago I was round at his, watching the Olympics while he shouted at the television, not cheering anyone on, not bias towards any British athletes, and that's the kind of man he was, an all-round nice guy. My Grandad was also good with the ladies, I must say. I remember one time when the whole extended family went to Center Parcs we had dinner one night and suddenly a waiter came over and said that two ladies in their 30s had just bought him a drink. Once the rest of the family had gone back to one of the hut things, he stayed and talked to the women. My Grandad, the silver fox.

He also gave great advice. While walking the dog, he once said to me, "Son, if I could give you one piece of advice in life, it would be to have no regrets, don't regret not doing something", and I think I am so far living by that advice.

Rest in peace Robert Inglis

You were my hero, my idol, my Grandad

Until tomorrow

Will :)

Day #363

Hey there, I'm Will and by the time you are reading this, I will have outgrown the suit in this photo.

Today was pretty good actually. Not too much happened but I know that it was all good stuff. 

Tonight was senior prize giving. This involved sitting in a hall, occasionally clapping and seeing what people look like in suits. This was all fine, if not very boring until one of the most embarrassing moments of my life happened. Picture this: over 200 people in a packed hall, a boy goes up for his award and instead of being a sheep and waiting for everyone else to clap to warrant a clap from me, I decide to be a shark. I start clapping, loudly, this happens for about 4 seconds until people are looking at me, nobody is joining in, the announcer hadn't finished announcing. Just as the embarrassment peaked, I pretended that I was stretching. Yeah, that's right I went from clapping like an insane maniac with hand spasms to a guy who just generally cannot control his arms.

Teddy turned to me almost straight away and imparted words of wisdom, "Don't be a shark, always follow the herd." Maybe I am a sheep, maybe I am a sheep dressed up as a shark, in an outfit his mum knitted him. I am now very careful when I clap. 

Appologies that I haven't gone out with my camera tonight, prize giving finished pretty late but ho-hey.  Today's photo was taken by my dad who seemed to know quite a lot about taking a photo. Kudos dad, kudos. 

Last two days to go, I am trying my hardest to get some decent photos and I think I have some idea of what I'll do for Saturday. 

Until tomorrow

Will :)

Day #362

We don't want to get in line. 

It's Wednesday, I'm quite tired and I have been out taking the above photos. 

Some crazy stuff happened today. Let me paint the scene as per usual. It was around 07:25 at my bus stop, I'm standing with earphones in, in my own little world of Coldplay and alike. Suddenly the girl next to me turns and says, "hey Will, you haven't got the time have you?" I replied, obviously (I'm not a social freak, I just blog all about it after). The weird thing was that I had never seen this girl before. I don't know how she knew my name. Maybe she just guessed it, maybe she is Derren Brown in disguise or maybe I had my ID badge at chest view and she just happened to be staring at my pecks of steel. 

I love going out and taking photos at night. There is something calm and non-rushed about it all. I wander where I want (within reason) and just take the pictures that I want to. The first photo can be seen in the daytime on 'Day #337'

Until tomorrow

Will :)

Day #361

I have fallen in love with night photography. 

Okay, so my day was pretty stressful, how was your day? Ah, that bad? I think you better sit down and enjoy my blog. 

So today I did my morning ritual of rolling into the sixth form common room, it being empty I make myself a cup of coffee and have a few spins on the spinny chair. This morning's ritual would be absolutely fine if it wasn't for the fact that at about the 7th spin, at the point where things just start to go dizzy, I spotted 3 cameras, all pointing roughly to the area of the room that I was spinning in. What could I do? Well, what I did was stop, bounce quickly on the chair as if to check the suspension, nod at the chair as if to say, "Yes, this chair is suitable for use" and walk out the door. If they ever check the CCTV surveillance from this morning then they will just think it's a very lanky chair-fixing fairy, like in the fairytale about the shoe maker. 

Today's two photos are taken at night, pitch black, long exposure. The first photo is next to Deal Castle, taken at a funny angle in their car park. The second is just one of the churches. I'm pretty pleased with them both. 

Here's a little spooky story to help you sleep. So after taking these two photos and being intimidated by a group of youths (yep, I said it), I headed home. My walk home takes me through a Royal Marines graveyard, and as I walked through the gate, I spotted a character standing in the middle of the path, just standing, staring. As I began to take in the figure, I heard a crunch from leaves behind me, I turn with my senses heightened but see nothing, I turn back to where I was walking and the figure had disappeared. It's safe to say I ran home after this.

Until tomorrow

Will :)

Day #360

Five days left. Just five days and it is all over. That moment of realisation keeps hitting me. 

Hello there! Today was the day I saw a resolution of a theft, talked awkwardly to a girl on a bus for half an hour, walked into a bus' wing mirror and wore shorts with a duffle coat. It's been a day like any other. 

I was in London this weekend when my band was booked to play a Ceilidh in one of our local halls. I missed it but I got the horrifying story today - we probably should have looked up what a  Ceilidh is before Teddy and Laura went! From what I could gather from photos and gossip, it was a dance, and not a good dance. For Folks' Sake - Playing awful gigs since 2012. 

During lunch time, I headed down to the shop with a couple of friends. On the way back we heard three people shouting at each other. I jokingly suggested it was a case of residential gang warfare. But as we got closer to the group, we then heard, "Oi, gimme my bike back, that's my bike, you stole it and the police are looking for you, now f*ck off!" We didn't look back and instead retreated to the safety of our middle-class grammar school. 

When I got home, I was sorting out some work for tomorrow when my phone goes off. It's my nan. I answer, "Hello William-" (Because that's my actual name), "It's your number one fan here, can I get a blown up image of the skyline of London yesterday? Thanks, bye", oh crap, totally forgot that I said that was possible.

Until tomorrow

Will :)

Day #359

It's Sunday, which means that tomorrow is the dreaded Monday. Hello there, I have had a super busy day. My uncle's partner took me round London taking photos, mainly down on the South bank. 

I am very tired so today's post will be quite brief. I sat on the train and bus home listening to four Coldplay albums on shuffle. I went from super pumped up to depressingly sad. It is only 6/7 days left of this blog. Let me know if there are any specific photos you would like me to take. I will try my hardest to get some good ones but I think today's and yesterday's posts kinda justify my little piece of the world wide web.

Until tomorrow

Will :)

Day #358

Hello there! 

I missed this. Yeah, it's late, but I had such a busy day. Today (which is actually yesterday) I jetted up to London on the fancy high-speed train. 60 minutes, can't complain. After sharing my two seats with a pretty large man for almost all of the journey, I started to wonder why he was still sitting next to me because there were about 30 other seats available including a whole four-seated table. Perhaps he didn't want to be rude, perhaps my 'Linx Attract' had indeed attracted someone, or perhaps he was just past that age where you don't care anymore; you will talk loudly on the phone, you will be as assertive as possible and you certainly won't care when the teenager's stop is coming up and he is nearly climbing over you to get to the doors.

If anyone wants any of my picture printed, framed or blown up, just let me know and I will see what I can do. I went to two jazz bands at the King's Place (no idea if that's what it's called), followed by an opera in the evening. I have never been in a posher place - instead of cokes and candy floss at the interval and jeans and a t-shirt, it was champagne, the poshest ice-cream ever and people in their best dress.

Until tomorrow

Will :)

Day #357

Today is a happy day, even my toast is smiling. 

It's Friday, which can only mean one thing, one song is good today, 'Friday I'm in love!' 

Today I woke up as per usual at 6 which is unbelievably painful. I finished at 1 o'clock so it wasn't all bad. I decided I would sleep when I got in. The day normally involves a walk through Dover in the early hours and today was no different. I normally see something that makes me laugh or makes me sad but today was just weird. I walked past a pretty depressing block of flats and as I came to the corner there was a sofa being thrown out, just left on the street. A homeless man was sitting in the sofa. This was nice, I thought, at least he has somewhere comfy to sit. As I got slightly closer (not too close, mind you), I realised that he was being sick onto the sofa. He was just casually vomiting onto the furniture as if it's something he just does, as if whatever is on the street is his and he is free to vomit on it. 

Perhaps he saw me as a potential vomit target. I walked slightly faster.

 My first lesson was ICT. We were told at the beginning  of the year that we would be taking apart and rebuilding a computer at some point. That point was today. The briefing was this word for word: "okay gentlemen, this lesson, you will take apart and rebuild the computer. Here is a screwdriver, take photos of all stages. Any questions?" I had about 100, mainly I don't know...urm "WHAT THE HELL IS THIS SHINY METAL PIECE AND HOW ON EARTH DO I PLAY PACMAN WITH IT?" My friend Alex equally had no clue but we powered through and as far as we can tell, the computer still works. The awful quality of the photo of the computer in pieces and half put back together is because I only had my phone camera with me and I needed to take the photos as evidence anyway. 

The last lesson of the day was English. In this lesson, I like to listen, mainly listen and think. Usually the conversation is about something profound and thought provoking but today, one of the main topics was 'Where could we find a picture of Kate Middleton's boobs on the internet?' 

Today was a half day, I know what most of the people in my English class were off home to do after the lesson.

Until tomorrow (where I will be in London so the post may be late, or early)

Will :)