Welcome...!
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to michaeljdixon.co.uk. I'm a professional photographer who likes to experiment, both with cameras and techniques. On this website you will find information about how to repair Canon digital cameras (300D, 350D, 400D and 5D) and about how to use them imaginatively.
I'm also a writer who likes to illustrate his books and stories. Sometimes it even works the other way round; the photograph is the starting point for the novel. Below is a recent short story of mine, but first, here's my latest tip on publicity:
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Business cards are cheap, even in colour now, and I buy them in bulk from www.vistaprint.co.uk and scatter them around wherever I go. But sometimes I want something a bit classier, usually in small quantities, and always in a hurry. This weekend is a good example: I'm doing formal portraits at a local ball, and on-the-fly shots later on. I want a card to give out as people come in, with my details on it, some classy thumbnail photographs...and the password for the event so that they can look at the images on-line. Spare ones after the event will be bin fodder.
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I really want them double-sided, as there's a chance people will keep them, pinned to their notice board, photographs facing out. So I want a double-sided, reasonable quality stock, in A6.
www.consumablemad.co.uk do a greetings card stock, their code 39964, in A4 with a centre crease, 25 sheets to a pack. I buy this stuff by the caseful now; a few moments with the paper slicer and I've a stack of neat A6 cards ready to go through the Epson (R1800).
Next tip: I only have light text on the back, so I print that side first. The ink load from image side leaves the paper just slightly curled and if you try to print the other side immediately after it will tend to catch. Often it's not banging on the printhead, it's getting smudged as the rubber pick up roller pushes the sheets together. If you really want to print the high density side first, leave it out to dry (and flatten) before you put it through again.
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Here's the front side. I try to keep the colours light,to keep the ink costs down, with punchy tight-cropped images and a light background tint.
The back is white, with grey, classy text.
...and now, this month's short story
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THE WRECK
I give the bucket one last tap with the red, plastic spade, and lift it, oh so carefully, my two year old son holding his breath. It’s my third attempt but the sandcastle appears, solid, smooth sided, perfect this time and he whoops, clapping his hands and jumping with excitement.
I hear a tiny click above the buzz of the beach, a solitary, out of place sound and I turn to place it.
‘Thanks!’
He smiles, lowering his camera, and I suck my stomach in, even though there’s no need. My obsession with weight has increased with my husband’s obesity and I glance back now to his deckchair, nervous that he’s noticed. But he’s flat out, sulking, still mourning the near full tin of beer that I’ve just knocked over, accidentally on purpose, trying, pitifully, to delay his habitual drunkenness on the last day of our holiday.
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Now, I pull back my shoulders, emphasising my breasts in the black bikini top, and look back at the photographer, demurely, my head slightly tilted, my lips not quite closed.
He’s gorgeous; long tanned legs disappearing into tight, black trunks, and a white singlet top on broad brown shoulders. And eyes to die for. He’s looking straight back, barely twenty feet away, hoping for a reply.
I can’t move, can’t break this moment, can’t do a thing but wait for the time bomb behind me, the short, increasingly fat, deathly white hulk of a belching husband to notice and give me hell for the rest of the day. For the rest of my life. A life sentence of sixteen years until my tiny son is of age, and I can leave with my conscience intact.
‘Again, Mummy! Do it again!’
The spell is broken. My husband stirs from his alcoholic trance, my son waves the spade dangerously close to my face, and, by the time I look back, the vision is gone, climbing the steps away from the beach. I watch his backside for as long as I dare, feeling a rush within me that’s been dormant for a while, before coaxing the spade from Timmy to refill the bucket with fresh, damp sand.
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The slur, I estimate, is a six beer one, the stage before comatose. I grit my teeth and break my firmest rule. ‘There’s one more beer. I’ve just found it.’ I toss the tin into the sleeping compartment of the tent. ‘I’ve packed everything up. And Timmy’s asleep. I’m going for a walk.’
The only answer is the sound of a ringpull, so I slip on my sandals, brush scent across my wrists and walk down to the beach in the twilight, my heart thudding ridiculously. I’ve never done anything like this before.
He’s there! Or at least someone is there, a lone figure by the old, wrecked boat that dominates one end of the beach. The shape gradually resolves itself into two figures and I stop, devastated. Then one figure moves, and the other becomes a tripod, and a camera. I breathe out and step onto the sand, the beat in my chest now painful.
‘Hello.’
He’s not heard me above the surf.
I move closer and say it again, and he jumps and turns and smiles.
And I’m lost.
‘How can you take photos? It’s pitch black.’
‘There’s always some light.’ He shrugs. ‘But it’s a boring picture.’ He points at the dull, grey hulk of the boat and tilts his head to me, asking, but easily.
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I walk silently to the water’s edge, pause and then, grasping my dress by the hem, pull it up and over my head in one easy motion. I know I look graceful, I used to be a dancer. I turn slightly, one breast to the camera and stand motionless, thankful that I’ve worn no pants. You can’t glide out of your knickers.
The shutter clicks, once, twice, three times, I can hear it somehow above the waves and then he’s behind me, his fingertips on my waist, asking something different.
I turn, put my arms round his neck and part my lips to his.
The rest is easy, and wonderful. I sense, early on, that the pace is mine, that he’ll wait for me, that for the first time in many years there’ll be no race to reach those blissful few seconds before the flaccid lump above me groans uncontrollably, breathes beer in my face and falls asleep.
This man is muscular, considerate and smells of the sun. And has the greatest butt in the world. I grip it as the waves spread through me, dig my nails in as I scream and subside, grateful beyond measure and exhausted. He stops, momentarily, raises himself on his hands above me and smiles. ‘Ok?’
‘Silly question.’ I rouse myself, anxious suddenly to give pleasure back, and pay attention, for the first time perhaps, to what he likes.
He likes my cleavage.
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‘Ok?’
‘Silly question. What’s your name?’
‘Anna.’
‘How long are you here for?’
‘We leave in the morning. If he’s sober enough to drive.’
‘Why don’t you leave him?’
‘Timmy.’
He nods, his thoughts unfathomable. ‘How long can you stay now?’
‘I can’t. He’s drunk, and Timmy wakes sometimes.’
‘Damn.’
I can feel that he means it, and that, if I had time, I might scream again. I am mortified; a man with a recovery time of less than a fortnight, and I have to leave him after twenty minutes. Life’s a bitch.
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The tent is quiet, save for the snoring. Timmy sleeps on. I remove my dress, less elegantly this time, pull on damp, camping pyjamas, wriggle into my side of the semi-inflated, wheezing mattress and press the small white pill, marked “Friday”, from its protective blister. Then, slowly, deliberately, I crush it between my fingers and sprinkle the powder onto the groundsheet. If his child is within me now, I shall not kill it. Sixteen years, or eighteen, what’s the difference?
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That was inspired, some years ago, by a chance glance on a beach in Cornwall. Thank you, whoever you are!
I call it a StorySnap, a story and a picture on an A5 greetings card, and I've written some others, some a bit racy, so don't click here unless you want to read a slightly saucy story about what might happen at a dinner party. There's a spooky one and another about a photographer:
Rickie framed the shot carefully, zooming right in to emphasise the woman's bottom and adjusting the exposure to catch the thin sheen of sweat on her buttocks. He must hurry, for her moans were merging now, so he inched one pace further into the tiny, wooded clearing, re-set the focus one last time and pressed the shutter.
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If you want a longer read, try "Kicking the Tyres"; the story of an inventor, with concussion, trying to bring his revolutionary racing car to the start line. Set against a background of horse-riding, and laced with high-speed action, it's a complicated love story that should appeal, I hope, to anyone who has ever sat in an office, working for someone else and wishing that they could go it alone.
Try the first chapter here.
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| Or, for a very short read, try a fridge magnet!! |
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They're 9cm by 6cm, which even I can read without my glasses. You can buy them here, along with the book and the StorySnaps. I take cards (via PayPal), and postage and packing is free (on everything from my website). |
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Here's a link to "Musical Chairs", my fine furniture firm, with workshops near Ely in Cambridgeshire. Established in the year 2000, and specialising in hardwood Windsor Chairs, I make unique numbered pieces, some with spectacular inlay, for clients in the South of England (and occasionally abroad).
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And one to "Situpandkick", my event photography business, covering East Anglia (and occasionally beyond). We cover everything from horse trials and dog agility competitions to ballet displays and animal portraits.
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And finally, "Youmaynowkissthebride", which now has its own website. Situpandkick just didn't seem right for this kind of photography any more...(someone did suggest "Shutupandsmile")
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Thank you for reading to the end.
Mike
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