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PRETEND // NONSENSE

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A little history

In 2011 I travelled south-east Asia for 7 months and whilst in Thailand I did my PADI Open Water with Simple Life Divers on Koh Tao. I liked it so much I went straight on to do the Advanced Open Water. To say I enjoyed myself would be a supreme understatement. 

Hoofing it around South-East Asia whilst being qualified to dive but at the same time being too poor to dive was the worst. My budget was about £10-15 a day and I just couldn’t afford it.

I had so much fun doing those courses however after that I didn’t get to dive again until I did my Dry Suit Speciality at Stoney Cove, Leicester with Christal Seas Scuba in 2012. My brother was doing his Advanced at the same time so whilst he was doing his underwater navigator dive and swimming reciprocals I was doing fin pivots and that weird somersault thing to get the air out of your boots. 

At the beginning of 2015 my brother and myself went out to Thailand to visit family and travel about. We did our Wreck, Deep and Nitrox Specialities with Simple Life which was so so so much fun. Daniel got a little narced at  We stayed and did a couple of fun dives on Koh Tao and then made our way over to Koh Lanta on the Andaman side and did some more with Lanta Diver.

My brother made a short video of what we got up to which you can find here. It was awesome to go back out and not have to hold back on spending however 3 weeks just wasn’t enough.

Last year my brother and Chloe took me out diving in Stoney Cove and as there were 3 of us I ended up“leading” the dives (even if I had my octo over instead of under -_- )

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Back on the saving wagon..

No more excuses.. Saving has properly started again...

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DIY Darkbox Pt.1

I had wanted to build a darkbox from scratch but am prohibited by my complete lack of carpentry skills so I had to settle for a ready made box like ..thing. I started looking at chests, ottomans, army surplus ammo crates and steamer trunks. I then came across a post by Tony Richards on his darkbox suitcase and I suddenly realised I had just the thing! When I left college I had been given two battered, old flight cases which were due to be chucked out. One was being used to hold my darkslides and ground glass backs but the other was just sitting in the loft unused...

I proceeded to rip out all of the foam, lining and scraped it clean as best I could. I then sprayed it black.

I wasn't that keen on the paint job though as it left too much of the crappy wood grain and imperfections on show. Further research revealed that darkboxes were traditionally painted yellow inside to help increase the brightness inside.

I like the yellow so much more! Much like Tony's design I have flipped the case so the lid comes down and acts as the workspace area and the base/bottom of the case acts as a shelf/storage area. Because of this I had to build some wooden feet for the base to rest on so when it is in it's upright position so it sits at 90ª to the lid. Another one is on the lid/top/work area so that it stands correctly when closed and upright.

Two pieces of wood were then shaped and drilled to hold the shroud poles.

The poles are made up of 15mm dowel. As the dowel was too long to fit in the case they were cut with the idea that a copper slip coupler from the plumbing section could be used to join the 2 pieces.

However it became clear that there wasn't enough strength in the joint. A piece of aluminium piping was found and cut to a longer length and then the dowel was wrapped in tape to make the fitting tight and then dot punched to make it a bit more permanent.

The same was done to the copper elbows.

The connection pieces are flipped on the left and right side poles so there is no common weak point.

That was yesterday. More to come..

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Instants from Cornwall 2014

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Avolent - www.avolentuk.bandcamp.com

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Dan

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This is a Piccadilly line service to Cockfosters. #asleep #underground

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Some shots from the beast that is my Mamiya RZ67.

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Skating the Cut Through is fun!

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Paxton on Flickr.

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Mindless Longboards advert from Concrete Wave Spring 2014

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So there are a lot of these in Berlin. I mean a lot! From where I was stood the other day I counted 19 that I could see. THAT I COULD SEE!!!

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Public Service Broadcasting @ Privat Club, Berlin 26.04.14

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This was from a shoot a couple of weeks ago. As it's fibre based paper they went mega curly upon drying so I have a pile of shots under a pile of heavy books waiting to be scanned in when I get back. Looking forward to doing some more of these and making the most of the summer light.