Things that happened a while ago that someone caught on camera - Imgur I like the sailing ship one. For a true 'quiz' I wonder how many of the sails you can accurately name.
Fascinating stuff there. Its nice to see Iran has moved on since the glorious Islamic revolution. They hang people from cranes now instead of blowing them apart with cannons. That's progress for you. Love the Victorian gentleman with his collection of heads. And the bizarre image of fire damaged waxworks. The quality of those looks amazing. Better than today's possibly. Can't name the ships, except to say they look like square riggers. I wonder how many of then still exist today.
Brilliant! Some moving images there, which should serve as a reminder to us all to be more tolerant, but also remind us that change is necessary.
I could be wrong but a lot of the better resolution and general picture quality has to do with plate size. Although optics and everything else has improved, quality has been sacrificed to a degree for portability. Ansel Adams used to use large format plate cameras when a lot more modern stuff was available, simply for image quality. The downside is fragility, weight, size and a limited number of plates. You need to "know your onions" when using these large format cameras to achieve good results. Just what I've been told and read
TT600 - Basically sails in a sailing ship are named as follows : Jibs (the staysails forward of the forward mast, fwd to aft) Flying Jib, Outer Jib, Inner Jib and Fore Top-Mast Staysail. Main, square rig, sails (named for each mast that they serve, followed by - working upwards...) Course Sail, Lower Topsail, Upper Topsail, Lower Topgallant, Upper Topgallant, Royal, Skysail and Moonraker. If additional sails are added outboard of the normal working sails in light winds these are called Studding Sails - eg "Main Upper Topsail Port Stud". Fore and aft sails between the masts are Stay Sails and are named for the stay that attaches their uppermost part - eg Mizzen Lower Topgallant Staysail. The masts, incidentally, are named (fwd to aft) Foremast, Main Mast, Mizzen Mast. The fourth, aftmost, mast is normally called either the Bonaventure Mizzen or the Jigger Mast. In some early sailing ships there may also have been a Sprit Topmast which was mounted on the Bowsprit forward of the Foremast. So, now you know...
You're right about the resolution and negative size. (Ansel Adam never used less than 10 X 8 I believe). But I meant the quality of the waxwork figures. If it wasn't for the pile of parts and the figure with no hands you'd never guess they were mannequins. The realism looks superb.
I wonder what opinion a modern day Islamic head taker would have of the British officer with his Maori head collection ? I would love to know what his fellow officer's and men thought of it at the time.
I doubt if he or his men took the heads themselves. I imagine they were tribal trophies which he bought or otherwise acquired as curiosities. Modern day equivalent: Islamists putting heads on E-bay?
JR is probably seething – he has provided a comprehensive answer based undoubtedly on many years maritime knowledge and experience, and that tosser – TT – has the temerity (The Fighting Temerity anyone....) to only give him 8/10 for his treatise on sails and masts of C18th sailing ships. I know says JR, I’ll ask a simple and polite question why I only got 8/10 and then blast him when TT comes back with a simple answer. Well JR – you missed two crucial sails – firstly the BoxingDayDFS sail… used only in peak weather conditions in the winter season in times of economic gales. And secondly, the SternPostPoopDeckMercury sail. This is much less well known, and appeared only on a few select frigates/barques in top secrecy. Indeed, there are no pictures of its use evident in paintings of the day, but there is a partly completed etching which has recently been drawn up to show how it might have looked on one of Nelsons ships of the line – artists impression below…. As an aside, I'm currently working my way through Patrick O'Brians Aubrey/Maturin series of books-most enjoyable, set in and around the era of Nelson.
Incidentally, did you know that (apart from HMS VICTORY) the last ship in the RN with a sail was the diving trials ship HMS RECLAIM ? She commissioned in 1945 and finally paid off in 1979...
Forgive me, it was somewhat of a cheeky reply to only give you 8/10, but your reply was very impressive – done from memory? As for the Fighting Temeraire reference, one had plenty of time trundling up and down the M4 over Xmas, to think of corny lines…. Two sailing things I managed to miss this year which annoyed me – seeing the Tall ships either at Falmouth or Greenwich in early sept, and the Longitude exhibition – 300th Anniversary of the Longitude Act. at the Greenwich Maritime Museum, which also has all five of John Harrisons timekeepers together, and which is about to end(4/1/15).
