Our latest release as of this morning is this film from John Bishop, quite a late era for cine but high quality picture . I doubt if this has ever had an outing before so too good to keep hidden but perhaps a litle modern for an archive. It was taken on cine without sound, rather than music I've added an authentic period London soundtrack although not synced to particular buses but a genuine street landscape to set the pictures against. Here is a cover for it.

Work on the new series of British Buses  is I hear progressing quite well with the first one in for checking before manufacture and the next will be getting to that stage in July. Not at all like the things that are promised and never happen. A whole raft of subjects are being considered for the future although that chap involved like newer prototypes than I would wish. I look forward to being able to release full details but it won't be too long now. This morning I was surprised to see a woodpecker right near the kitchen window feeders, it was fighting off crows and magpies four times its own size

I'm doing a lot of work with the OTA archive these days, as well as the many cine films I've processed they also have a huge archive of photos for sale, here are a couple of shots from our region.

Tomorrow I'm at Gaydon for the Wythall event, I've now joined Gaydon with premier membership.

A week of catching up after an exhausting weekend at Kelsall. I've completed al the images for John Bishops coverage of London buses 1988-99 all on S8 cine. Cleaned with NEAT plus up rated to 50 fps HD it looks great but was silent, thankfully I've quite a lot of 1988 video which donates a soundtrack albeit not always the correct bus to bus sound. This should be ready tomorrow. My toe has settled down after the verruca microwave treatment. Tonight was pub night it was also shopping day. Tesco had their 6 for 25% less and minus club card discounts. Anyway that gives us a dilemma, the wine cellar is full do we stop buying any more for a while or drink more? A bit late now so pics tomorrow!

It is rather overshadowed  by our 50th wedding anniversary next year so not a lot of celebrating but we do have an opera gala tonight at the RNCM another of their 50th anniversary events. Lots of Alumni singing and the orchestra of Opera North join the RNCM orchestra students. We are just waiting for the carrier to pick up the old POS terminal before we leave. I've been out in the garden before the rains came down lopping overgrown magnolia tree. I've been slowly working my way through John Bishops last quartet of cine films taken on S8 in London taking us up to 1999. All very late for cine but with care the quality can really shine  but alas silent. I'm going on to put the work from 1988-99 on one DVD/Digital download. It all takes a lot of time, so many processes to put it through once you have done the digitisation scanning process which is only the start. Meanwhile yet more photos of lorries at Kelsall last weekend.

A fairly productive day, up early to foot clinic, another blitz with the microwave, took painkiller  before I went which has kept discomfort to a minimum, just wearing off at tea time. Then back to getting the Kelsall films edited. Did well everything is now on as DVD including the two recent archive features. The replacement / new card machine arrived from the new supplier Nat West, wrong type of machine but they'll send the right one, all is well though the one we got does the job just a bit of a long way round. We've put through the payments for folk who we sent films out to last week. I'm putting the first full length OTA film on the Online Film Archive channel, it is available clean as in no watermark. Our own channel will have trailers for all the Kelsall films tonight. Meanwhile here are the covers for the new DVD releases.

I don't seem to have converted Kelsall 3 to jpg I'll put on tomorrow. Here are some shots for the tractor fans

Last but not least Mandy and myself have been married 49 years tomorrow!

I've managed to get covers done for the two new archive films and four of the Kelsall films are now edited plus covers done but more to go. Tomorrow I get another dose of micro wave on my foot, not looking forward to that, toe still numb and shooting nerve pain along base of toes. At least the verruca hasn't come up again nor the tiny one next to it. Windy and cool today compared to previous weeks. I'm tied up tomorrow with foot clinic, then Opera Gala at RNCM on Wednesday , Thursday the new car machine should arrive via Nat West - that took a lot of doing but I got a helpful chap eventually, I wouldn't want to hold my breath if it packed up and we needed support. Its an identical POS terminal as before.
Some more shots from Kelsall, here are a few for the steamer fans.

A superb weekend, mostly good warm weather, just a heavy downpour and another sprinkling later, as it was near home we got rain back in our village as well. Good growing weather. Anyway Kelsall was another huge success other than getting the trucks out at the end. It was running at about 2 hours in the queue which was fine for me filming but not so much fun in an elderly wagon. Anyway lots of superb vehicle owners and drivers, lots of general public ( are they really necessary!). I want a sit down and relax now. Lots and lots of film and photos. Here is another selection.

Great to meet friends old and new, a sweltering hot sticky day, I started at 8.30 and carried on until around 6pm. Around 230 ERF' s on the field so far.The ice cream and beer tent was still doing very well as I left. I'll be back around lunch time tomorrow, brolly at the ready. We could escape the thunder storms or just be unlucky in either case it should all have passed over before the 4.30 flood gates open to the leaving wagons. I'll keep filming until it thins out. Enjoying a glass of beer and we've a bottle of wine wine in the fridge.give up it won't write properly on Weebly, must be the heat.

I thought I had problems with our point of sales provider which is 123 in the DNS suite of companies. The replacement was to be Nat West Tyl, they said it would be sorted in 48 hours, it doesn't even seem to have got started in 48 hours so we are going to try the Market Traders Federation who have a good deal , anything has got to beat the rubbish we are encountering. We have just sent out orders with no payment rather than upset people and will process payments as and when. All i can say is from my experience anyone involved in the financial sector is probably a complete lyer, a member of the mafia or Scottish.

Anyway I've managed to edit a second archive film this week, this latest one covers London in 1986, some quite good video which certainly predates my efforts which also has three LT films released in  the 1970's. Anyway with London on my mind I'm also working through scanning all my pal John Bishops London films. The later ones I don't think have ever been before an audience. I'm also getting some suitable street scene tracks prepared for a 1980-90's London atmosphere.

I'm now compiling several archive transport features plus researching more material for our friends overseas who are working on new model buses for the UK market. I am also downloading and scanning more cine film on London, this will be complimented by some video material from the 1980-90's. The first one though will be all colour on British coach travel. We are out tonight at the RNCM 50th birthday event in Manchester. We have had no word back from credit card terminal people, we've sent out DVDs uncharged to regulars and will put payment though when we are up and running. Nat West have returned to the credit card machine market so it is likely they will be the new provider. All very annoying, some real crooks out there in the financial institutions. Meanwhile dipping into recent trips some scenes from Norwich last week. This coming weekend it is Kelsall show, lorries galore.

It took a whole day to get the OTA Youtube channel up and running although a lot of that was preparing an intro video. A long time since I've had to do all the basic stuff, I even had to get double verified to put a thumbnail caption on the short film. Our card machine has not yet been collected and neither has the replacement arrived. All I can ask is that as of today please order via the shop rather than send an order form. We are hoping it will all happen tomorrow but the back up service is awful, 123send have powered us for many years now and we had a situation like this before but it was soon sorted.
Here are some photos from the last batch of trips out. Hoping to be out with the camera on Friday. Its 50th birthday for the RNCM this Thursday night so guess we won't be going too far on Friday. Here are more views at the Black Cat, Beds