Naked Science Forum
General Discussion & Feedback => Just Chat! => Topic started by: Geezer on 14/02/2010 07:26:58
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Does anyone happen to know where this photo was taken? It might be near Blackpool. It's from an old family album and we are trying to identify the location.
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Regrettably, there is not a lot to go on. The two buildings are distinctive and the chimney in the background may be significant but I can't place it. I'm originally from Formby, Lancs. so know that part of the world quite well.
Quick research on the aircraft, which I expect you've done, shows it to be an AVRO 504 which crashed 9th May 1932. It belonged at the time to Northern Air Transport based in Barton near Manchester. The photo does not seem to be of Barton though. It looks like a beach area (JPEG limits the resolution) but I can't tell.
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Northern air transport did operate between Manchester and Stanley Park Aerodrome in Blackpool. Could it be there? The area has been redeveloped so an contemporary map is required.
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Thanks Graham!
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Very little can be done to improve the images of the buildings on the photo posted ...
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You may be able increase the resolution setting on your scanner for a more detailed image.
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Very little can be done to improve the images of the buildings on the photo posted ...
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You may be able increase the resolution setting on your scanner for a more detailed image.
Thanks RD. My brother in Aberdeen has the original. I'll ask him to try to step up the resolution.
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If anyone is interested, here's the gent that took the picture. It's my dad, and this is probably in the chemist shop in Blackpool where he worked as a young pharmacist.
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Geezer..
I think ewe have missed a vital clue in the picture !
If ewe look very closely....(it's tricky but squint and you'll see it !!)...but I reckon your pop took this photo in India !!
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Glad I could help !
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I'll ask him to try to step up the resolution.
This does increase the time taken to scan the image and the file size, but the time could be reduced by just scanning the centre area with the buildings, not the whole image.
For highest resolution the image should not be in a lossy compression format like jpeg, but lossless like png (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portable_Network_Graphics). (File size will be 5x - 10x bigger than jpeg).
Increasing the resolution of the scan may not necessarily improve the image: if you can see sharply defined photographic grain on the digital image that's as good as it's going to get.
BTW here is Geezer Snr without the bright flare (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lens_flare) spot in the centre of the frame ...
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Looking again, DiscoverDave may be right about Crosby Beach but better resolution would help. What I remember, from 40 plus years ago, is that Ormskirk Parish Church can be seen from much of the area in that part of the world. The shape of the hill and the church look like the feature on the horizon towards the right of the picture. The church is very distinctive (see pics on the web) so may be reconisable with better resolution. If so it is the north end of the beach otherwise Ormskirk would not be seen; the land rises close to the shore further towards Liverpool. The two impressive buildings may be related to the golf course to their north but I could find no pics of the area in the 1920s to confirm. They are not there now - at least not like that. It is certainly true that Northern Air Transport operated around Crosby too as one of their other Avro 504s crashed in Crosby.
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Maybe further to the North, if it's there at all. Better resolution pic would help. Identifying Ormskirk parish church on the hill in the distance would definately tie it down to this area.
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Thanks everyone!
I've asked my brother to send hi res clips of the buildings. He only checks his e-mail about once a week, so it could take a while [:D]
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Not just the buildings, Geezer. The two main buildings are reasonably clear anyway. If we had a photo or map from the 1920s it would be clear. The church on the mound to the right of the picture is important. Apart from the file size, it isn't any harder to get a high res image of the whole thing is it?
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Dave, I think Graham is referring to this one.
Oooh! I just noticed that there appears to be someone on a bicycle (or motor cycle perhaps) right above the letter L on the fuselage. That could suggest there is a paved surface at that point.
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Correct. You need to compare that church with Ormskirk Parish church which has an unusual spire and tower combination. Unfortunately, I don't think it is Ormskirk Church from this image, but I am not wholly sure.
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Dave, I suggested Ormskirk because I lived in the area (Formby) for the first 18 years of my life and remember that the church on the hill (about 8 miles away) was a very distinctive feature that could be seen from Ainsdale to Crosby. South of Crosby it was too built up, and I think it was even in the 1920s. It could be another church, and it is hard to determine the perpective, but then it would not narrow it down to Crosby particularly. Did you have any reason to suspect Crosby? I didn't think it would be there (until you suggested it) because Geezer was suggesting Blackpool area.
I don't think it's Blackpool tower that you can see unless there is a heavy smoker on top. I think I see a plume so it is probably a chimney stack. If it were the tower we would have to be much further North than Crosby.
Interesting puzzle isn't it?
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I don't think it's Blackpool tower
It is more like a chimney: the insert is derived form the Blackpool tower image posted above
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The "plume" could be cloud rather than smoke, but the building seems too slim to be the tower.
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I would have a small wager that it is a smoke plume - it's in the same direction as the smoke from the more distinctive stack over the EB on the plane. Could be a cloud though.
You are pretty nifty with the photo manipulation, RD. Are you using photoshop?
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Here is a pic of Ormskirk parish church taken from the south. The tower is very distinctive alonside the spire. This may not tally with the church in the pic, which if viewed from Crosby, would be looking from the south west. Need the high res picci.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ormskirk_Parish_Church.JPG
One other useful pointer, if we could determine it, is that churches are generally aligned East-West along their length. I don't think the spire has to be anywhere but it is often at one end.
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RD. Are you using photoshop?
I’m a cheapskate : I use a free image manipulation programme called GIMP (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GIMP). It is available in Photoshop format : GIMPshop (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GIMPshop)*.
[* should be the name of a sub-section in Anne Summers boutiques [:)] ]
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I was only 20 or so miles from Crosby at the weekend (visiting my mum in the Wirral) and would have gone to have a look had the weather been OK, but snow showers would have made it pointless as visibility very low. Looking at an OS map suggests that the church on the hill at Ormskirk may not be visible from Blundellsands afterall, as there seems to be some high ground in between. It may be a closer church (there is a possible one in Little Crosby) but it is hard to say. Of course it may not be this area at all!!
The photo must have been taken between 1927 (aircraft purchased) and May 9th, 1932 when it was written off after a crash (there were no fatalities).
When you get a higher res photo, Geezer, I suggest that you scan it with at least 4x the resolution (preferably more). Because the file will be huge I suggest just posting the key features as separate pics.
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Looks like my brother figured it out. The idea that it was near Blackpool was a bum steer. Sorry!
Here are the the coordinates of the left distinctive building with the turret. Both buildings are still there. You should be able to find the church spire. Also, the "factory chimney" is not what it seems.
55°27'15.01"N
4°38'28.85"W
Small World Graham. My mother had a cousin who lived in the Wirral. Her husband was a marine bioligist at Liv Uni.
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Bu**er, I was enjoying the challenge. I'm not sure I would have guessed at looking that far north though, given all the clues about where the plane operated. What was the big event everyone was gathered for?
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Also, the "factory chimney" is not what it seems.
55°27'15.01"N
4°38'28.85"W
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Insert derived from this image ... http://www.clydesite.co.uk/ayr/ayr_town_hall.asp
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It is hard to see where the viewing point is, where the two houses are and where the church is. Can you give exact coordinates for each Geezer? I would have thought the town hall spire would be further to the right compared to the image (I still think it's a chimney).
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sadly around that time England was littered with sandy/muddy areodromes and any field would do for a landing site if necessery. and the area of blackpool is covered with post industrial revaluation chimnies. and prewar ones.
it looks like a beach where the tides go out a long way. look around the beaches round blackpool for post WW2 beach partys
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when posting ideas it is important to see the entire thread, and not just the first page, i was enjoying that as well
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Cleaner version of this (http://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=28708.msg299405#msg299405) ...
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You can see all the landmarks on Google Earth. (That's where I got the coordinates.) I'll try to highlight them on an image later. I'll also try to figure out the location of the camera.
RD did the same thing that my brother did to ID the steeple. The one on Ayr town hall is quite unmistakable. I think the Church spire on the horizon to the right is also clearly visible on GE, although I have not checked to ensure that it existed around the time of the photograph, but I'm pretty sure it did. On GE you can get a good idea of its height from the whopping big shadow it casts.
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Seeing as the geezer conundrum has been solved...(though I still think it was taken beside the Taj Mahal)
Can someone please help me find the location of the place in this photo ? [;D] [;D]
(https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fmentaldimensions.files.wordpress.com%2F2009%2F03%2Fstatue-of-liberty.jpg&hash=0d8aeca89a89b88a28915fd4a2eee7b6)
Thanks for your help
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I knew that !
it was like a gift from frenchy land to america land ?.....I bet they stuffed it with garlic !
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I also new that.. I think most of us Americans do!
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OK - Here's another one.
No prizes for identifying the subject as the suave and debonair prototype Geezer.
But where is Geezer standing?
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On a wall ?
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Right! One point to the Tupperator.
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I'd guess somewhere in Scotland.
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Is it Loch Ness ?,,are ewe Nessie ?..it's a Loch in any case !
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I now think it may definitely NOT be Loch Ness..too hilly/mountainy !
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reminds me of crater lake.. nice piccy geezer!
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I need to go on Google Earth and see if it's possible to view a similar perspective. If it is, I don't think I should give out any clues. That would make it more challenging, but you would know when you had found it.
But if everyone prefers yes/no responses that will work too. What do you think?
BTW, the location was in the metadata. I think I removed it! RD will let us know if I didn't.
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BTW, the location was in the metadata. I think I removed it! RD will let us know if I didn't.
The only information I can extract from the metedata is that the Geezer family are loaded : Macintosh and Adobe CS,
and that the digital image was created on the 1st December 2009.
[ It is possible to remove all the Metadata, including date and software, using free RIOT (http://luci.criosweb.ro/riot/) programme/plug-in, example attached ].
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The only information I can extract from the metedata is that the Geezer family are loaded : Macintosh and Adobe CS,
and that the digital image was created on the 1st December 2009.
Ah! That's the Geezer brother. Funny thing is, he's too cheap to pay for broadband, so he had to take my Google Earth reference to the Apple store to see what I was talking about.
Mind you, there is a clue. He lives in Aberdeen. He gives some credence to the expression,
"The streets were deserted. It was like Aberdeen on a flag day."
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The Google Earth view of the location where the extremely handsome, if slightly long in the leg, "yout" is standing is rather good. You'll know when you find it.
BTW, do you think that water is fresh, or is it salty?
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Is it Loch Lochy?
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Is it Loch Lochy?
Not even close!
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Here's the Google Earth view. (Don't worry - no Lat/Long)
I don't think I should give out any more clues. This should tell you if you've found it or not.
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This is where I think the features are on the Avro photo.
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Geezer, the angle subtended at the camera from the church and the town hall would be stretching the viewing angle of camera/lenses at the time and, considering that only is part of the total view in the photo, the wideness of the angle would mean quite a wide angle lens for cameras of the day.
I would still go for the feature to the left of the houses being a chimney - it does not seem to taper enough to be the town hall spire and there is a hint of a smoke plume. The two houses are more "face-on" too. Also, is St Leonards on a hill? It (apparently) isn't on Google earth but I'm not sure whether a small hill would register and I have not got an OS map of Ayr.
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reminds me of scotland
loch Tey
i have the feeling that scotland was the first country, and it was sooooooo good that the rest of the world was modeled on it
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A view of Merligen from Faulensee (Switzerland). You are a cruel man, Geezer: the misdirection of mentioning Aberdeen :-) The wriggly local border meant it probably had to be in "old" Europe and the mountains were quite big. The google-earth view of a lake in the sun tended to rule out Scotland.
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If the picture is essentially all the film frame (not cropped) and taken with a modestly wide-angle lens, (say 35mm on 35mm format, or equivalent), then the red line is 0.95o vertically and is about 0.35 the height of the town hall, which is in total “225 feet (http://www.clydesite.co.uk/ayr/ayr_town_hall.asp)“, (68.58meters).
So using trig (someone better check) the picture was taken 1447 meters from the town hall, (say +/- 10%),
i.e. you can draw a couple of circles on the map centred on the town hall with radii 1302 meters and 1592 meters,
and see where the zone between the circles intersects with the beach.
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I think it would have to be sub 28mm focal length on a 35mm camera. Not common in the late 20s or early 30s I don't think. The horinontal frame view-angle is 90 degrees or more.
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35mm focal length lenses were available for the Leica 2, produced in 1932.
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From Wikipedia..
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An example of how lens choice affects angle of view.
28 mm lens, 65.5° × 46.4°
50 mm lens, 39.6° × 27.0°
70 mm lens, 28.9° × 19.5°
210 mm lens, 9.8° × 6.5°
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A 90 degree angle would require an 18mm lens!!
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... you can draw a couple of circles on the map centred on the town hall with radii 1302 meters and 1592 meters,
and see where the zone between the circles intersects with the beach.
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The grey thing top right is part of the runway of Prestwick airport, which according to wikipedia was built "around 1934 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glasgow_Prestwick_Airport#History)" so perhaps the plane on the beach was an emergency landing, if there was an airport 5km away, which may explain why the picture was taken.
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It is quite a wide angle shot. I've no idea who took it, but it was most likely my dad. I can remember his old camera, but not the make. It was one of the ones where pull out the lens on a bellows. Nothing very exotic.
Perhaps it was taken from quite far out? The tide goes out a long way there. BTW, my dad's family lived in Irvine which is just up the coast.
I have some more details from my brother. I'll post them in a bit.
If anyone is losing sleep over the location of the other photo, send me a PM and I'll put you out of your misery [:D]
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Your estimate for the camera position is just in my red zone (based on modest wide-angle lens) ...
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Geezer, I already answered the second location question and I think I was right. Are you ignoring all my hard work?
I can't believe the wide angle is 90 degrees. It would be distorted. It has to be wrong.
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Geezer, I already answered the second location question and I think I was right. Are you ignoring all my hard work?
I can't believe the wide angle is 90 degrees. It would be distorted. It has to be wrong.
[;D] Graham, I'm not intentionally trying to tick you off.
Stay tuned
Yup! Dead right!
I was expecting to see Lake Thun in the answer. You were too specific!
How did you do it Graham?
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Here's the colour picture I got direct from the Geezer hotline ...
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Definitely not a chimney.
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Elementary my dear Watson :-)
The google image was key. Your photo with the clouds (and the mention of Aberdeen) were shown to be misleading with the blue water and sky in the google image (for once not taken at dawn). The regional wiggly border implied it was somewhere that defined their borders when fine detail was importent. These things pointed to somewhere in old Europe and not Scotland and probably not Scandinavia. The mountains were significant so I thought of the Italian lakes to start then moved over to Austria, Switzerland, Southern Germany. There are not that many lakes near big mountains so it took about 30 minutes. I was probably a bit lucky too.
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No, RD can't be right. No schoolboy or aeroplane in the pic :-)
OK, I give in. How did they get a 90 degree view angle on the pic?
Geezer, did you have this pic all the time? Tut tut!
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How did they get a 90 degree view angle on the pic?
Geezer's erroneous inclusion of "St Leonard's church" is what's giving you the idea that it's a 90o field of view.
I estimate the horizontal field of view in the full monochrome image is about 55o.
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Perhaps it's not St Leonards church. This may work better, in which case, the camera position would be a bit further South.
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Elementary my dear Watson :-)
The google image was key. Your photo with the clouds (and the mention of Aberdeen) were shown to be misleading with the blue water and sky in the google image (for once not taken at dawn). The regional wiggly border implied it was somewhere that defined their borders when fine detail was importent. These things pointed to somewhere in old Europe and not Scotland and probably not Scandinavia. The mountains were significant so I thought of the Italian lakes to start then moved over to Austria, Switzerland, Southern Germany. There are not that many lakes near big mountains so it took about 30 minutes. I was probably a bit lucky too.
I suppose if you had just posted the same image from Google, we'd know you were right but the location would remain unknown to others, but maybe that's taking things a bit too far.
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Geezer, did you have this pic all the time? Tut tut!
About the same time as I posted that my brother had figured out it was Ayr. It's such a pain posting images on TNS that I decided to dump the whole lot on RD to see if he could make sense of all of it.
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Before you posted the new suspect church I was about to say that the bearing of mystery spire is 30o East of the town hall...
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Spot on.
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I suspect the apparent hill under the spire is all the trees in that area.
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Did your brother go there to take the photo? It lines up well. If it is this other church we see, although that explains away the large view angle, it does seem too close to the right hand building to fit with the original. Is it possible to find a camera position that is consistent with this?
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Did your brother go there to take the photo?
I'm not sure how he got them. Perhaps he got a friend to take them. I'm reasonably sure he didn't make a trip from Aberdeen to Ayr.
I think there is quite a lot of wiggle room in the camera position. It's also possible I'm missing another church, or that one was demolished, although that's pretty unlikely. Some bombs did fall on Scotland during WW2, but I don't remember hearing about that any came down on Ayr.
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Did your brother go there to take the photo?
I'm not sure how he got them.
Here are the links which were attached to the photos from the Geezer hotline ...
http://www.ruleworks.co.uk/Ayrshire/wellington-school.asp
http://www.197aerial.co.uk/ayr_wellington_school.htm
As well as Googling, Geezer brother did manage to squeeze out some more detail second time around ...
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Here's another one. Not too difficult I think.
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Here are the links which were attached to the photos from the Geezer hotline ...
http://www.ruleworks.co.uk/Ayrshire/wellington-school.asp
http://www.197aerial.co.uk/ayr_wellington_school.htm
As well as Googling, Geezer brother did manage to squeeze out some more detail second time around ...
It looks like that might be our spire in the top left corner of the second photo from 197aerial site.
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It looks like Geezer's brother did a good job of finding relevent pics on the internet. It's very hard to find a site with just the right pics so amazingly well done. The higher res pics would have been a help too. It is certainly much clearer that the it is the town hall spire.
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Not much to narrow this one down. I'd hazard a guess at Priest Lake.
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Not much to narrow this one down. I'd hazard a guess at Priest Lake.
You know, it does look a bit like Priest Lake. That mountain in the distance is a good bit taller than the ones near Priest Lake.
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It looks like Geezer's brother did a good job of finding relevent pics on the internet. It's very hard to find a site with just the right pics so amazingly well done. The higher res pics would have been a help too. It is certainly much clearer that the it is the town hall spire.
The Geezer brother in unencumbered by domestic authorities.
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I'm sure
nobody actually gives gives a carp the suspense has been intolerable, so I thought it best to come clean.
It's in Montana - Lake MacDonald in Glacier National Park.
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There you go spoiling all the fun :-)
Actually that was far too hard without any external clues. Finding a random lake with a mountain is pretty difficult and this time there was no extra clues (like a boundary mark). Even the name on the boat was unreadable. I guessed it might be somewhere near the Selkirk mountains - well at least it was in the US.
It was interesting and challenging trying to find info on the Ayr photo because it might have had some importence or relevance to you or your family. And the Swiss site was just a challenge. Perhaps you should try to see if some newspaper would run a competition along this line. It's better than spot-the-ball.
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Does anyone recognise this place?
(Photo snaffled from the web)
(https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fgdl.cdlr.strath.ac.uk%2Fsmcj%2Fsmcj027%2Fsmcj027100.jpg&hash=18a89ad9f46ea749bc5d6288311e3c42)
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Too easy. It's Coire Mhic Fearchair Ben Eighe.
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Ah! Torridon is a wonderful place.
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Absolutely correct. I guess those triple buttresses are just too easily recognisable. I had to camp up there one December night and the only bit of flat 'ground' that I could put the tent up on was the frozen run-off from the lake.
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I had to camp up there one December night
Good grief! I hope you had a good sleeping bag.
Dangerous place Scotland. The weather in the mountains can change from delightful to deadly in no time at all. It scares me to watch parents taking young children up mountains like Ben Lomond as if they were going for a walk in the park.
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No prizes for guessing where this is. It's in Irvine, Scotland. My grandparents had a dairy there, and the horse (called Snowball, naturally) pulled the milk float. The three gents are my uncles and my dad, who was the oldest, was the photographer.
The only reason I posted this one is because I find it fascinating that this shot was taken at least eighty years ago. Uncle Andrew, who is holding Snowball, looks as if he could have stepped off the street a couple of weeks ago. I suppose men's fashions have not really changed much.
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The two lads on the horse don't look too happy. You are absolutely right about the style of your uncle. Timeless.
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I had to camp up there one December night
Good grief! I hope you had a good sleeping bag.
Oh yes, most definitely. It was snowing only moderately when my pal and I put the tent up but it turned into a bit of a blizzard in the night i.e. from about 16:30/17:00 onwards. It was also the site of the most challenging tom-tit I ever had too, as I had to put on my gortexes and crampons before venturing out into the dark, wind and snow, and then take careful aim whilst only exposing the bare minimum. Lol - even just handling the loo-paper was a challenge.
That wasn't the coldest night we had on that trip through: on our way back home we camped beside Loch Ness and when we woke up to a bright and clear morning the insides of the tent were coated with ice, formed from the moisture in our breath as we slept, and similarly, the evaporated moisture from our bodies had frozen into lots of little ice balls on the outside of our sleeping bags.
The great thing about winter hill walking though, is that you don't have to worry about mud too much, as it's all frozen solid, and to clean your cooking pans, you just fill them with water and then chip it all out with your ice axe once it's frozen - much easier than trying to wash them in cold water and without detergent. Oh yes, and no midges either: another great bonus [;D]
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The two lads on the horse don't look too happy.
They do look a bit ticked off, don't they. They probably got fed up sitting there while my dad messed around with his camera. Perhaps it was because old Snowball had major "outgassing".
Come to think of it, my dad was into home movies (9.5 mm) and on one occasion he had us all parading up and down for ages in the gardens at Hampton Court while he recorded the remarkable event.
I think my mother finally told him to knock it off!