I take lots of photos these days with my faithful ultrazoom bridge camera.
Even on days when I'm too ill to venture far, there's always something swanking into shot, flaunting its best profile, posing for its spotlight moment, framed by my lens.
Birds. Such remarkable characters, always up to some busy business!
The Moon. I try to capture her in all her moody magnificence.
Clouds. A member of the Cloud Appreciation Society and a BBC Weatherwatcher, I aim to keep one eye on the sky.
Trees. Flowers. Fungi. Every one inspirational and unique.
Planes. Pipers with their sleek lines and their ankle socks aka in less anthropomorphic style, their wheel fairings or spats. Cessnas with those jaunty struts bracing up their wings. Taildraggers. Show-offs phuttering over my rooftop.
Anything that makes my imagination do a creative somersault.
I upload my snapshots to Flickr (other photo clouds are available!)
Flickr has its own puzzling range of bewildering tags. Even when you've tagged your own images with the appropriate search terms. Sometimes I find my crescent moon's been labelled "FULL MOON" or even worse "PIZZA" or just "FOOD".
Flickr once labelled my image of a Pheasant as "DOG" and a Wood Pigeon recently metamorphosed via Flickr tag into an "EAGLE". Though I never was quite sure what kind of crossbreeding they imagined was going on, or what they'd been drinking!
Then there are clouds that Flickr insists are "MOUNTAINS" "SEA" or "SNOW". Local upland fields here in northern England it calls "PLAINS" as if they've been transplanted into the New World. Often the Flickr bots throw up their hands and attach perplexing tags like "ABSTRACT" "MINIMALIST" and (even when it isn't) "MONOCHROME".
I often marvel at how Flickr manages to transform birdwatchers like me into unwitting soft porn peddlers! No sooner have I tagged a Great Tit, Blue Tit, Coal Tit or Long-tailed Tit than my view count soars up into the hundreds overnight! Last week when I tagged the catkins of Salix caprea, Goat or Pussy Willow, my view count skyrocketed and kept on climbing off the scale.
Just imagine the droves of disappointed users clicking and salivating in anticipation of extracurricular thrills, only to be frustrated by my innocent picture of a tree in springtime!
If you've ever had hilariously inappropriate tags added to your photos, please share your laughs by leaving a comment below.
If you fancy exploring my Flickr, ditch your dirty raincoat, grab a cuppa and join me over at:
Joyce's Flickr
