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calumsmac.bsky.social
@calumsmac.bsky.social
92 followers 320 following 470 posts
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calumsmac.bsky.social
#AlphabetChallenge
#WeekNForNeon
The neon signage for restaurant Sushi Samba, Heron Tower, London.
A very large, red neon circle, across the middle “SUSHI SAMBA” with smaller font “HERON TOWER” below.
October 5, 2026 at 12:11 PM
calumsmac.bsky.social
Annie Dillard’s dead…holy crap!
October 4, 2026 at 9:43 AM
calumsmac.bsky.social
A flock of sheep dodging the light rain under the cover trees. 15 of them, mostly white and a couple of black ones. Some standing, most of them laying on the ground. The trees are birch, on the whole.
#SundayPixAnimals
#SundayPix
October 4, 2026 at 9:11 AM
calumsmac.bsky.social
A still from a 10 seconds video of a pair of miniature Shetland ponies mutually grooming.
There’s a local prize winning stud that keeps numerous miniature Shetlands in paddocks up the brae.
This year’s foals were remarkably cute tiny wee things.

#SundayPixAnimals
#SundayPix
#MiniatureShetlandPonies
Slightly off centre to the right in the foreground, stand two miniature Shetland ponies. They coats are dark chocolate brown. Shaped like a yin yang symbol, they are grooming each other, simultaneously. One pony has its rump to us, the other its head. The grooming is licking / cleaning the top of the others rump / bottom of the back. Five sheep can be seen on the upward slope of the field behind the ponies. There is dried out, browned bracken in the foreground, between the viewer and the ponies. A wire-strands fence separates the ponies from the sheep. One of the fence posts is visible on the left edge of the image. I can post the video later, if anyone wants me to.
October 4, 2026 at 7:45 AM
calumsmac.bsky.social
Oh, to be a fly on the wall.
#shadow
#insects
#photography
What looks like a black and white photo, includes a speck of sparkling blue. It’s a fly resting on a plastic cable, its shadow cast on to the white wall behind. The fly’s wings are open, and the shadow shows that its left wing has a chunk out of the lower edge.
October 3, 2026 at 12:39 PM
calumsmac.bsky.social
A sneak peak of the cover artwork for the new Pet Shop Boys album, scheduled for release next week.

Inspired by a post yesterday by
@rufustsuperfly.bsky.social
A colour photograph from the Dead Parrot sketch by the Monty Python mob. It features Michael Palin (on the left) and John Cleese (on the right) with a Norwegian Blue pining for the fjords (centre stage). The comedy sketch is played in the interior of a shop set with virtually empty shelving. Is that a symptom of a lack of money available to the Flying Circus crew in the 1970’s? Some of these facts may be correct.
October 3, 2026 at 7:14 AM
calumsmac.bsky.social
Ersatz spats
A black and white photo cropped to show only the lower legs of a man in a light coloured, tailored pair of trousers (maybe linen). He is wearing fancy, men’s shoes. The footwear is dark with white panels on the upper. Somewhat reminiscent of spats. That’s it.
October 3, 2026 at 6:56 AM
calumsmac.bsky.social
#AlphabetChallenge
#WeekMForMachinery
Overexposed square (originally my IG post?) image of a yellow combine harvester, probably gathering barley. The big crop around here, for the distillery industry.
The sky is burnt out white.
Working on a slope, it looks like it might tip over at any moment.
October 1, 2026 at 11:16 AM
calumsmac.bsky.social
Four photos from September 2026

#fourphotosonemonth
Spores from chanterelles left to air dry a bit on an enamelled baking tin. A wiggly line in the top left corner. A streaked dome shape (with the gills visible) in the bottom right. The tin is black enamel with white spots. A ridge of hills, low across the image, sits below a cloudy sky that includes a dark flying wedge shaped cloud (across the width at the top and narrowing away to a sharp point in the distance) accentuated by a section of lighter, brighter cloud to its left. Light filtering through the curtain over a narrow window on the side of a yacht. The curtain is the full middle third of the image’s height on the right, trailing away to about a quarter of the height on the left. Right side is quite bright, and the left darker. It looks quite cinematic. A very colourful image of a printed, woven linen wall hanging. It includes stylised fishing boats, abstract sea, shore and harbour, and possibly a marker buoy. I saw it An Tobar, a gallery in Tobermory, and enjoyed it hugely. This piece is from an exhibition titled Transit by Eve Campbell. The show “Reflecting maritime history, including Loch Fyne skiffs, Clyde puffers, and the waterways that connected local communities in a collection of bold, vibrant textiles and mixed media pieces”
September 30, 2026 at 9:20 PM
calumsmac.bsky.social
#AlphabetChallenge
#WeekMForMachinery
I took this photo 8 years ago, tomorrow. It was when I was doing a weekend etching course. This colour picture shows someone turning the wheel on a press for printing from the etched plate. There’s an arm holding the protective covers flat, as the roller passes across the plate, ink and paper. The artist is stood on the right turning the wheel. His energised posture and the blur of the turning handle show that the printing is happening RIGHT NOW. Beyond the press and the printers is an apparent jumble of: wire plan chest (for drying prints); at least two other presses; an administrator sat on a swivel chair; a customer stood talking to the former; a wall mounted fire extinguisher; the glazed door and large windows either side of it. The floor is covered with lino, which is a nice touch, isn’t it!
September 29, 2026 at 10:22 AM
calumsmac.bsky.social
#TelephoneBoxTuesday
Portrait oriented colour photo. Centred in it is a traditional red phone box. The door is held open by a member of the public who is speaking into the phone, which they are holding to their left ear. It’s a warm sunny day, back in June. The sunlight streaming through the glazed panes on the right hand side casts a shadow ladder across the floor of the box and out through the open door onto the pavement. Above the door the panel reads ‘Lochaline’, because that’s where it is. Outside the phone box: there is a telegraph pole (just to the left); a whisky barrel planter; a section of crash barrier (behind the box), and trees and shrubs.
September 29, 2026 at 8:00 AM
calumsmac.bsky.social
#AlphabetChallenge
#WeekMforMachinery
A portrait oriented colour photograph of a whisky still in its shed at the GlenOrd distillery, and short walk from home. The huge, bulbous, copper pot (in the lower third of the image) narrows inwards and up its long neck (no, I don’t know the technical term) towards the darkened space of the ceiling (nearly to the top of the picture). A two bar safety railing stretches across the width of the lower section. There are various pieces of pipe work, a hatch, bolted together seals where the pot joins the neck and so forth. It looks like a fuzzy filter over the whole image, that is metal netting (to keep birds out, perhaps?). The ceiling is pale grey panels set in a metal frame, with various tubes all over the place. What you cannot see is the roller door that is opened vertically to allow the space to breathe. This door looks like the roller doors on a fire station, with transparent sections. I think this counts as machinery. Do let me know if you think otherwise…well, maybe don’t, eh.
September 28, 2026 at 10:19 PM
calumsmac.bsky.social
8 seconds of explosive goldfinch joy.
September 27, 2026 at 9:41 PM
calumsmac.bsky.social
It’s a braw, bricht, moonlicht nicht the nicht.
A dark photo that looks black and white, because it is an interior shot illuminated by the moon (just past being full). There’s a small spot of light off to the left. The window frame is visible due to the moon light coming through. Reflected light shows where the cutting board and guillotine (used by my photographer OH) lay on a desk. Outside the moonshine lights up a wedge of clear sky bordered by a dark frame of trees.
September 27, 2026 at 8:45 PM
calumsmac.bsky.social
#SundayPixSolitude
#SundayPix
This is a zoomed-in, filtered, fuzzy, old colour photo, probably originally posted on Instagram around 13 years ago. And, it is a bit of a cheat. There is a Caledonian Pine tree, standing all alone in open farmland. The tree trunk is lit by the afternoon sun, all around it the vegetation is brown, orange and gold. A low lying line of hills crosses edge-to-edge mid frame, with patchy bands of cloud in the sky above. Its canopy of reddish branches and green needles looks like a parasol, set against the sky. I captured the image from a moving train, a short distance north of Larbert, in Scotland. Why is it a bit of a cheat? Well, it is an optical illusion. For there are two trees. For a moment or two they merge into one, as you pass by. I first noticed these in the 1990’s and have looked out for this separation / merging / separation effect countless times over the years. Simple pleasures for my simple mind.
September 27, 2026 at 12:28 PM
Reposted
edwardphilips.co.uk
It’s world maritime day. BBC Radio 3 are celebrating by broadcasting from various lighthouses. So, here are some lighthouses just for you. xx
St Mary’s Lighthouse Flamborough lighthouse Longstone lighthouse Muckle Flugga lighthouse
September 26, 2026 at 7:20 AM
calumsmac.bsky.social
It’s Gaulling!
Asterix the Gaul…no?
September 25, 2026 at 9:44 AM
calumsmac.bsky.social
A local photography collective have an exhibition on, part of an arts festival in Moray, at Logie Steadings near Forres.
I mention as it includes 8 photographs by my better half.
Her website www.mairimacaulayphotography.co.uk
A pair of Mairi’s photographs. The pictures are partially obscured by window reflections on the glass in the frames of the mounted prints. Each is of rock weathered and worn by the waters of the river at a location called ‘Randolph’s Leap’ close to Logie. The sharpness of detail in the rocks are set against the (long exposure) smoothed flow of the river. This shows the eight prints as they are hung on the wall. They are configured in an approximate diamond shape thus: a landscape oriented set on the horizontal middle line to the left, mirroring a similar image on the right; inset on both sides there are above and below the mid-line a pair of landscape oriented prints, and in the vertical mid-line there are two prints, a portrait oriented image above and a landscape oriented below. They are all of rocks and river water. My powers of description fail the beauty of Mairi’s photography.
September 25, 2026 at 8:34 AM
calumsmac.bsky.social
Thanks to last week’s #FireHydrantFriday I now know where to find the nearest hydrant to my home. I really appreciate being brought to notice this by you lot.
Landscape orientation photograph of a cast iron fire hydrant cover plate. It sits in a tarmac pavement. The cover was once painted yellow, although only fragments of colour remain. It is otherwise rust coloured, with a yellowing birch (probably) leaf laying just off centre, across the left leg of the capital H. Cast into the design it says ‘BRICKHOUSE’ at the top, ‘FH’ centred in the middle. Below that a British Standards Kitemark and ‘8050 R’, with ‘DUCTILE’ on the foot of the plate. The pattern is (mostly) 4 or 5 offset rows of the letter ‘G’ in (to my mind) a very rigid font. Also, there are deformed ‘S’ in a font similar to the typical two-headed Allen Key shape. And I have just realised that the G’s and S’s are in diagonal lines, rising left to right. Anyway, if there’s a fire nearby I can now direct the Fire Service to the nearest hydrant. Bluesky saves the day!
September 25, 2026 at 8:02 AM
Reposted
gralefrit.bsky.social
Is it time to post that paragraph from The Road To Wigan Pier? The one about how the desperate, pleasureless poor will always refuse to just spend their pennies on cabbage no matter how much you try and insist. This isn’t a thing you can make people do. It’s not how humans work.
johnharris1969.bsky.social John Harris @johnharris1969.bsky.social · 11d
1)how to create an illicit fags & booze economy run by spivs that'll deprive the Treasury of tax revenue
2)you don't get people "back to work" by making their lives impossible (note cut of a third to long-term benefits). It makes the problem worse
3)you bastards
September 24, 2026 at 7:10 AM
calumsmac.bsky.social
#WednesdayWalls
#WallsOnWednesday
#aofoto
Tobermory on Mull
A colour photo of a mostly monochrome subject. There’s the once white wall of a building on a sloping road rising from left to right. The lower foreground is an aged tarmac road surface, with double yellow lines that are heavily worn away on both lines. A very narrow pavement sits between the road and the foot of the wall. The building’s wall is rough stone that had been painted white and is now dirty and worn. There’s muck, probably from vehicles passing during wet weather, and what is possibly patches of algal growth. Two-thirds width of a wooden door with six glass panes (3 rows x 2 columns), and a metal letterbox flap. Above the height of the wall is a slate roof, topped off with a metal ridge. There’s a near vertical Velux window towards the right side of the roof. The window is filthy. Around the foot of the wall there are patches of bright red paint, as if that was the colour previously. In line with the door’s lintel the top of an old advertising hoarding that is mostly broken away. The only remaining portion is the top 20% or so across its full width. Spray painted on this part of the sign are the words “Prometheus In The Rain”.
September 23, 2026 at 8:26 PM
calumsmac.bsky.social
#AlphabetChallenge
#WeekLforLookingIn
Three figures are reflections on the window pane looking in on a bare room. Situated in the piece is a wooden table and chair. A book lies open on the table. The chair sits at an angle to the table, as if the reader has stood up and walked away. The shot was captured in a gallery in Sweden, in 2019. It is a screenshot of a short video I have of these people moving around the exterior of an (otherwise inaccessible) exhibit set in woodland. I apologise that I don’t have a note of the artist’s name and the piece’s title to share with you.
September 21, 2026 at 8:14 AM
calumsmac.bsky.social
Quote post this with a picture of the aircraft you’ll accept as a bribe.
A painting of a sky blue RAF jet fighter zooming against an orange backdrop. Done in such a way as to give the impression of hugely high speed, ya bam! It was painted by my brother, Campbell, over 25 years ago. I think it is supposed to be a Harrier VTOL jet, but he was the expert and I am not.
September 20, 2026 at 7:54 PM
calumsmac.bsky.social
Thank you @robertspictures.bsky.social for including my hydrant shot.
September 20, 2026 at 7:31 AM
calumsmac.bsky.social
#SundayPixAutumn
#SundayPix
A section of wooden shingles from a wall on a Swedish church, Hjulsjö Kyrka. The building is painted in Falun Red, or Falu Rödfärg. A rich orangey red made with iron oxide, a byproduct of copper mining at Falun. A visit to the mine is recommended. If you are familiar with the colour of the Forth Rail Bridge, this is similar. The image is a detail of the shingles, three rows with each row about seven shingles wide. Each shingle is longer than it is wide, and the width varies quite a lot. Rounded ends give an appearance similar to scales, like on fish or reptiles. Rounded ends overlap the hidden tops of the row below. Tips of the rows above and below these three rows are (inevitably) just visible. Sunlight is filtered through a nearby tree, giving a mottled surface of shadows and light. Differing patterns of wood grain are visible in each shingle. This shot was taken in 2019 a few days before the autumn equinox, so I may get drummed out of the Brownies for cheating. Also, I think this specific version is probably one I posted originally on Instagram, on an account I have since closed and deleted.
September 20, 2026 at 7:14 AM