White shed beside a loch - where?

Adam Brown · Post by **Adam Brown** » Fri Apr 29, 2011 8:21 am

Bit of a long shot here. In fact I'll be very suprised if the location can be identified but there is a photograph on the The Scottish Military Research Group blog today which has been taken on a loch. There is a small white building in the background which is about the only clue.

http://scottishmilitary.blogspot.com/20 ... -2011.html

Any ideas?

Thanks

Adam

Alan SHARP · Post by **Alan SHARP** » Fri Apr 29, 2011 9:33 am

Greetings Adam, from New Zealand.

I transferred the image and blew it up five times. As I thought, to reflect so much low light, the building appears to be a newly built boat shed, sheathed in new corrugated iron. You can see the corrugations on what I presume is the boat portal, though the clinker, appears to have known better times. The building's blocks and diagonal bracing is also discernable. Someone who understands light, in your area, should be able to orientate the location for you. I presume late afternoon from what appears to be the low angle of the sun. What surprised me was a wrist watch on the one arm. Pity the resolution is not good enough to read the time. Would the type of tree, also be an indicator of whether it is a low or high land setting ?

Alan SHARP.

30-4-11 Added PS. Where the background is most in focus, it appears that through the trees there is a larger body of water as apposed to a very flat landscape. I feel, a professional photographer’s opinion upon the light and composition of such a photo is in order. Afraid my camera skills go only as far as point the camera and hope for the best. Success rate is not that high, especially so when it comes to getting well lit faces in such low angled sun light. I would suggest re-scanning the photo, at the highest resolution available, to you and you may learn more. Recently I made an archival, high resolution, scan of an old 1922 photo and discovered the face of the old Granny, looking through the quarter pane of a sash window, at the photographer, who was photographing her daughter and Grand kids on the front porch.

AS.

Currie · Post by **Currie** » Fri Apr 29, 2011 2:03 pm

Hello Adam,

It’s a very nice photo, except for the boat shed. Maybe they are making an amphibious landing.

It seems to me that they are looking up at the camera. If that was the case then the cameraperson is either on a much bigger boat, or is standing up in a rowboat, but why would they do that, and besides there’s no camera shake. I have a feeling, just a feeling, that the camera person is standing on the other shore and that it is a relatively narrow waterway.

Perhaps they have hired or stolen the boat to go for a row. There’s room in the boat for more than three, the cameraperson is probably wearing the same uniform they are. The fellow with the cigarette looks surprised but the other two seem to be posing and waiting for the snap to be taken.

It looks like it is on fairly thick cardboard and is an enlargement and has been coloured. It looks too sharp to have been taken by a box brownie. I don’t think a professional would have included the blight on the landscape unless there was a particular reason to do so. Professionals probably didn’t wander about in that sort of terrain looking for customers. Maybe the whole background is a very cleverly executed canvas backdrop and that’s not a real boat at all.

Does anybody know anything about cameras? What sort of camera would give you that degree of sharpness and that very small range of distance where it is in sharp focus sort of thing.

All the best,
Another Alan

Adam Brown · Post by **Adam Brown** » Fri Apr 29, 2011 4:41 pm

Alans

Like you both the more I look at it the more I see something not quite right with it. Well done Alan S. for identifying a corugated iron shed though.

The men are in very sharp focus but has it been taken by a very good camera outside or is it a composite photograph with the men and boat taken in a studio being added to another photograph of the scenery? It's not the moset scenic location though. Maybe that's a double bluff to make it more like a real shot though!

It is a shame a date couldn't be given. In my opinion the uniforms place it anywhere from 1908 up until 1938. I'm plumping for the post 1908 army reforms rather than before it because I think the middle man has a 'T' for territorial on his shoulder title.

The TA wore service dress right up until the Second World War but there is something about the right hand man which suggest an earlier period, maybe First World War or 1920's. The wrist watch perhaps places it nearer the 1930's though?

Could have been taken during a summer camp for the Lanarkshire Yeomanry in which case perhaps the location is near somewhere like Stobs in the Borders?

Thanks for the updates

Kind regards

Adam

Hibee · Post by **Hibee** » Fri Apr 29, 2011 5:54 pm

For my tuppenceworth.......why is the background in colour (greenish) and the men/boat in mono? Why is the fellow on the right seated facing the stern? They've obviously not been anywhere on this boat.

My first thought was the building might be a bird hide, but it would have to be facing inland.

Hibee

Adam Brown · Post by **Adam Brown** » Fri Apr 29, 2011 6:30 pm

Hibee wrote:For my tuppenceworth.......why is the background in colour (greenish) and the men/boat in mono? Why is the fellow on the right seated facing the stern?

Hmm, it's all adding up to this being a 'fake' but why?

Thanks for the input.

Thanks

Adam

Currie · Post by **Currie** » Sat Apr 30, 2011 1:42 am

I don’t really think it’s a fake, I was only joking about the painted backdrop. It looks like it’s been hand coloured although only very subtly, there may be some colour in the uniforms.

If you look at the boat the trim seems to be all wrong, down at the bow up at the stern, there seems to be weight missing from there. All the weight is forward and it may be aground at the bow end. One oar is in the water, the other at what is probably the shallower side, has been pulled inboard. That’s probably what you would do if you were approaching a shoreline.

The body of water probably isn’t very wide. How wide is a Loch? Is there anything on the back of the photograph? Is it set up as a Post Card for example?

Alan

War Memorials · Post by **War Memorials** » Sat Apr 30, 2011 3:17 pm

Hi folks,

The photo belongs to my wife. It was in the collection of her grandfather. I would say, given the time period of all the other photos in the collection, that this dates from the First World War.

This is a postcard, and it has been coloured at some point, not sure who by.

I wuld hazard a guess that this shot was perhaps taken by the fourth passenger on the boat, who snapped it after he had stepped off?

Regards,

David McNay

kennethm · Post by **kennethm** » Sat Apr 30, 2011 4:05 pm

Hi All,

I'm not really familiar with Lanarkshire but wonder if the shed could perhaps be a fishing hut?

Regards,

Ken

Alan SHARP · Post by **Alan SHARP** » Sat Apr 30, 2011 8:31 pm

Greetings again.

When blown up there appears to be shingle under the tip of the bow. At the stern a large keel can be seen, with the "shed" reflection passing underneath the stern. Through the trees there appears to be a larger body of water.

I'm not a water man, but here in NZ, I would associate a craft like that, with what we would call a whale boat. Is crafts like that, common for the period, on inshore waters in Scotland ?

Alan SHARP.

TalkingScot.com

White shed beside a loch - where?

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