Photo Roundup: UK, France, Ukraine, Russia, Mongolia [pics]

excellent!

Simon! It's such a pleasure to "meet" you! I've admired the photos at 3XTom's Compound since he first showed me your work. I'm a huge new fan, and you didn't disappoint with this new batch! Excellent!!!xxx

Thanks
For the SLR shots: Canon 1dsm2, with a 17-40 normally, or a 50mm [but it compacted itself on the trip]

Warrior is fake, photoshopped :P

Thanks. Likewise. I think we met briefly when I was tweaking the cam setup...

Has Tom shown you his war wound? ;)

Magnificent pics...as always.

You really should write a book.

Being Saturday night, and having work to do, I decided to write up about one of the experiences. Whilst the first two photos posted [the telescope snaps] might not seem like much, it was one of the biggest adventures we had on the trip.

What follows is a very lengthy account. So fresh, it's not even spell checked: my apologies.

To us simple folk, the chemistry of pop-tarts confuses baffles us - the machinations of the television: magic.

But there exist men to which these things are mere triffles, bite-sized gambits of logic to solve over breakfast.
You're entering a different world: The world of science. A world of men with pocket protectors and bored wives.

They spend a lifetime lost in labcoats and equations: while we struggle to figure out bus timetables, they ruminate such subjects as origins of the universe. Despite what their wives tell them, they don't

have their heads in the clouds: they dwell in the lofty heights of beyond: space.

When dusk settles, lights slowly flicker out, the electronic chatter of the world slowly fades. Cell phones are laid to rest. Even truckers, hurtling down the black highways, pause their tirade of CB

obscenities to concentrate on the murk of stimulants and dark roads.

This is the Time of Scientists. Eager at the controls: arrays of satellite dishes, having slept through the day, sleepily spin their engines to speed, and in unison, they turn their faces to the heavens,

hoping to be the one that tonight might catch the scrap of light, the burst of xray or the crepuscular glow of an unknown world.

There is, however, one problem: a problem of numbers. Like the single surviving hostess in a plane crash, the telescopes are outnumbered by the natives. And, since the untimely banning of to-the-death

academic deathmatches, scientists are forced to take a number and wait, with nervous anticipation, before they can run their fingers over the dials of the telescope control rooms.

Some scientists have to wait for months, even years to get a window of operation time. Marked on their calendar with a large red X, they become more anxious and nervous as the day approaches. They begin to

self doubt: are the numbers correct? What if the weather is bad? Where's my damn slide rule?

So: it would be no stretch of the imagination to assume, that on the Night of Nights, the scientists want everything to go to plan. No solar flares. No stray EMF. Even a mobile phone call can render results

useless - let alone physical interference, such as explorers climbing all over the telescope dish.

with that said, I would like to extend my apologies to the scientists that were working on the telescope a few weeks ago.

We arrived at 3AM, assured that by now, the dish would be 'put to bed' - in its dormant position. during our trek through the muddy field, it was revealed this was not the case.
Someone was working late. The dish was fully rotated, peering off a few degrees above the horizon.

We got closer. Peering through the nettles and barbed wire, the enormity of the task became apparent. Steel girders, the width of cars, patched together to form a lattic that held the dish. Pulsing orange

lights, and the solid hum of electricity assured us that what were were witnessing was serious business. The bearings that the dish rests on are from battleships. Behind the clockwork nightmare of gear lie

huge Rolls Royce engines. Countless layers of steel and bolts hold this bohemoth in place. It rests on a giant circular train track, to facilitate rotation.

On the edge of the track: the control room. Brightly lit, we could see the boffins shifting their stares between computer screens, and every so often, the dish itself.

And there, flanking the largest girder of all, a ladder: dwarfed by the superstructure around it.

Fingers meshed into the chainlock fence, we decided, despite the fact it was very, very muchly in use, to go for it.
Over the fence, through the barbed wire, we picked our way through the rusty graveyard of telescopic paraphenalia that lay just inside the compound.

Bathed in orange light, and in full view of the control room, we dashed across the rails, to the bottom steps. Seconds later, the compound went into lockdown.
Floodlights sprang into life, drowning us, in black, against the white of the telescope. There was nothing to do but run.

Cowering in the bushes, we passed thirty minutes of speculation: was it coincidence? Would there be security? until the lights snapped off as suddenly as they'd snapped on.

4AM arrived. The cold set in, and the sky took on a light blue wash. We mounted the fence, this time with a revised approach: stay off the walkways - we'd scramble the girders themselves.
The steel was cold. Giant flecks of rust and whitewash peeled off in our hands. After thirty seconds of intense climbing, we were above the line of lights. We peered down through a mix of adrenaline and

sweat to see the infrared trip that we'd previously set off. We prepared ourselves for the epic climb to the edge of the dish.

However, before we could move, the hum of electricity was drowned out by a rising whine. The motors that powered this until now passive giant started to wind up. The intensity of the sound drilled into our

ears, and just as it reached its most painful, the scope began to rotate: in the direction of the control room. We had moments to move in any direction: if we froze, we could concievably rotate directly in

front of the control room and security hut - not the result we were hoping for.

so as the dish built up speed, we shot down the girders, trying to grip hard against the vvibrations that were now oscillating through the entire structure, in tune to the heavy rumbling.

Finally at the bottom, hearts in our mouth, we retreated, defeated, for the second time.

430AM arrived. Against all common sense, we ran back to the dish for a final attempt, the agreement: stop at nothing.
15 minutes of exhausting climbing later, we were at the edge of the dish. By now, it was well and truly dawn. The sky was splashed with pink, the burning glow of the sun just below the horizon.

Due to its rotation, we couldn't venture to the dish itself, but were confined to the massive engine rooms, which on two occasions sprang into life, only further adding to our levels of stress and

adrenaline.

Finally, at 515AM, we dropped down, exhausted, pushed our way through the nettles to a railbridge, and in the shadow of the dish, watched trains rumble past beneath us as the sun rose.

great shots once again, the stacked up boxes, were they old ammo boxes ?

Hey Julias - thanks for taking the time to leave a message
Actually, they were neither boxes nor ammunition, something slightly more macabre.



The ones in the other photos are smaller, because basically, it's a room full of kiddy coffins

Looking forward to seeing you in AMS

Great shot, Thanks Simon, c ya there

Those are some amazing pictures

Spectacular cap'n.

Suckee suckee?

Just wow. I always love seeing your pics. have you ever divulged your main camera setup?

Thanks for the comments.

I normally reveal my camera setup in each one of these threads.. It's about post #25 I think.

In brief, though:

SLR: Canon 1DsMII, primarily with a 17-40mm - I have a 50mm too, but it compacted on the trip :D

Pano: Fuji TX-2 [ Hasselblad XPan-2], 30mm

Misc: Lomo LC-A [Cute camera, but hideously overpriced for what it is, thanks to the power of the intawebs]

AMAZING...

I'm so going to bother you to death with information (specially the Transiberian trip)...looking at your photos makes me imagine just how fun I would have doing something similar

Feel free

Awesome pictures, seriously

[QUOTE=quantum-x;14748290]OK, here we go..

Russian Particle Collider.....


I am curious. When you shot this is it a locked down shot and you just moved one light?
Or where the lights already there and you just powered it?
Or.. Is it multiple exposures (captured separately and merged)? Looks amazing.


Was this shot on the Hasselblad? Aspect ratio seems lower.
I love that 30mm lens in some of the wider shots.

Jay Allan

amazing pics!! thanks for sharing

[QUOTE=JayAllan;14757171]Hi Jay.
Thanks for taking the time to send a message.

The background on the location is that this is a 22km abandoned particle colliderabout 170km out of moscow. (For comparison, the new hedron collider is 26km - this is no small affair..)

This shot was set in one of the access shafts of the collider - there are only a handful of them, and even fewer are accessible - to get into this one, you have to crawl through a tunnel dug under the concrete foundations of the superstructure, to get inside a sealed hut, to begin the climb down. The shaft is 60m.

Although abandoned, the collider is an odd mothballed state: they have automated pumps etc to prevent major flooding, and power (if you know where and how to connect it) - but for all the millions of dollars spent on it, it sits there rusting, and completely unknown to the world - a shameful reminder of the soviet era.

So, back to your question: This was shot on my Canon 1ds, 17mm. Fortunately, we got the lights in the cages turned on, so it was a fairly straightfoward shot.

The hassy pano of the tunnels is this one [click for full size]


Throughout the entire system, there's a train network:


You shoot on an XPAN?

haha - such a showoff

amazing photography and commentary as always simon

I still can't get over how crazy some of these adventures are, especially the pepsi max and bridge one.... It's awesome.

Great photos.

Would you be able to upload higher rez pics somewhere? Especially those panoramic ones?

Let me know which ones you'd like and I can do them to a size you like.
I normally don't post huge res files online

woow! amazing pics as always ...

Awesome pictures!! Congrats!

wow great accomplishments and nice application of photography

Who are you and why aren't we friends? We travel in very similar ways.

Hit me up...

Lol sweet thanks mate.

Woa, great :P

Well any of these would do. Don't want to trouble you too much so anything would do, these are my favs.
http://www.ninjito.com/dump/2009-09-...mongolia-1.jpg
http://www.ninjito.com/dump/2009-09-...ongolia-11.jpg
http://www.ninjito.com/dump/2009-09-...mongolia-9.jpg
http://www.ninjito.com/dump/2009-09-...siberian-3.jpg
http://www.ninjito.com/dump/2009-09-...siberian-2.jpg

Size? Well i dont know what size they come into :P But the bigger the better. I never been to somewhere like that and really dig them. If you got bandwidth probs so dont want to post here that big, you could mail me or something i dont know.

Is that monument real or photoshoped then btw? Looks huge, but i never heard of it.

Awesome post. What an adventure and fantastic pics!

Those are some sick photos man

If you're looking for a wallpaper, let me know your preferred size. I'm hesitant to give out full-res photos, simply because I can't follow them once they're out - But happy to give you something desktop sized.

The monument is completely real.. Not many people know of it - it's in the middle of the mongolian desert

Yea, this is an "adult webmaster board" and all, but we need a "QUANTUM-X" day of bumped posts of yours. Such love for the art, an art, albeit not nudes, is savage.

Thanks, yo, for the posts. I don't know about anyone else, but they get me excited to "work", in the fun sense of what work could be; which should be enjoyment but I forget that sometimes.

[QUOTE=quantum-x;14757230]Simon,

I have only shot with the fuji GX617.

I shoot a lot of 35mm and the Fuji is too bulky for me. Especially if I want to go climbing into abandoned Submarine bases.

Do you shoot color negative film mostly?

The Xpan2 looks pretty sweet. Seems like they are getting scarce too. I am keeping my eye out for one.

I would love to shoot some girls outdoors with it.

You and I met at Matt's Models last year. I think it was Earl Miller who brought you by. LMK next time you are in LA.

Jay

Well as high as you're comfortable with putting i'm ok. I'm interested in more details. They seem so full of it, i can't see enough on those. Amazing sceenery.
Lol fuck. Who built it there. gota see what that thing is. It's unreal

Great Pics , Great Places Wery Well Done

Grats

wow cool photos, and great story, what an amazing adventure, you're my hero.

those pics are intense

Really really cool pictures

Great photos
How you got access to Moscow Underground? I wanna too

We didn't get into the Moscow Metro - not that we couldn't, but it wasn't worth the risk.

For locals, getting caught in the Metro is Serious Business. For foreigners, kiss your passport goodbye, because you can get thrown in the klink without trial.

AIDS prevalence in russian prisons is 75%.

I think skipping the tunnels was a good idea.

That said, they're gorgeous, and I'd love to :D