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Who likes fireworks?


Mel B

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World championship Fireworks on at Stanford Hall near us just at the end of the A14 on the first weekend in August.

 

Our 3rd year this year, we go on a rally on the campsite linked to the Hall, excellent time and some amazing displays.

 

Pics are excellent by the way.

 

Mandy

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On the first night, 13th July, we didn't have a clue what was going on. There we were about 1.2 km away from the centre of Sarreguemines, parked up with another motorhome, when, at around 9.30/10.00 pm a lot of people in cars started arriving and parking up near us, all along the roads and anywhere else they could get a car! Out came, couples old and young, Mum, Dad and kids, etc and off the toddled to the centre ... loads of them ... like locusts. We kept hearing an odd firework go off so dediced to see what was happening and donned our waterproof jackets and went for a look-see.

 

In the centre, near the river, was a massive crowd and by the time we got there fireworks were going off - I managed to get near to the front and stand on a bench to see the display ... then it started to rain for about 5 minutes, fairly heavily, then it stopped - great stuff! After about 2 minutes the heavens totally opened and a massive thunder storm ensued, thunder and lightening ... trying to compete with the fireworks!

 

They obviously finished off the display much quicker than planned which was a shame but most peple were heading for the hills by now ... well the shop doorways at least, to try to get out of the deluge! We got absolutely soaked, our trousers and shoes were dripping although our jackets did keep our top halves dry. We waited a while to see if it was going to stop but it wasn't so we trudged along back to the camper - we must've looked like to drowned rats! Our shoes to 3 days to dry out!!!

 

On 14th we were at Pont du Mousson, parked behind the official 'aire' with a load of other motorhomes. There was a massive thunder storm and downpoor around teatime, then it cleared beautifully to a nice calm evening, perfect for the firework display. We only had to walk about 100 yards to the edge of the river to watch the display which was brilliant, afterwards we went into the village centre across the river and there were a few stalls and a stage with a band doing a "Bee Gees" tribute ... I do hope they don't do it for a living!!!!

 

Thanks for the comments about the photos, they've gone a bit 'blurry' due to me having to resize them but don't look too bad - my favourite is the last one too! :-D

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I was in Paris for 14th July 1961 (I was a fair bit younger then) and you could buy quite openly fireworks of a truly stupendous explosive power. They also sold little 'bangers' that looked like the salt packets in crisps, they had no fuse, they were simply thrown or dropped and exploded on contact.

 

We spent quite a noisy night (near the Gard du Nord) and next morning I remarked how much more lively were the French celebrations of their special day than ours were, of say Guy Fawkes night. The hotel manager then told me that the spectacular bangs were due to the OAS (Algerian terrorists) letting off bombs across Paris. :-S

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Fantastic photos. I have just one question, that is "what camera do you have, is it a DSLR, what settings did you use and what lens did you use"? Sorry but being rather interested in photography these little things matter...........

Also read one of the other replies, sounds like a jaunt down to the firework world championships is in order.

Keep on clicking away and if you get results like this all the time maybe

it's time to send some into a photographic magazine for publishing.

Regards

Phil

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Hi Phil, thanks for your compliments.

 

I use a ' bridge' camera, much better than a common point and shoot but without the expense of a full DSLR (ie lens isn't removable), it's a Fuji Finepix S8000fd camera, 18x optical zoom, 8 megapixel, more details here:

 

http://ngadgeti.blogspot.com/2007/12/fuji-finepix-s800fd-review-smart-simple.html

 

Before this I had 3x optical zoom Fuji camera, then a 10x zoom Minolta. When I bought the S8000 I wanted something with a good zoom but not too big and I didn't want to have to mess about with changing lenses and carting too much kit around. The S8000 fitted the bill and was a good price, it has all the 'facilities' on it I need at the moment, the only real compromise as a camera is that it doesn't have an 'instant' shutter as a DSLR does, in that there is a slight delay, but for the type of shots I tend to do - landscape and some action, but nothing with extremely fast movement such as racing etc - it suits me fine. The only other thing is that when using it to take movies, once you've started recording you can't zoom in or out, it is set unless you stop, zoom to where you want, and then start recording again, but as I didn't buy it for this facility, being able to record movies is a bonus anyway.

 

As a general rule I leave it on auto but used the correct 'scene mode' on it for the conditions when taking the fireworks, there are quite a few variants depending on what you are taking pictures of and when/what the conditions are. You can manually set your own aperture or shutter if you want but as I'm usually out with hubby and the dogs I don't have time to pratt around.

 

I might spoil myself one of these days to a full DSLR set-up but at the moment I can't really warrant it as I wouldn't get the time to make full use of it ... hopefully I will soon though so it might be my 'early retirement' treat! Hubby keeps hankering after a digital camcorder so that could be his 'treat'!:D

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Great pix Mel

 

We must have passed each other at some point, we were on the train home at lunchtime Monday 12th, looks like we missed all the fun but we had to get back for a drama group meeting to go through numbers for this years show. No show = no money for charity

 

Geof

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Hi,

 

Having watched my mate pull a lump of broken bottle out of his eye, I don't like fireworks. This was circa 1957, so it got him out of National Service.

 

More recently, there was a bang in the road outside my front window. Two teenage girls in the road.

 

"You can stop that!*

 

"What?"

 

"You are not that stupid!"

 

"It was only a firework".

 

" I bet your father doesn't know".

 

"He bought them for us".

 

"I bet the police don't know".

 

" My dad is a policeman".

 

"Whats his name?"

 

"Sergeant T*****"

 

Silly moo!

 

602 (wearing MOG hat).

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Hi,

 

Having watched my mate pull a lump of broken bottle out of his eye, I don't like fireworks. This was circa 1957, so it got him out of National Service.

 

More recently, there was a bang in the road outside my front window. Two teenage girls in the road.

 

"You can stop that!*

 

"What?"

 

"You are not that stupid!"

 

"It was only a firework".

 

" I bet your father doesn't know".

 

"He bought them for us".

 

"I bet the police don't know".

 

" My dad is a policeman".

 

"Whats his name?"

 

"Sergeant T*****"

 

Silly moo!

 

602 (wearing MOG hat).

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I love to see photos of fireworks in the sky, but I'm afraid I do not like fireworks that are not in a proper organised display. I think and this is only my personal opinion, that fireworks should be banned to the general public. I have seen a guy with his hands blown off after having lit one in the back of a car.

 

s I have dogs, I wish that they were only used on Nov 5th so people could look after animals, but no, people think its great to set them off at all times of the night and at any time of the year to suit them. If you can't honk your horn after lights on, then apart from Nov 5th in a public display it should also be banned. I know its not going to stop the people who are inconsiderate and only think of themselves.

 

I'll get off my soap box now!

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Don't whatever you do go to France when there's a celebration on then - you'll go nuts and be a nervous wreck! Whilst we were there they were letting of fireworks all over the place, including the kids who were given them by their parents!!!

 

At the display on 14th July, while we were parked behind the official aire at Pont Du Mousson, and all the vans in the aire itself that had been nearer the river were moved across and slotted in between the rest of the vans for safety to get them out of harms way ... problem was that some of the occupants of the French vans were then outside them on the roadway between the pitches letting of fireworks ... within feet of the motorhomes! By heck was I glad I wasn't in the aire itself, I think there were a few owners nicely developing nervous tics as the amateurs let the fireworks off!!!

 

When we later, after the official display, went into the village centre, there were people just lighting bangers and fireworks and throwing them on the ground and walking away, without a care ... if soneone had walked next to them as they went off I hate to think what could have happened.

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Hi,

 

Prior to the incident with my mate's eye, I was in the Air Cadets (ATC). The CO suggested we all bring in our fireworks and have a big display.

 

With one accord, we split into two teams, formed up each side of the parade ground. and had a minor war. Throwing bangers is easy. Launching rockets horizontally is a little more difficult. It lasted probably about 20 minutes. Exhilarating!!!!! Nobody got hurt, could that be because we were all on the same wavelength?

 

About that time you could buy bangers with a fizzing fuse. The Dambusters was released at local cinemas. Somebody in the gang found that the fizzy fuse would burn under water. Hmmmm! Tie banger to a spanner. Light blue touch paper, wait till fizzy fuse got going, drop into bucket of water. Yep, Barnes Wallace was right. Bucket of water jumps about 2ft into air, water everywhere. But a problem - after about half a dozen "tests" the rivets holding a metal bucket would let go. Mum wasn't impressed. It was wonderful being a kid in the 1950s. My mate lost his eye the following year.

 

Similarly with guns. Another mate was pooping of with a shotgun in his garden (Tooting, South London). Had a tussle with his brother, shot himself in the head. Sort of concentrates the mind. turns you into a MOG.

 

602

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