Welcome to the Website of Alan Burnett: writer, blogger, collector of old photographs, and devotee of all things pointless and inconsequential.
Edwardian AI
This early twentieth century picture postcard image of the approach to Halifax Railway Station has the look of something that has been created by a cut-price AI image colourising programme. It wasn’t; it was created by the Edwardian equivalent, a cut-price studio assistant with instructions to make the hills green, the sky blue, and the horses look happy. It wasn’t true, of course, but anyone who has been within a hundred miles of Halifax will instantly recognise the scene.
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Real People, Real Lives
Whilst photographs may start out life as things that are intensely personal – this is Aunty Vera, this is our holiday – after a century or more pressed in an album and…
Just Messing
Why do we take photographs? Despite a lifetime of taking them, I am no closer to finding an answer. It’s partly about wanting to capture a moment or maybe share a visual…
Three For The Price Of One
I wanted something cheery for Friday the 13th – there is enough bad luck and misery going on around us at the moment without me adding to it. We also have a…
Nostalgia Noir
I can vaguely remember taking this photograph of Broad Street in Halifax from what must have been the top of the Bowling Alley in the late 1960s. It was back…
Mondrian’s Market
Black and white, light and dark: Bradford’s new Darley Street Market seemed to present photo opportunities with all the enthusiasm of an overstocked trader’s stall. There were loads of straight…
Do Seagulls Screech In Cleethorpes?
Whenever I look back at the photos I took in Cleethorpes in the 1980s, I am reminded of the trauma caused by the gradual loss of my hearing during that…
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