Showing posts with label Michael Rogge. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Michael Rogge. Show all posts

Tuesday, April 06, 2010

Skiving from work to share two old Oban videos (1926 and 1955) with you



From BFIfilms

Oban is still very much a working harbour. Among other things (women processing herring, for example), the clip features a Clyde puffer. When the clip was made, my dad wasn't even born yet. Last May he and I enjoyed a tour of the Reaper, a herring boat that would have come into Oban, laden with fish, in the old days. On another occasion I was able to explore a restored specimen of the old west-coast workhorse called the Clyde puffer.

"The extract comes from Claude Friese-Greene's 'The Open Road' - originally filmed in 1925/6 and now re-edited and digitally restored by the BFI National Archive. Britain seen in colour for the first time was heralded as a great technical advance for the cinema audience - now we can view a much improved image, but one which still stays true to the principles of the colour process."

And while I'm at it, here's another one showing Oban in 1955. I was three that summer, had a one-year-old brother, and we lived nowhere near Oban. Sadly, I cannot embed the clip here, so please click on the link.