All posts by Mike Turner

Photos of St Joseph’s Seminary Wigan

History

St joseph’s Seminary is located Walthew Park in Upholland, Wigan and is a former Roman Catholic Seminary which started to be built in 1880 and opened in 1883. The building has recently been unconsecrated.

The Seminary flourished until the early 1960s, but a sharp drop in enrollment meant that the northern bishops were forced to consolidate the activities of St Joseph’s in Upholland and Ushaw, with all junior seminarians in the north attending  St Josephs and all senior seminarians attending Ushaw.

As enrollment continued to decline it became a boarding school for boys considering a vacation.

In 1986 the total number of students was down to 82, of whom only 54 were Church students, and it was no longer viable to educate them on the premises. From 1987 the remaining students attended St. John Rigby College in nearby Orrell for their schooling, an arrangement that continued until the very last of these students left Upholland in 1992.

taken from Wikipedia

Our Day out at St. Joseph’s

We’d heard about St Joseph’s Seminary through an urban photography website and wanted to check it out while it was still there, so we went down with a Google map in hand.

We realised that getting in through the front entrance was a no go with security and CCTV at the gate. We drove on along the road until we found a public footpath, at which point we parked up and followed the path, which luckily brought us to the back of the Seminary. There were no walls to climb, we just walked into the grounds.

We don’t go to these kind of places intending to cause any damage, but merely take photographs.

Having walked around for a couple of hours we were approached by a security guard who was very helpful in providing some information about the building before leaving us to continue walk around the grounds.

The shear size of the place is very impressive, but just a shame it is being allowed to deteriorate so much. We were told that the building was intended to be used for luxury apartments but that the owners had run out of funding. Lets hope it gets done sooner rather than later before it becomes to late to save it.

Photos: The Limes Orchard Lane in Leigh

GOING…GOING…ALMOST GONE!

The general accepted facts about  the history of The Limes are it was built about 1873 for John Heyes of JJ Heyes the cotton mill magnates who built Heyes mill where Asda now stands (corner of Atherleigh bypass and Kirkhall Lane). He lived there with his family and when his surviving daughter Anne died she bequeathed the house to Leigh infirmary. It was split into flats and used for residence of the single doctors. It has now been derelict since at least May 2010 as there are pics posted on local sites that show it boarded up but in a much better state than we saw it today.

There seems to be no recent mention of it until now and it remains a mystery as to why it was left to rot for so long without a decisive move to ensure its preservation. Interestingly the convent next door or’Hollybank’ to give it its proper name was built for James the other brother at about the same time and in 2009 was on the English heritage as grade 2 listed

The house is scheduled to be demolished in the near future and will be another sad loss to Leigh’s heritage.  Wigan Council should bow there heads in shame allowing so many great buildings go to ruin within it’s boundaries.

 

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16 Photos Taken a second before Disaster

We all love to see photos that make us giggle. Check out these 16 photos taken just before impending misfortune.  Good to see that whoever took the photos didn’t react to what was unfolding in front of them but preferred to capture it for prosperity. …enjoy

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Perspective in Photography can be fun

Perspective can really play tricks with your mind check out this great compilation of photographs that will make you look twice…enjoy

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Perspective is defined as:

“The art of representing three-dimensional objects on a two-dimensional surface so as to give the right impression of their height, width, depth, and position in relation to each other.”

With regards to perspective in photography, we are talking about the spatial relationship objects have to one another from the perspective of the camera lens.

Things that are further away seem small compared to objects closer to the camera. Parallel lines appear to get closer together the further away they are. Think of tall buildings appearing to go almost to a point as you look up at them or a straight road reaching out into the distance and getting narrower the further it stretches away from us.

Wide angle lenses can greatly exaggerate perspective, distorting the image captured particularly so with lenses wider than 16mm and particularly towards the edges of the frame. Fish-eye lenses create surreal images from the most mundane of scenes. Wider angle lenses make objects appear further way from one another. Telephoto lens compress objects captured making them appear closer together from front to back.

Sometimes this can cause problems for photographers capturing photos of buildings, to combat this tilt and shift lenses can be used which can offset the effects of perspective as they are angled upwards.

The video above perfectly demonstrates how positioning people can provide funny consequences even with mid range lenses which in themselves aren’t having any effect on the captured image. It is the subjects and their relationship to one another and the camera that provide the humorous illusions.

Pictures Taken At The Perfect Moment – Hilarious!

Getting great natural photographs is all about timing, getting the shot at the perfect moment. Sometimes with hilarious results, check this compilation out some really funny ones here

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