NKW1709

I wanted to start a new project, one that would tell a story and have elements in it that would speak about my journey so far.  I will limit what say for now because the image, when it is done will have the narrative as well.  Depending upon how I feel at the time I may or may not reveal all. I have taken inspiration from my brother regarding a composite image and, as I have no natural art skills in the sense of drawing or painting by hand, I am making my image a composition of a number of photographs and styles to get my message across. As part of this I wanted to capture my service career and thus I chose to represent that by using what are normally wooden boards for battle honours. I have replaced the battles with names of ships and places that I have served.  Arguably, they were battle honours in their own right and some harder won than others.  There are stories behind each name and maybe one day they too will come out. This first one charts my early career when...

 I am going through a phase of turning everyday naval phrases and sayings into simple designs that can be applied to products, both clothing and other decorative and practical items. In this case I take my inspiration from my earlier career.  When approaching a known high risk area we like to be prepared and ready to face the threats, so we adopt a manning state where everyone is at their action station, this is called State 1 and we close and prepare the ship itself to receive and resist damage and attack, this is called Condition Zulu.   For defence against nuclear, biological and chemical attack, we further make the ship into an overpressure citadel by going to Alpha.  The result is that we force any bad things in the air out using air pressure. So we have a State 1 Condition Zulu Alpha.  It means we are ready for pretty much anything.  The inside of the ship is considered safe and, to go on deck you must be completely kitted out in protective cloth...