Chris Brunnen

I have been a professional photographer for over 35 years, I started trading as CJB Photography in 1986 and took my first aerial photography flight the following year. My interest in photography was triggered by Neil, my friend and neighbour of the 60’s and 70’s who showed me some black and white prints he had made at school that day. I was instantly hooked, I wanted to know how they were made, what was the process, could I do it? I wanted a camera there and then but being just 12 years old my parents weren’t about to buy me a new one so gave me an old Box Brownie to ‘play’ with. Neil’s mum worked in a chemist and knew how to load the camera so we bought a film and started shooting. We would set up scenes in the garden and photograph them, we even re-created the moon landing with my Action Man and Neil would take the films to school to process them. A few years later photography became an option for me in art lessons at my school, The Technical High School, so I started using the their 35mm cameras and lenses. I learned to develop and print them myself and went on to take photography ‘O’ & ‘A’ Level exams that introduced me to the practical, theory and history aspects of the subject. I also studied Art, Technical Drawing, Physics and Chemistry, all essential subjects in this field of work. This is where I met Jim Bramble, he was my Technical Drawing teacher. I remember seeing films hanging to dry in a darkroom he had at the back of the classroom but we weren’t allowed in there so I had no idea what he was shooting at the time. 30 years later I came across a website with dozens of old aerial photos of the area. It turns out they were taken by Jim who also had a passion for photography and flying and this is what he must have been processing in his darkroom. Looking through this archive I soon realised that I had taken shots of virtually all the same places and some of them were actually very similar shots indeed. The idea of putting something together to compare these old and new shots had been brewing for some time when by chance I came across somebody who also knew Jim. I got in touch and explained my idea and he was more than happy for me to use his shots so sent me a CD of some of his images that had been scanned. Over the years Jim has moved house and ‘downsized’ and sadly all of his original negatives and slides have been lost. Only after many years can we appreciate the true value of old photographs, it’s a pity more weren’t scanned but I know the problem, I have thousands of negatives sat in boxes but finding time to scan them all is impossible. However, I have dug out a few to make this book and having learned this, I know I need to look after the rest.