Cyber, developer develops the image, stop-bath stops development dead, and fixer fixes it for eternity.

You need all three, for both film and prints. Though if you had to omit one, you might get away with the stop-bath, if you move quickly.

G

Easily the best looking of the large yachts is Eos, which is longer overall than the Maltese Falcon. I came across her in Porsmouth a few years ago, and sailed right up alongside to check that she really was bigger than my boat. I can confirm that she was. Her deck was higher than my mast.

In fact, she is 50% longer than HMS Victory.

G

You'll take a grinder to your lens? Yikes.

Just unscrew the screws holding the back plate to the lens, and you will be able to remove the pin.

Much nicer than filling your lens with iron filings.

G
(Owner of a Ricoh-fit VS1 70-210, now sans-pin)

Haven't you noticed that we are in the process of converging on one, rather bastardised, language?

And all because Britain was the leading sea-faring nation 400 years ago.

Were it not for Sam Pepys, who modernised our navy after your country attacked Chatham in 1667, things might be very different today. Probably, we would all be speaking Americanised French.

We'd have lost an empire, but retained our language.

G

Ten years? Twenty I fear. These years are flying by.

Fogherder, your score has been reduced to 60%, on the grounds that you can't spell "hyphenated". But I personally prefer miss-spell, so I'm with you on that.

Frankly, English does not need development, other than finding a word for a gender-neutral third person pronoun. I tend to use "their" when neither he nor she are appropriate, but it's not correct.

"Evolution" is invariably the result of mistakes made by the semi-literate.

G

Stefan, if you would speak and spell English correctly, you should eschew any advice emanating from across the pond.

Americans have a woeful habit of including any and all spellings, including misspellings, of a word in what they are pleased to call their "dictionaries".

The reason they do so is not ignorance, as you would be forgiven for suspecting. On the contrary, it is a cynical marketing ploy.

They know that any form of controversy is news-worthy. For that reason they will also include words that they invent, purely in order to have their wretched publications mentioned in the media.

Buy a second-hand copy of the original Oxford Dictionary. Edited by a Scot, of course, it is the only definitive guide to English spelling, uncontaminated by modern abuse and misuse.

G

Lens, lens, lens!

I thought one thing kids today learnt was how to spell four-letter words.

But it seems I was wrong.

G

Those who frame the rules can never envisage every possible situation that might arise. The British legal system is in many ways superior to most others because it allows judges to interpret and sometimes even extend the law.

This is what is happening here. His Honour, Justice Riley, is using his judgement to ensure that a little harmless quirkiness is not steamrolled by the inflexible juggernaut of the rule-book.

G

Pentax Expert was hilarious at first, but the joke has worn thin.

Re-invention is required, methinks. Become an ardent feminist, old chap. Lots of scope there, and in a humour-free zone you won't be unmasked for years.

G

It's an old lens now. And it wasn't so cheap at the time.

G