William Leece looks at the latest Daily Post Flickr pictures

THE Grand National meeting at Aintree – and Ladies’ Day in particular – is a photographer’s dream.

Forget, just for a moment, the drama playing out on the track. It’s the people who make Aintree, from the racegoers to the jockeys, and from the animal cruelty protesters to the police and stewards.

Particularly the racegoers. It’s a time when being seen to be seen is part of the fun, and no more so than on Ladies’ Day when the women put on their best frocks and finery. So, too, do some of the men, but that’s another story.

Two samples from the many submitted by the Flickr group will have to suffice.

The first depicts a young lady spotted by Graham Peers, who posts as Photonutter to the Flickr group.

Maybe in an ideal world the background would have been a little less cluttered.

But given a subject as striking as this, who is really concerned about what is happening in the distance?

Mobilevirgin’s group of spectators must surely have a story to tell, but exactly what story?

The lady in red can hardly suppress a smirk, and her counterpart in blue is also looking mightily pleased with herself.

But what of the gentleman in the middle of the picture?

Has his jaw dropped in amazement at the size of his other half’s winnings, or is he just desperate for a beer while the womenfolk go on their way?

We’ll never know, which is half of the attraction of a picture like this.

A couple of weeks ago, we featured Hale lighthouse looking barely believable under a blue sky at high tide.

This week, the skies are stormy, yet there is still an exotic quality about the lonely building in Zonepix’s image which seems far from the urban sprawl of Liverpool.

The same air of mystery carries over in to Richard Deane’s picture of Cressington station at night.

By day, it is a pleasant piece of Victoriana in one of south Liverpool’s most agreeable suburbs, but by night it is something altogether creepier.

Swap the car for a hansom cab and it becomes North London in the days when Hampstead Heath was semi-rural.

Small wonder that Granada TV’s 1980s Sherlock Holmes series was filmed right here.

Meanwhile, Jacob Lillington’s close-up of part of the former Quiggins emporium in Liverpool, now incorporated into Liverpool One, is an excellent example of an unfamiliar take on a familiar city landmark.