One way

It's nice when things come together in a totally unexpected way.

As I was walking back from a day in the park (sunny!) I saw a woman in a wedding dress on Portobello Road. An unusual situation I think, it had this whole "runaway bride" feeling about it. There were a lot of people walking in the opposite direction, getting in the way of my shot. I was also in line with a bunch of her friends walking behind her in the same direction so I just decided to shoot "from the hip" rather than bring the camera up to my eye. The lens was locked at 18mm and I just clicked when there was a break in foot traffic and moved on. Further down the road people were stopping in the street, taking out their cameraphones and just snapping away, which is probably less intimidating and in-your-face than a DSLR with a fat lens on it.

When I looked at the pic afterwards I think I got lucky. The people in frame were walking to the left, except the bride (and friend), nobody was in front of me, the "One way" arrow was in the centre of the frame pointing in the direction of the bride's path and the bride turned her head to look back at her friends. I don't know if there's any "theories" or "rules" with black & white photography but I did it with this because the buildings and bunting (all the colours in general, actually) were really distracting. As a black & white shot you're drawn more to the white of her dress.

100% unplanned and unframed but I think the different individual elements lined up nicely.

One crown, five rings, one eyeball

The olympic opening ceremony begins tonight, so here are a few pictures in keeping with the olympic theme. I'll throw in a few jubilee related pics too as that happened earlier this year but this blog didn't exist then, as well a general bunch of GB and flag-type pics for good measure.

 painted by the children of a nursery school

 Photographing the photographer

 Cute!

Note: if you hang the flag of the Philippines vertically, the blue portion should be on the left and the red on the right. Hanging it red-to-blue turns it into a war flag!

A pretty good summary of London's summer: The Olympics, the Shard, Tower Bridge. Missing: the rain! That happened moments after this was taken.

And finally, London 2012's mascot Wenlock, in Union Flag livery.

Beautiful Ugly

A little break from street-style and candid pics, I think. I've got loads of nature photos and I should upload some of those too.

(35mm f/6.3 1/160 ISO-100)

Dandelions, Beautiful and ugly.

Unlike the usual dandelion seed heads, this one was huge, a little bigger than a tennis ball. I was able to capture a lot of intricate detail in the full picture, despite the fairly slow shutter speed and hand-held camera (and, if I remember correctly there was a slight breeze). And yes, I knocked the seeds right off after taking this.

Up in the air

Moments like this are one reason I like having my camera with me.

(46mm f/5 1/4000 ISO-400)

I noticed a small group of people in the park, holding balloons, having their picture taken. I didn't really pay much attention, then they released the balloons. And they all looked up, some with their cameraphones because of "VIDEO EVERYTHING OTHERWISE IT NEVER HAPPENED!".

After the shot I realised some of the balloons were latex gloves. Medical students? Health & Safety officials? Simple balloon shortage?

"If, for example a guy was walking down the street with a parrot on his shoulder..."

(60mm f5.3 1/500 ISO-100)

I know, my last entry totally set me up for this post.

I was walking up some subway steps when I saw a guy walking in the opposite direction with a couple of blue things on his shoulders. I couldn't make out what they were until he was close enough, then out came the camera and snap!

The funniest thing was that when I held the camera up to my eye both of the macaws suddenly turned their heads and looked into the lens, as if they were posing for me. Even the one on the man's right shoulder looked forward so as not to be obscured by his head. The man on the other hand just looked straight ahead and carried on walking LIKE A BOSS, while everybody around him looked on in amazement. And so they should.

If I could change anything, a full body shot of him walking would have put him in a better context, but he was already close to me and walking quite fast so I ended up half-bodying him (plus my camera was in my bag, argh!). I also would have liked some bystander reactions, but nobody was in frame when I took the photo (just my luck, really).

Keep on rockin', Parrot Man!

Street signs

I read something in a photography book about "many" and "one" with regards to composition. I don't remember the exact points made, I'll need to read that book again.

55mm f/5.6 1/50 ISO-100

This is an attempt at "many", slightly cropped at the top edges to give the impression that the signs go on much further than the edges of the frame.

18mm (27@35mm) f/4.5 1/80 ISO-100

The same moment taken at a wide angle and the situation is different, now it's a street photo showing some people looking at signs (I like how the Titanic sign is upside-down... intentional?). I like that they are looking up, making the wall feel enormous. And is the guy pointing to the Jack Daniels sign?

Street photography is something which has sparked my interest recently, but as I'm not the most confident person in the world I sometimes feel a little pervy taking photos of random people on the street in normal situations. If, for example a guy was walking down the street with a parrot on his shoulder, then out comes the camera and I capture the (unusual) moment, but if a group of people are standing in such a way that is completely ordinary, but photographically quite interesting then I'm a little bit hesitant. The last thing I'd want is to get punched in the face for a misunderstanding. I'll try more, picking my moments obviously, but I probably should also learn how to duck and weave just in case.

(D5100, 18-55 kit lens)

Symmetry

Finding patterns is easy. Making those patterns interesting is a lot harder

 

So when I took this picture I decided to take it out of context and focus on the lines rather than all the other stuff that would make it look boring (like the people and signposts littered around it), that way it's much more abstract than it actually is.

Taken way-back-when with an old Canon compact. £1,000 to whoever correctly guesses what and where this is.*

*This offer does not exist.

Heron

Nature is a subject that always seems to just be there, even in a big city. Whether it's a bunch of leaves on a bush, a flower in a plant pot or a bug on a wall, there's always something tucked away behind all that concrete, steel and glass.

@Hyde Park, London (23mm f/3.6, 1/320, ISO 200)*

Just one of many nature-type shots I have. I really like the heron's long, slender shape, and that stare... intense!

If there's one thing I could change it would be the reflections in the top of the frame as they are a little distracting. I suppose I could have just 'shopped them out but I usually prefer keeping the image true to how it was taken. the only major edits I normally like to do are adjusting colour levels and cropping.

*Programmable auto mode (or full auto, I forget) on a DMC-FZ45. Info added for the geeks :)

35mm focal equivalent = 126

Oh, hello there

So, this will be my attempt at creating a photography blog. I'm what you would call a noob when it comes to the world of photography, and I'm slowly picking up hints and tips along the way (only to forget them at a later date, hah!).

So why photography? Well, I like to draw, paint, sketch etc., but the mathematical/realistic/rational side of my brain always wants me to create true-to-life images. That's not to say that I can't draw non-realistic stuff, but I often end up drawing realistically. Kind of weird I think, especially when I studied René Magritte during my high school days.

Enter the camera. It enables me to create those "true-to-life" images. It makes it easier for me to create the realism that I often want in my drawings. That's not to say that photography is easy for me, far from it! (see "noob", 1st paragraph). It's a really complex, intricate, [another big adjective] subject with plenty of guidelines but no real fixed rules as to what a constitutes a good photo. (Hmm, kind of like art...)

I'm a snapshot person, first and foremost. I've never taken a photography course and don't really even know of any photographers (silly noob!) but, I'm learning as I go along, and it's very interesting.

I have thousands (yes, thousands) of pictures spread out on my computer and various hard drives taken over about 5-6 years (since my first point & shoot digital compact), but I don't think I've ever uploaded any of them (bar Facebook), or taken many of them with an artistic eye/non-snapshot mindset, so this blog will hopefully start to host a choice selection of those, as well as more recent photos (or snapshots :P) that I take. We'll see how this blog evolves.

'til the next post...


no photos yet, those thousands will need a good once-over ;)