Masking over the cracks

I’m sat here on Monday 27th July 2020 writing this blog post, after the announcement at the weekend on 24.07.20, when the government made the wearing of PPE / face covering, mandatory in England. That is, when visiting closed spaces such as supermarkets, petrol stations, retail shops etc, MASKS ON.

Although England has been late adopters to this next stage of addressing the pandemic, I suppose its ‘better late than never’.

I have found this whole COVID-19 pandemic to be very revealing and insightful, in regards to understanding the human psyche.

Largely folk are conformist / compliant towards adhering to these changes to societal customs, But I find the right to demonstrate, against such stances as lunacy, for example this MP recently in the Houses of Parliament spouting complete nonsense, as part of his constitutional right to debate.

Normal folk see sense.

What I am finding is that now masks are more common place, folk are more attuned to having their photograph taken, they are conscious about how they look. This change in mindset is making it difficult to catalogue my ongoing COVID-19 project, whilst I look to compile source photos for COVID-19 Volume II Zine.

I am sure things will settle down as masks become the accepted norm, as they have in the Far East.

Whilst I finish of this blog, the radio has had several articles today regarding Boris Johnson’s next government campaign with the fight against obesity. If this is a success, no doubt he will start offering marriage guidance classes.

Until next time, Keep snapping.

A selection of the images within this article are available for sale on the Website or Etsy Store, if you would like to enquire about something else, please click the email icon at the foot of this page.

Sublime online

I'm writing this blog, some 24 hours after going live selling my #02 Zine - 12 mths with the GRii.

In three weeks time, its the first anniversary of setting up my website.

After pondering on setting up the print and zine store, I finally went live some 3 months ago. It's crazy that the catalyst to get this sorted was the boredom of the COVID-19 lockdown.

I have no idea why it's taken so long, but I can say that it's been a real labour of love.

Lockdown has afforded me the opportunity to ‘marinade' some images and projects, whilst jettison others. I have found this part of the process to be really cathartic.

The steep learning curve was getting to grips with MailChimp (for marketing), squarespace (commerce on the site) and finding suitable professional printing houses to print my work. Whilst the stumbling blocks were several, they were not insurmountable, it's also a process that you really need to go through to understand your prospective customers and business model.

I watch quite a few photography YouTube videos, whether these are POV street photowalks, discussion groups or influencers, which I have found highly informative during this journey.

I think it will be helpful to share this reference list in an upcoming blog post, so watch this space.

A recent post by Ted Forbes on the excellent The Art of Photography YouTube channel, pretty much sums it.

We get too hung up on buying gear, testing lens, tinkering with post production (Lightroom / Photoshop), we all need to be producing our work. Whether this is printing postcards or prints for family and friends, or prints or zines for our website stores, we must take our photos off the hard drive and print into a physical object, to hang it on a wall, put into a picture frame or a zine on a coffee table.

Whilst I would be a little happier if my print sales were a little more active, during this initial period, I'm really enjoying the activity surrounding the zine sales and after all, this is a marathon not a sprint. I also want to cultivate a steady and loyal following of clients, who want to enjoy this journey with me.

I have received some lovely feedback from customers on their purchases so far, so it's also been rewarding.

For those pondering this side of their photography, i urge you to take a leap of faith and go for it!, you (like myself) will be surprised and enjoy your journey!

Until next time. keep snapping.

Photobooks, the pond and telling a story

Here’s an update on my photobook’s series.

The intention is to buy a photobook per month. These are generally themed around streetphotography or portraiture, but I have recently added a documentary / photojournalism book to the library.

North of the Dixie by Mark Spelz was recommended as part of a #BlackLivesMatter post on social media, outlining recommended reading following the recent heartbreaking events that occurred in Minnesota, when George Floyd was killed by a Police Officer.

This is something that is front and centre as a discussion point with both of my kids.

I have founding it challenging to fully articulate the longstanding ingrained racism and hardship black folk have and do experience, so I thought this book (aswell as watching films and documentaries) would be a good resource for us all.

The book has some very powerful images and also referenced notes for further reading.

I had an interesting discussion with a client a couple of week ago, who mentioned the irony that this year has seen unprecedented change or realignment of the norm. All in the year 2020, or what is normally perceived as perfect clarity.

This discussion was before the terrible news from Minnesota.

What I found particularly harrowing was the content on Twitter under the hashtag #policebrutalitypandemic.

I don't think the width of the Atlantic Ocean has ever been so narrow, or met the definition of ‘the pond' better. We share so such commonality with our American cousins demonstrating the Black Lives Matters movement.

There is a #BLM march here in Brighton this coming weekend and its something that the kids have asked to go on, I know this is against a backdrop of COVID-19, but these are indeed changing times.

Black folk have had immense influence on our Culture, Media, Sports, Politics, etc. They have an uncanny knack of reinventing the perceived norm, for the betterment of everyone.

No doubt this same level of persistence and influence will bear fruit to deal with these hardships.

Lockdown

Decided to pop into town for an end of the day meander.

Seeing first hand the sheer quietness of COVID-19 and the impact of the lockdown on the city, is dystopian.

This period has also led to some interesting discussions with my kids.

What their generation have lost with the exclusion from their peers and friends in the school environment, they have made up with their ability to understand and adapt to these changing times.

What I did notice tonight was a little change.

Whether it was shop owners painting their shopfronts, signs on windows stating 'Opening soon' or owners dusting down counters, there is a sense of change in the air.

This is a once in a lifetime event, I'm so glad that I decided to document it.

You can see the COVID-19 project here.

As this is an ongoing project, I decided to make this into my first zine, Volume I - COVID-19, which will go live this weekend.

Exciting times

A selection of the images within this article are available for sale on the Website or Etsy Store, if you would like to enquire about something else, please click the email icon at the foot of this page.

COVID-19 - Lockdown

‘Stay Home, Protect the NHS & Save Lives’

I created a page for my coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic, that is sweeping the world.

Its hard not to make this a political statement, such as the header at the top.

Utter nonesense by the government making our front line NHS workers be exposed to this with any form of acceptable PPE. Not forgetting other essential key workers (transport, supermaket, teachers, this list goes on).

Have a look at the COVID-19 page here.

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Street Photography Rambles

Here's a selection of my Street Photos in Brighton, taken on my Ricoh GRii and Sony A7iii with 28mm F1.8. Music is royalty free / creatibve commons provided ...

It's 31st March 2020.

The kids and I (as well as the rest of the country) are under government stated self isolation.

With itchy shutter fingers, I thought I would have a look over the photo archive and build a YouTube video with a random selection of digital photos from Brighton

The vast majority of these images were captured on my Ricoh grii, with a few also from my recent purchase, the Sony A7iii.

Tinkerman

I originally shifted to film photography a couple of years ago, as I got bored, no, more frustrated by the constant tinkering with editing photos in lightroom.

(Read polishing a turd).

It was opportune timing. It slowed my thought processes down, eliminated chimping and was a great educational piece, as I developed and scanned all my images at home.

It gave me a new found respect for the masters of street photography, who use film, especially the likes of Garry Winogrand or Vivian Maier, who had thousands of undeveloped film rolls at the time of their deaths.

That said there were instances, were I was missing some photos, either due to the lack of burst mode, or the thunderclap of the Pentax 67 shutter, which stopped me getting that bit closer.

So I decided to step back into digital. A birthday gift in June, afforded me with a new Ricoh GRii camera, what an exceptional piece of tech, designed with street photography in mind.

The idea was to get a series of images, that I could edit (quickly), not tinker with, and could have a uniformed theme with colour.

I originally tried film emulation lightroom presets, but I found the edits………….

…..just too much.

Thankfully, there are many influencers out there, happy to share their knowledge. I stumbled across this excellent post by Sean Tucker on YouTube, explaining the Virtues of HSL (Hue, Saturation and Luminance) when editing colour. The major benefits of this method are:

1) it's a simplified workflow for uniformed output.

2) it's quick.

3) the methodology is the same in lightroom, a mobile photo app (polarr on Android or darkroom on iPhone) or other photo editing software.

This technique / workflow works really well, allowing very subtle edits, that keep colours natural and not over processed, boosting a natural warmth to the images.

This image of the shop owner in Brighton, taken on the GRii and processed in lightroom.

I have a basic HSL preset saved with saturation and Luminance tweaks. Following the advice on Sean's video, these suppress the blues (remove the coldness from the image) and boost the warm tones.

I then add a global contrast adjustment with a medium or strong tone curve.

Next I click and drag the histogram to tweak overall exposure on the image.

Finally, I either select 'as shot' white balance or boost the temperature to warm up the tones.

All these edits a completed in a couple of minutes.

This guide is for lightroom, but as you will see with the Sean Tucker YouTube video, these edits are just as easily completed on a smartphone.

Give it a try.

GAS isn't good, but photobooks are.....

This is my first blog on the new website.

The last 2 years, I have been predominantly shooting film in either 35mm or 120mm. I have loved the experience. It’s been a double benefit, for slowing me down and also chimping.

Of late I thought I would purchase a couple of photobooks, to develop my craft. Having read plenty of reviews, I decided on ‘The Suffering of Light’ by Alex Webb.

This is essential reading for anyone interested in street photography and getting an understanding of framing.

Also, Webb discusses his reasoning for prominently specialising in the use of colour, rather than black and white for his imagery.

As much as you will consume the content of this book quickly, you will most certainly revisit the pages for inspiration, time and time again, as the content covers 30 years of Alex Webb’s career.

Essential reading and a learning for me that photobooks are better than GAS (Gear Acquisition Syndrome).