Tag: street photography

35mm · Film photography · Photography

Watching the Thames at low tide

fishyfisharcadeLeave a comment

This was a photograph taken very quickly during my walk along the South Bank of the River Thames in London recently. The smart suit, bald head, and posture of this chap made for a nice composition. It was the last shot on the roll and I wasn’t sure it would come out (as a result of this, I loaded another roll and took a second shot of the same guy a minute or two later, albeit from a different position – I’ve not scanned that roll yet, so maybe I’ll share that picture in a future post). Luckily it turned out quite nicely.

FILM - Low water

Olympus OM-1, Zuiko 28mm f/3.5 & Fujifilm Acros (pushed to 400asa).

Taken on 23 October 2019

35mm · Film photography · Photography

St. Paul’s Cathedral from Millennium Bridge

fishyfisharcade2 Comments

Three shots of the same subject today, all of St. Paul’s Cathedral in London taken from across the river on the South Bank from the end of Millennium Bridge. Two of the photos were taken using the Olympus Zuiko AUTO-Zoom 75-150mm f/4 lens, my second time using it since I bought it back in the late summer (I used it for a few shots on my trip to Hull a few days prior to this). So far I’m quite happy with it’s performance. Like most Zuiko lenses, it’s pretty compact, but it has a decent reach and is able to compress distances nicely.

The first shot was taken with the Zuiko 28mm f/3.5.

This is one of those slightly cliched and overdone photo locations – albeit for obvious reasons – but I’ve never shot it before and as it’s not a place I get to visit often I though I might as well take the opportunity while I had the chance.

FILM - St. Paul's (wide)

FILM - St. Paul's (mid)

FILM - Millennium Bridge

Olympus OM-1, Zuiko 28mm f/3.5 & Zuiko AUTO-Zoom 75-150mm f/4 & Fujifilm Acros (pushed to 400asa).

Taken on 23 October 2019

35mm · Film photography · Photography

Turn up the contrast

fishyfisharcadeLeave a comment

I shot a roll of Fuji Across a couple of weeks ago and, expecting the weather to be a bit on the gloomy side, pushed it to 400asa. As it turned out, the sun decided to come out for at least some of the shots. This resulted in super-hight-contrast images being the outcome. Across is pretty contrasty anyway, but pushing it amplifies this noticeably, such as in today’s photograph of a street corner convenience store in Southwark in London.

The sunlit areas, particularly those with lighter tones stand out vividly, while the shadows have been reduced to deep blacks – the lady on the left of this shot seemingly emerging from a pool of liquid darkness.

I do like a contrasty image, but care needs to be taken when shooting in such conditions of light and shade that it doesn’t become too much. I’m pretty happy with this one – there is still detail in the highlights, and while the shadows are deep, they work nicely withe the brighter details popping out of them.

FILM - Contrast

Olympus OM-1, F.Zuiko 50mm f/1.8 & Fujifilm Acros (pushed to 400asa).

Taken on 22 October 2019

35mm · Film photography · Photography

It’s a bit blurry and I don’t care

fishyfisharcadeLeave a comment

I generally try to ensure that my photos are in focus. It’s kinda important in most cases (for the sort of pictures I make, at least). Sometimes however, despite my best intentions, they are not in focus – perhaps due to missing focus, or sometimes due to camera shake adding some unintended blur.

Sometimes it doesn’t really matter. Sometimes you still like the photograph despite it’s flaws. Sometimes they might even enhance it.

Today’s photo is one such example. It was taken under the railway bridge that passes over Blackfriars Road just north of Soutwark Underground station, carrying the line heading east/west in and out of Waterloo. The light beneath the bridge was quite dim and I had to lower my shutter speed somewhat. I also needed to be quick to try and catch the image while people were placed in a pleasing way and also when no road traffic (of which there was much) was passing through the scene. These factors likely combined to cause a small but noticeable amount of camera shake in the the resulting picture.

Perhaps the photo would have been better had it been perfectly sharp, but the slight fuzziness is pleasing in some way. It gives the picture a slight vintage feel somehow that I’m quite pleased with. I don’t tend to publish photos that I believe are mistakes unless they rise above their shorcomings, and I think that this is one of them (for me, at least).

FILM - Blackfriars Station

Olympus OM-1, F.Zuiko 50mm f/1.8 & Fujifilm Acros (pushed to 400asa).

Taken on 23 October 2019

35mm · Film photography · Photography

Road-crossing reflections

fishyfisharcadeLeave a comment

People waiting to cross cast their reflections on the wet road surface.

It’s one of those photos where I noticed after scanning the negative that someone appears to have spotted me when I took the photograph (three people in this case!). It’s a little difficult to tell for certain, and some of them might just have been glancing in my direction, but I always get an “I’ve been spotted!” feeling when I notice such things.

I was hardly being covert to be fair – stood on the oposite side of the road with a camera to my eye. 🙂

FILM - Crossing the road in the rain

Olympus OM-1, F.Zuiko 50mm f/1.8 & Ilford HP5+ (pushed to 800asa).

Taken on 26 October 2019

35mm · Film photography · Photography

The caravan of gin

fishyfisharcadeLeave a comment

This caravan was parked next to the Minerva pub on the bank of the Humber Estuary at Hull and the words written upon it made me smile. For those not from the UK (or anywhere else that has a fanbase for The Housemartins), the words are a play on the lyrics of the song Caravan of Love. The Housemartins originated in Hull, so it seems particularly fitting somehow (although I’ve no idea if the band were gin drinkers or not).

FILM - Caravan of gin

Olympus OM-1, Zuiko 28mm f/3.5 & Ilford HP5+ (pushed to 800asa).

Taken on 19 October 2019

35mm · Film photography · Photography

From one side of the street to the other

fishyfisharcadeLeave a comment

A couple of photos for today’s blog post. One looking south(ish), the other north(ish) from opposite sides of the same street.

The first – the southerly-facing picture – is of Hull Minster. It’s a slightly odd image aspect ratio as, for some reason, the negative for this frame was missing a slice. I like the way there are several couples going about their business in the scene – in fact it almost looks like they might be following each other, walking in an anti-clockwise circle from one side of the street to the other. You can see the tables and chairs at the bottom of this frame in the second picture too, which indicates roughly where I stood to take this first photograph.

I didn’t go inside the minster on this occasion (although I have in the past). I find churches to be impressive buildings, always full of interest – both architecturally, and also because of their history and the artifacts within, especially those with original fittings, and Hull Minster doesn’t disappoint in that regard. Alas, I didn’t have time to pay a visit this time.

FILM - Hull Minster

The second image is of the northerly view and was taken from a position to the right of the post in the picture above – there’s an open plaza in front of the minster, which is where I stood.

I took a couple of variants of this shot. The one I didn’t use had a number of things I liked – a woman in dark clothes framed between the two windows on the left of the image, and the people at centre right were crossing the road and no longer partially obscured by the bin. The one I’ve posted below has the guy in the middle doubled over though, and I didn’t want to lose that. I think he was looking at something in his lap (or maybe even praying with clasped hands), but in the next shot he’s upright again and it lost a little interest as a result.

FILM - People in Hull

There’s another, slightly different, viewpoint on this location in this post from a couple of years back.

Olympus OM-1, Zuiko 28mm f/3.5 & Ilford HP5+ (pushed to 800asa).

Taken on 19 October 2019

35mm · Film photography · Photography

Couple with a guitar on a cobbled street

fishyfisharcade2 Comments

It’s always a joy to wander around an unfamiliar area with a camera, whether it be somewhere far-flung and exotic, or just a part of your own town or city that you’ve not explored before.

During my wander around Hull last weekend I found a number places that just brought a smile to my face. While probably not drawing a second glance from many local eyes, to me they were heavy with possibility – even in the somewhat flat, grey, overcast light in which I viewed them.

This is one such location – Bishop Lane. I never knew this existed before last Saturday (and why should I? Despite a couple of prior visits to the city, I’ve barely scratched the surface in terms of exploration) but as soon as I saw it I was finding photographs in it’s wonderfully cobbled straightness and shot a few pictures. The first two were of an empty street, but then a couple appeared at the far end of the lane and began to walk in my direction. As they got closer I noticed that the man carried a guitar case and the woman a smaller intrument case – possibly a fiddle – and I knew I had to get them in a photograph of the location.

Before they got too close I checked my focus – the 28mm is fairly forgiving, but I pre-focussed on a spot where I thought the composition would work best as they passed, and then I waited. Looking at the photo it seems evident that one thing I didn’t check was the shutter speed as the couple have some noticable motion blur, so I’m guessing the camera was at 1/125sec (or perhaps even 1/60sec) when I pressed the shutter button. Despite this, I feel the photo works with the blur – it adds a subtle hint of motion in an otherwise motionless scene.

FILM - Couple with a guitar on a cobbled street

Olympus OM-1, F.Zuiko 50mm f/1.8 & Ilford HP5+ (pushed to 800asa).

Taken on 19 October 2019

35mm · Film photography · Photography

Backstreets and alleyways

fishyfisharcadeLeave a comment

On my visit the HIPFest last weekend I discovered upon arriving that a) there was no longer a charge to enter the exhibits (it  cost £5 for a wristband that granted you access to all the gallery areas on my previous visits) and, b) that the galleries (apart from the display in the main atrium area) didn’t open until noon (it was a little before 10:30am at this point).

Given that I’d planned on spending some time walking around Hull town centre taking photos anyway, this wasn’t too big of an issue, so I set off for a wander. I’d done a bit of a recce before the visit – Google Streetview is very handy for this – and had found a location that might make for good pictures, so I headed off to find it.

The first three images today are of the place I found on Streetview, and the last is of an alleyway that I found by chance slightly later.

FILM - Off the hook

FILM - Men at work

FILM - Horizon Tattoo

FILM - Through

Olympus OM-1, Zuiko 28mm f/3.5 and Zuiko AUTO-Zoom 75-150mm f/4.0 & Ilford HP5+ (pushed to 800asa).

Taken on 19 October 2019