On Your Knees, Please!

Challenge 8: "On your knees please... Take a photo from floor level." - Matt Stuart

When I seen this challenge appear I knew immediately what photo I would use if we could submit older images. This photo was taken in March of this year and is one of my favourite ground level images to date. I think I will attempt to take a photo quite similar to this one as I love the blurred legs and phantom shoes that display the kinetic energy. That, to me, is one of the best paradoxes of photography: a still image that coherently conveys motion or dynamism.

So, having reattempted the same image the results were the same. I find shoes with heels work really well when blurred... They become so much more surreal. The legs attached to the shoes fade and become oddly ethereal, and wisp-like.

Whilst out photographing I realised that although I enjoyed photographing with longer shutter speeds to try and capture the 'spirit' of the city and the perpetual motion that exists in it, I prefer to be involved in the urban environment. So, keeping to the brief, I set out to photograph a set of shoes that could function as a suitable portrait. This allowed me to work within my documentary portraiture and comply with the challenge set by Matt Stuart.

His name is John Lawreneson and he smokes a pipe.

-PM

"When you have to shoot: shoot! Don't Talk"

Challenge 7: '"When you have to shoot: shoot! Don't Talk" - Il Brutto

Make a picture containing The Good, The Bad and The Ugly' - Jens Olof Lasthein

Taken as part of the Street Photography Now challenge.For more info:streetphotographynowproject.wordpress.com/

This was a very open challenge. And, based on the majority of responses posted in the pool thus far, I can see that most people opted for the more obvious interpretation: framing an image to contain three figures to represent the 'good', 'bad' and 'ugly'. And, to be honest, I was tempted to do the same. I also thought about taking the cinematography of Leone's film and applying that to street photography (wide framing, close-ups of eyes, or the fantastic of 'Triangle of Trust' from the film's conclusion).

In the end I decided to take Il Brutto's words to heart and photographed without asking or talking to anyone, which was quite odd. My thinking was to walk constantly and photograph as I went. So, this photography was more invasive and intrusive than my normal street photography, which can be highly sociable and interactive. As a result my style was based more on the work of Bruce Gilden or Mark Cohen than Jens Olof Lasthein, yet I still complied with his challenge.

Street Photography Now - Week 6

Challenge #6: "Never overlook a cliche" - Artem Zhitenev

Taken as part of the Street Photography Now challenge.For more info: streetphotographynowproject.wordpress.com/

The challenge this week asked us to 'never overlook a cliche' whilst photographing in the urban environment. This threw me. Was it better to be fully informed of the established cliches or to just go and photograph the really obvious? Well, studying photography for the past four years or so has instilled too much, I was aware of all of the 'cliches' that can pop up. I get the point of it though: there are still photographs to be had by using previously successful compositions... Not that we would reinvent the wheel by attempting cliches but they have become cliches for a reason.

In the end I went for the seasonal cliche of focusing on the dramatic shadows that winter's light can produce. Also, there is an established tradition of framing the natural world [trees] upon the manmade and industrial world [buildings] that had been stablished long before but perfected in the colour photography of Eggleston to Callahan - another cliche-box ticked!

I was tempted to opt for:

- Images that featured a repetition of colour...

- Images that used the obvious compositional traits. Such as adding a natural frame or border by including walls, posts or trees to create an 'edge' of frame. I prefer this image to my submission to the competition but the other photo fit the brief better.

-PM

[10/11/2010]

Whipping Winds and Heavy Rain...

A shoot with Darkest Era up on the North Coast was more of a battle against time and the elements than anything else! The location, at Museenden Temple and the surrounding castle grounds, were fantastic for achieving a colder colour palette and mixing rural Ireland with heavy metal!

To break up the serious faces, which are mandatory for the portraits, we shot a few sillier images. A batch of the final images shall be posted up soon [as soon as things are sorted with the label].

-PM

[27/10/2010]

Oct/Nov

Again, I am behind in my posting so I will have to make a heavy post to catch up on the events. Well, there has been more photo madness in the past few weeks!

With the current Street Photography competition being hosted via the Photographer's Gallery in London it has given me just cause to take to the streets each week to fulfil the assignment. The system is simple: respond to the photographer's task (set by a different established artist each week) by adding your image to the corresponding Flickr group for that week's instruction. My entries thus far can be found here! Check the competition website and get involved too!

Here is an example of the format.

Instruction 1: "If you can smell the street by looking at the photo, it's a street photograph" - Bruce Gilden

In the future I will try and place the photos and stories that I do not submit into the competition on this blog. The tasks are great for forcing you to look at the city in new and unusual ways so there are always going to be other images!

Halloween was come and gone already! Although I dressed as a homeless Santa [probably the most cost effective costume ever] there should not be too many photos of that floating around in cyberspace. On the plus side I was able to photograph two excellent costumes: Death, from Neil Gaiman's Sandman [Claire Mc Kervey]; and Tony Stark of Iron Man [Mark O'Neill].

Also, over the course of the last year, and maybe more in the past few months, I have found that I am drawn to [aka. stalk] old people whilst I am photographing. Maybe they have more stories and experiences that I want to hear. Maybe they show me what life can do to you. I am not sure what it means but I will continue to do so until it makes more sense...