A set of tourist snapshots captured while on a short trip to Berlin. It is a fascinating city with a rich, complex and often tragic history, and it would be interesting to have time to undertake a more in depth photographic project there. All images shot with the Leica M10 and 50mm Summilux. I did take a wide-angle lens as well, but never used it because 50mm always just seems right.
Another short set of push-processed film images, showing some fragments of urban Barcelona. These are from some more test rolls looking to improve the processing and improve contrast (using Delta 400 in DD-X 1+4).
Five images of people sitting, Barcelona. Some of these people are actively working, begging or just resting. It is not always obvious which.
Some more street images, taken around the Raval and Ronda Sant Antoni, Barcelona. These are again mostly candids, taken using manual focus and a wide-angle lens. Although I am far from an expert in street photography, it is clear that themes naturally emerge as a result the interaction between environment and the instinctive interests of the photographer. And the environment here in Barcelona has such an incredible variety of life and its contrasts that there is always something interesting to photograph.
A common aspiration in Spain is to become a Funcionario – a civil servant with a good salary, large pension and a job that is guaranteed. If you achieve this, you are set for life. If not, well that’s your problem. This creates a social duality that the politicians and the tourist industry seem to carefully avoid seeing. The image of Barcelona portrayed in the brochures is a tad one-sided. It gives a view of visitors strolling down La Rambla in a city filled with Gaudi architecture and expensively chic cafes and trinket stalls. But […]
Some more wide-angle street photographs, taken around the Raval and Diagonal Mar on Saturday. All were shot using manual focus, manual exposure and auto-ISO with a micro 4/3 camera and 12mm lens at f4 (equivalent to 24mm at f8 in 35mm format). As usual, some work well, other less. Technically, this image is terrible. Even though it was shot at 1/250th there is a lot of motion blur. To be fair, this is a group where we have previously needed to call an ambulance for – after finding one of […]
Two recent street snapshots from Barcelona. The top image taken in the Raval, the lower image in the Boqueria. Mouse-over to toggle between black-and-white and colour versions – on an iPad, tap the image quickly. A frequent problem with street photography in Barcelona is getting good subject isolation. We are now starting the summer tourist season and the streets are packed with people. It often seems impossible to take a picture, with people continuously bumping in to you or inadvertently blocking the shot. And even when it does work the […]
Trapped in Sesto San Giovanni by the flu, there was a chance to explore the town a little and as an experiment I have tried to produce a series of cinematically styles images of architecture and odd points of local colour. Sesto is one of the satellite towns to Milan, named after the distance from here to the centre (6 Roman miles). Most of the construction here is 20th century, although much of the industry that was present early on has been or is being replaced with residential blocks. […]
Transient Eye 