ARCHIVE 610 – MAN IN A BASEBALL CAP (MONO)

 

 

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Man in a baseball cap; New Quay, west Wales; 23 Sept 2014.

He was standing on the harbour wall, lost in thought as he intently scanned the sea for dolphins.  I was doing the same.

I’ve processed this as low key, quite far from reality.  Its very much in our faces.  The intent gaze and slightly open mouth, the bitten nails and morning stubble.  What emotions, if any, does this provoke?

Click onto the image to open a larger version in a separate window – recommended.

Technique: D800 with 70-300 Nikkor lens at 300mm; 400 ISO; Silver Efex Pro 2, starting at the Low Key 2 preset.

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SOMERSET LEVELS 468 – THE MORNING COUNT (MONO)

 

 

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A farmer stands in the back of his Land Rover, counting his cattle early in the morning, making sure none have disappeared during the night; on the Tealham or Tadham Moors, on the Somerset Levels; 25 July 2009.

This picture us something of an enigma to me.  Its never been filed away in the usual folders and never been posted – so, here it is!

Click onto the image to open a larger version in a separate window – recommended.

Technique: D700 with 70-300 Nikkor lens; 800 ISO.

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ARCHIVE: LOOKING AT CARS 46 – SURFING THE GYRATORY

 

 

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Early morning driving on the Temple Circus Gyratory, which is a large roundabout at one of the southern approaches to Bristol, near Temple Meads railway station.  Roundabout?  Traffic circle in The States I think.  And the roundabout’s official name?  Well, it could really only have been dreamt up by local officials, couldn’t it, by a Local Authority, in the interests no doubt of good urban planning and neutral nomenclature?

And the photo?  Well, its garish, technicolour plus.  The highlights are all blown to featureless white but to me that’s fine because this isn’t reality, this is how I like to see it.

So what gets to me here?  Well, the lines and curves of the blazing white vehicle, which frame the face – cool shades, no-nonsense beard, mouth slightly open – with the thrill of surfing the Gyratory maybe?  And the car’s curving lines also frame the reflections in the car’s windows, which become more colourful over towards the right.  And then, in the backdrop, all those technicolour stripes.  And no, before you ask, I haven’t ramped up the colour Saturation in Lightroom, although I did increase the Vibrance to +65.   Then CEP4 was used to provide a thin black border, to prevent the lower edges of the image merging with my blog’s white background.

The Looking at Cars series: looking back through the nine years of the FATman Photos archives (and some new images too), I’m posting pictures of cars in various contexts and styles.  These Looking at Cars posts are here: 1 (with context); 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 .  Each post will open in a separate window. 

Click onto the “early morning” tag (below) to see more images from the early hours of the day. 

Click onto the image to open a larger version in a separate window – recommended.

Technique: X-T2 with 55-200 Fujinon lens at 300mm; 400 ISO; spot metering; Lightroom, using the Pro Neg Hi film simulation; Color Efex Pro 4; central Bristol; 7 April 2017.

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ARCHIVE 604 – ON THE UPPER DECK OF THE EARLY MORNING BUS

 

 

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Three travellers on the upper deck of the early morning bus to work.

The woman beside the window is engrossed in a newspaper, her expression reacting – negatively, perhaps –  to the day’s news.  But the other two people – further into the shot and less clearly seen – appear more passive and preoccupied.  And the steaminess of the bus’s window is thick, almost opaque in places, and densely textured.

Those two people at the back get to me.  First, they can only be partly seen, its almost as if they are fading into the background – which brings thoughts about the dehumanising effects of some workplaces, and of the unnaturalness of lives spent commuting and working in cities.  And second, both of these people are staring fixedly ahead.  Are they somewhere far away in daydreams, or do they see something nearer at hand, closer ahead, in either the present time or in times soon to come?

Also, this blurred image is starting to look like some sort of painting or daub (more probably the latter), and when any photo does this I feel I’m getting somewhere.

Click onto the “early morning” tag (below) to see more images from the early hours of the day. 

Click onto the image to open a  larger version in a separate window, and click onto that image to enlarge it further – recommended >>> come on in, the grain is lovely!

Technique: X-T2 with 55-200 Fujinon lens at 300mm (equiv); 12,800 ISO; Lightroom, using the Provia/Standard film simulation; Temple Meads, central Bristol; 15 Dec 2017.

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ARCHIVE 603 – THIS MAN IS PHOTOGRAPHING YOU! (MONO)

 

 

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Selfie with spiral staircase; 5 Nov 2014.  I’m photographing my reflection in the window of a shop that is empty save for a metallic spiral staircase.  The staircase is given prominence and I’m edged out to the side, such that I appear to be sneaking a shot of you around the edge of the image’s frame – sneaking a shot of you from out of the window perhaps. 

Personal ensemble?  Well a rather natty outfit, even if I do say so myself, comprising a battered old cap, which has variously been described as making me look like an engine driver or a Japanese soldier or, for all I know, a Japanese engine driver.  And then specs, a mostly untidy beard and a grubby old jacket that has definitely seen better days, much like its owner.  Oh and a penchant for trying to keep a low profile  – probably deriving from decades of birding and other wildlife observation but still useful photographically in these more modern and enlightened times.

Clicking onto the image will open a larger version in a separate window.

Technique: D700 with 70-300 Nikkor lens at 70mm; 640 ISO; Silver Efex Pro 2, starting at the Architectural preset.

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ARCHIVE KENYA 119 – FISHERMAN AT LAMU

 

 

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Fisherman, with the last of his catch for sale, on Lamu Island, Kenya; July 1978.

I wondered about using black and white here, but the colours of the man’s clothes really jump out of this image’s otherwise quite muted palette.  Not that a muted palette is necessarily a bad thing – I’ve often thought that some of the more successful colour images are those with the least colour – but here I like the contrast between the shock and glow of those clothes and the rest of the shot.

Click onto the image to open a larger version in a separate window.

Technique: OM-1 with 28mm Zuiko lens; Agfa CT18 colour slide film, rated at 64 ISO.

THE ARCHIVE KENYA SERIES

I’m re-posting photographs that I took in Kenya over 30 years ago.  You can find more context here .  Click onto the “Archive Kenya” tag (below) to see more of these film images from Kenya.

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ARCHIVE 601 – PHOTOGRAPHER (MONO)

 

 

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Photographer at a wedding reception near Bristol; 17 Aug 2011.  Some good friends invited us to their wedding reception and I took my camera along – and fired off 384 frames (including this one)!

Clash of the Nikons!  Here I’ve used Silver Efex Pro to emphasise the structure (i.e. detail) of the cut and patterning of the clothes, the wristwatch and the camera, which makes everything sharp and crisp, almost standing up out of the picture in 3D.  The subject is anonymous, save for the designer stubble and the strong hands familiarly manhandling the very solid and businesslike D2x.

There are two strong lines at varying angles in the picture.  One heads up towards 11am, from the wristwatch and through the camera to the top of the flashgun.  The other heads up towards 1pm, following the white shirt up between “the gateposts of the two cuffs” to the camera and the man’s chin.  The presence of these two axes brings some sense of movement and action to the shot – this is not someone posing with his camera, but rather someone actively in the process of taking photographs.

Click onto the image to open a larger version in a separate window.

Technique:  D700 with 24-120 Nikkor lens at 120mm; 1000 ISO.

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ARCHIVE 598 – OLD MAN TAKING A PHOTOGRAPH (MONO)

 

 

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Old man taking a photo, West Bay, Dorset; 21 Apr 2015.

Someone engrossed – doing what I’m doing – on the other side of the road.

Click into the image to open a larger version in a separate window – recommended.

Technique: D800 with 70-300 Nikkor lens at 300mm; 400 ISO; Silver Efex Pro 2, beginning at the High Structure Harsh preset.

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ARCHIVE: LOOKING AT CARS 38 – RUSH HOUR (MONO)

 

 

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Morning rush hour:  alone amongst a torrent of temporarily stationary metal.

The Looking at Cars series: looking back through the nine years of the FATman Photos archives (and some new images too), I’m posting pictures of cars in various contexts and styles.  These Looking at Cars posts are here: 1 (with context); 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 .  Each post will open in a separate window.

Click onto the image to open a larger version in a separate window – recommended.

Technique: X-T1 with 55-200 Fujinon lens at 300mm (equiv); 400 ISO; Lightroom, using the Velvia/Vivid film simulation; Silver Efex Pro 2, starting at the Cool Tones 2 preset, giving the image the look of Fuji Neopan Acros 100 black and white film, and adding a strong selenium tone; Victoria Street, central Bristol; 11 Nov 2016.
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ARCHIVE 592 – LOOKING INTO AN EMPTY BUILDING

 

 

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The FATman has you in his (actually rather wonderful) electronic viewfinder!

Or, then again, I’m pointing my camera into an empty building.  There’s really not much here.  My (double) reflection is given substance by a dark pillar in the building’s interior, and the rest of the picture shows a desolate and completely empty room – left by a business that has moved on –  with a large window on the left through which a building in the next street can be faintly be seen.

Click onto the image to open a larger version in a separate window.

Technique: X-T2 with 55-200 Fujinon lens at 300mm (equiv); 1600 ISO; Lightroom, using the Classic Chrome film simulation; Quay Street, central Bristol; 20 Apr 2018.

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