Charing Cross Road, London, 21st September 2006

This is another spot I like to take pictures on when the sun shines in the late afternoon. Before I started using digital cameras, I’d prefer overcast conditions with colour negative film as it gave more even lighting. Digital is more similar to colour transparancy in that it has less latitude between the shadows details and highlights and looks better when shot in sunny conditions. With a picture like this for example figures tend to have more dramatic contrast against unlit backgrounds. I had noticed the woman in the middle with two of her friends on the right of the picture waiting at this corner for some other friends to catch up with them. I shot about half a dozen frames to balance out the left side of the composition.

The Queen’s Walk, London, 11th August 2007

Lots of photographers are reluctant to take photos of children for fear of being branded a paedophile, either by the parents or any Daily Mail readers in the vicinity. I’ll admit that most of the time I’ll think beforehand as to whether to a picture is worth risking the hassle and often it’s easier to ask the parents permission in certain circumstances. Here however, I felt the situation warranted the spontaneous approach as I felt it was too good an opportunity to pass up and maybe the mother may not have wanted me taking a picture of her new baby  looking a little sleepy, shall we say.

Cranbourn Street, London, 23rd September 2006

This is one of those pictures that I took for no reason other than the fact I thought it looked odd. Quite why this man had his hand on top of the dashboard of his car is a bit of a mystery, I can only guess that his car was overheating and he was somehow checking how cool the engine was, except he had it there for a very long time. I’m pretty sure he wasn’t trying to keep his hands warm either as there are lots of people in the background wearing short sleeves. I deliberately framed this so there wasn’t any people’s faces in it to distract the central subject matter and another hand appearing by the light in the car just adds more weirdness.

Peter Street, Soho, London, 30th September 2006

I’m sure this poster has been photographed thousands of times before and I nearly didn’t take a picture of it because I thought it was quite predictable. It’s the first time I’ve posted it anywhere and the only reason I can think of for doing so (apart from the fact I love the poster) is that this whole building has since been demolished. I would hate to think that other shops and establishments catering towards the sex trade suffered a similar fate in Soho as I personally think they are an integral part of what makes the area such a special part of London. The delightfully trashy looking ‘School for Virgins’ poster, points to an era in sexploitation movies when Russ Meyer was at his prime.

Covent Garden, London, 3rd June 2006.

I find Covent Garden just about the most difficult place to photograph in the West End, not because of any particular people getting the hump with having their picture taken, far from it. It’s just that I find it difficult to avoid all the street performers and other predictable subject matter that so blights this area. There are a few corners which are really nice to work on though, particularly outside the tube station where this shot was taken. Unfortunately for this shot I was new to the D70 camera I was using at the time and accidentally shot it at 800 ISO. Doh!