Semi-detached

Enlighten me as to what "rather semi-detached observations of small incidents in the ordinary." means in words of less than 3 syllables and I may be better qualified to offer an opinion....

At the moment, I don't see what you are trying to achieve with these snaps...

I see three random non linked images of somewhere guessing in London... exposure is ok, other than the blown sky in the last... or is it always that colour in Londondinium?

Personally, I would hate to live in or near any of them.. looks to be a sad and depressing place in need of some TLC or C4 and redeveloped.

If you want to portray the grimness of it, a B&W conversion with high contrast and added grain would work wonders.... but as I said earlier.. don't know the initial goal...
 
They are not very exciting are they? Yet, these pics are well talen and are great record shots. In years to come these will be history.

I lived for the first 11 years of my life in a house of a row of 12 next to The Unitarian church. They were quite a unique row of Victorian terraces, not because they were different, just where they were I suppose. They were knocked down to make way for an even more unique building for a big insurance company.

I always hope I can find pics of the houses where I grew up and was born, but nothing.

Your pics will be part of the history of the town where they are taken and added interest will be that table, and, that broken furniture that slightly impersonates the architecture.

That's my reaction.
 
I have looked at these for a little while now and pondered on them. They are moments in time in a rather grim urban landscape. I am not sure about the third one, I think it seems to cluttered, lacks focus and is Just too random. The other two are a different matter though in my view.

The lines in No.2 are interesting and the incongruent table in the street hints at the absurd and simultaneosly mundane, a touch of the William Eggleston about the image. For me the colour really works. Eggleston's shots, almost always in colour had a random feel and I see that in 1 & 2. He also went for colour to show the real and the gritty, rather than the easy and sometimes cliched use of B&W.

This sort of image making will not appeal to many but as part of a set I think they are good. Can I ask were you thinking of Eggleston's work when you were taking these images?
 
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Well, that's an interesting spectrum of opinion. Thank you for them all :)

A bit of background - they were all taken near where I work in Bermondsey, a working class area of London that has been undergoing a lot of change in the last couple of decades, with new office developments and private apartments built by the Thames replacing warehouses and other former industrial sites. There's also a big programme replacement of mid-20th century local authority housing with new housing association flats. I've witnessed similar processes at work in Clapham and Battersea where I've worked previously. So, I've been documenting much of this while I've been working in the area for the last ten years - seeking out the ordinary that will become extraordinary in a few years time.

Every once in a while I come across something that's out of place, an incident in the street, if you will. Usually it's something that looks as if it's been discarded, but perhaps not. The table (maybe stool?) for example: is it there because nobody wants it, or was it left by children playing, or somebody likes to perch upon it and watch the world go by?

'Detached' because I'm making no judgement about the people that left it there and why - I don't know their motives. 'Semi-detached' because I am making some kind of judgement by training my camera upon it: that it's worthy of photographing (and a bit like Garry Winogrand, I want to see what it looks like in a photograph). Going 'gritty' with b/w would rather be putting too much of a value judgement into the image - I'd rather leave it to the viewer perhaps to invent their own stories.

To answer Jao's question: I discovered William Eggleston a few years back and some of his photographs resonated with what I'd discovered for myself in pictures like these and it's somewhere in the back of my head when I take them now. You're right, probably the last of the three doesn't fit the theme so well (BTW, I checked in Lightroom and the sky was not blown - it was just overcast at 98% luminosity :))

Three more: the first was the one that kicked off the idea in my head.

4. (2007)




5. (2010)




6. (2010)

 
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I like them, maybe with a different title along the lines of City Life...Street Shots or the like and then they could well be looked at from a different prospective
 
I do like the new ones, particularly the last one, very Eggleston!

They are bleak and uncomfortable, I know this sounds odd , having said that I like them, but it shows the power of the medium to summon up a range of emotions. Also they record absurd moments of reality.

This is an really interesting collection that you are developing.
 
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Nice shots mate well done. I grew up in similar places and I don't live too far from some either. London is pretty much like that outside zone 1 -2
 
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