Urban and rural location photography #2: The City or the Urban Sprawl.

Unlike the Countryside or Wilderness brief where I had a really strong idea about what kind of images I wanted to produce, I started this brief not really knowing where I was going with it.

Inspirations
Set out below are some examples of photographers and their work which I discovered along the way.  As with the photographs of trees in my wilderness blog, the images I selected as I researched focus on textures, shapes and patterns, unexpected angles and looking at the ordinary in a new way.

Searching on the internet for urban photography I discovered the work of Paul Raphaelson (http://www.paulraphaelson.com/portfolios.htm#).  His work seems to capture the sadness of abandoned places – these examples are from his work titled Lost Spaces, Found Gardens:

where these images captures urban wilderness:

Raphaelson's work is also found on the site http://www.urbanlandscape.org.uk/raphaelson.htm.  In contrast to Raphaelson, Josef Hoflehner shows urban spaces in a more flattering light, for example, with his classic city images (better quality versions of these images can be found on his website -
http://www.josefhoflehner.com/portfolios.html)

 The images below from different photographers all capture lines, patterns and shapes found within the urban environment (all images from Google Images except where otherwise stated):

Robert Frank

Bryan Hayes

                                                                    (www.industrial-landscape.com)

Ralph Gibson

Richard Littlewood

Tom Sullam http://www.tomsullam.co.uk/#/black-and-white

I also find the website Urban Photography Art (http://www.urban-photography-art.com/) a useful source of images, inspiration and information on urban photography.

Concepts
I experimented with a couple of ideas, starting with some fairly conventional images and ending with something more abstract - seeking out lines, patterns, shapes and textures in the urban environment.

Planning and planned outcomes
My aim was to take images in two different urban settings in different light and weather conditions. Details of the plan and outcomes from each environment are given below.

I used a Canon EOS 50D with a choice of wide-angle (10-20mm) or super zoom (18-200mm) lenses as detailed on specific images below.

Research
I didn't do any specific research on places in advance – they were places I had some familiarity with and, as detailed below, I had idea of what kind of images I wanted to capture, what I wanted them to say.  Other than that I just walked, fairly randomly, with the camera and photographed what I found along the way.

Outcomes

1) Urban meets wilderness
I visited Banff in February 2010 on holiday. Banff, located on the Trans-Canada Highway, is the largest town in Banff National Park, in Alberta's Rockies. At 1,463 m (4,800 ft), it is the town with the second highest elevation in Canada. It is surrounded by mountains, notably Mount Rundle, Sulphur Mountain, Mount Norquay, and Cascade Mountain, and is situated on the Bow and Spray Rivers. My aim was to capture the contrast between the town and its magnificent surroundings.

I took photographs on several days under different weather conditions. On some days the sky was overcast and the light was very flat. This created a landscape where everything appeared grayscale. Other days were bright and sunny creating great contrast between the town and its surroundings. These contact sheets show a sample of the photographs I took:

These are some of the selected images from the above sheet:

Canon EOS 50D 35mm f/16 1/50 ISO100

Post production editing = fill light added to correct the exposure of the dark foreground

Canon EOS 50D 100mm f/16 1/50 ISO100

Post production editing = fill light added to correct the exposure of the dark foreground 

Canon EOS 50D 20mm f/6.3 1/30 ISO200

Post production editing = increased exposure

Canon EOS 50D 135mm f/11 1/60 ISO100

Post production editing = reduced exposure

Canon EOS 50D 80mm f/11 1/30 ISO100

Post production editing = adjustments to exposure and saturation and some slight cropping.

With landscape photography to get the best images sometimes you have to wait for the light to change or be able to go back on another day with better weather conditions or when there are dramatic skies.  Whilst some of these images could have been better if I'd been able to go back under differnt conditions, I know from the reaction people have had to them, that I did capture the 'wow factor' that I was after.

On the overcast days because there was very little colour in the landscape I thought some images would benefit from being converted to black and white, with what I think are pleasing results as this really bring out the contrasts in a way which is lacking in the original images.  On some the brighter days it was difficult to balance the dark foreground with the bright skies (unfortunately I didn't have a ND grad filter which might have helped) and again I felt a black and white treatment may help.  Here are some before and after versions:

Canon 50D 20mm f/6.3 1/60 ISO200

Post production editing = increased brightness and preset black and white conversion

 Canon 50D 40mm f/5.6 1/320 ISO100

Post production editing = increased colour saturation and preset black and white conversion

Canon 50D 20mm f/5.6 1/320 ISO200

Post production editing = increased saturation and preset grayscale conversion

The Photographer in action!

Taken by Ian.

2) Blackburn town centre

On Monday 8 March a group of us decided to take a walk round Blackburn town centre to take both some candid portraits and some urban shots. All pictures were taken with an 18-200mm lens.  I started out by taking some conventional images trying to capture the ordinariness of the setting – what David Chandler described in his essay The Landscape of Disappointment as “functional landscapes” and “nondescript scenery”.  However, as it was a really bright and sunny day, the images are not as grim as I expected Blackburn to look, especially as I have slightly saturated the colours!

Canon 50D 32mm f/16 1/60 ISO200

Post production editing = fill light added to remove shadow from the stone building on the right

Canon 50D 18mm f/16 1/60 ISO200

Post production editing = fill light used to remove shadow areas on the front of the building 

Canon 50D 110mm f/16 1/10 ISO200

Post production editing = fill light to remove shadows

I also tried black and white versions (using a black and white adjustment layer in Photoshop for the conversion) and I feel that these capture the kind of atmosphere I wanted better than the colour versions but it still doesn't reflect David Chandler's vision - it was just too nice a day!:

I soon grew bored with taking conventional shotsand started to experiment a bit more. It started when I took this picture of the Thwaites brewery through the chain link fence:

Canon EOS 50D 32mm f/16 1/80 ISO200

Post production editing = increased blue saturation, fill light to brighten the foreground and preset black and white conversion

Then I thought I’d try to photograph just the fence and the way it seemed to bend and flow:

Canon 50D 145mm f/16 1/80 ISO200

Post production editing = small amount of cropping and preset black and white conversion

This lead to me exploring some of the patterns and textures on the buildings:

Canon 50D 140mm f/9.0 1/10 ISO200

Post production editing = small amount of cropping and preset black and white conversion

 Canon 50D 50mm f/16 1/6 ISO200

Post production editing = small amount of cropping and preset black and white conversion

Canon 50D 200mm f/16 1/180 ISO200

Post production editing = cropping and preset black and white conversion

Canon 50D 80mm f/16 1/8 ISO200

Post production editing = small amount of cropping and preset black and white conversion

Canon 50D 50mm f/16 1/10 ISO200

Post production editing = exposure reduced, image cropped and preset black and white conversion

Canon 50D 60mm f/5.0 1/30 ISO200

Post production editing = reduced exposure, cropping and preset black and white conversion

These images were taken in colour, as shown on the contact sheet above but in order to enhance the graphic quality of the images I converted them to black and white.

They remind me of the work of Lewis Baltz (images from Google Images http://www.googleimages.co.uk/):

Although I didn't think I was getting anything very interesting when I was taking the conventional shots above on reflection I am quite pleased with the edited versions with the saturated colours and the black and white versions but I prefer the abstract images as a concept.

Postscript

More examples of my urban photography from Manchester and Salford Quays can be found on my flickr site - see links at top or bottom of blog.