Enforced phone photography - colour

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On our most recent visit to London my camera stopped working properly and so for a few days I had to use my phone for photography. Despite the rapid improvement in phone cameras to the point where many are "good enough" for a limited range of photography, I still prefer the flexibility and quality of a purpose-built camera. I should also add that my phone was bought knowing that I wouldn't use it a great deal and so I chose on price rather than features.

All that notwithstanding, it takes photographs, and in some circumstances for some purposes the images it produces are quite good. It doesn't have real zoom or course. Nor does it handle low light well. Its dynamic range is somewhat limited, and you have to make a conscious effort to hold it still. In fact, the latter is the most frustrating feature because a few of my shots that are compositionally quite good, when enlarged show distinct blur caused by my hand movement. As far as basic ergonomics for photography goes the shape of the average smartphone seems deliberately chosen to induce blur.

Today's photograph is one of the better shots I got. It shows the platform at Cannon Street station in London. We've become quite familiar with this location following the closure of London Bridge station. However, our regular route means a walk to Bank station to get the Northern line tube, and interesting as that is, I'll be glad when London Bridge reopens in 2018 and I don't have to do it so often.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Photograph: CannonStreet Station, London
Phone photograph

St Pancras before the rain

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Today's photograph was taken from in front of King's Cross railway station in London: in fact, from the space in the foreground of yesterday's photograph. We were waiting for a train to take us home and I'd noticed that a stormy sky was gathering above this part of London. Opportunities of that sort are to be seized and so I walked around looking for a shot or two. I missed the zig-zag of lightning that flashed near the clock tower but did get this image of the dark grey clouds as they gathered above the buildings. In the photograph you can see the side of the St Pancras Hotel and on the right of it the glazed train sheds.

One of the things I like about a big city is the pools of light that make evening photography so appealing. It's something that isn't found in a country village and I always relish a visit to London that gives me opportunities to be out and about when the daylight is fading.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Photo Title: A Gathering Storm, St Pancras Hotel, London
Camera: Olympus E-M10
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 17mm (34mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f2.8
Shutter Speed: 1/80 sec
ISO:400
Exposure Compensation: -0.7 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Charing Cross escalators

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If anyone were to look for favourite formal characteristics in my photographs - compositional themes rather than subjects - I think (hope) they would notice, strong shapes, shadows, reflections and both simple compositions and complex, even confusing, compositions.

Five years ago I came upon a location in London that indulges all those predilections. Charing Cross railway station has escalators that take pedestrian down from the bridge level or up to it from the station below. They are the work of a notable firm of British architects who re-developed the whole station - Terry Farrell and Partners. The big circles, mirror walls reflecting the passing travellers, and the diagonals of the ever-running escalators drew my camera recently for the second time. A late afternoon on a dull day gave more shadow and artificial light to the scene than did the better light of my earlier shot.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen
Photo Title: Charing Cross Station Escalators, London
Camera: Olympus E-M10
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 16mm (32mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f4.1
Shutter Speed: 1/80 sec
ISO:1600
Exposure Compensation: -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Art Deco doorway

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English architecture of the 1930s was relatively unadventurous compared with that which was being built in continental Europe and the United States. The only buildings that can stand with the modernist structures across the water were built either by emigres fleeing the turmoil of pre-war Europe e.g. , the De La Warr Pavilion of Erich Mendelsshon and Serge Chermayeff, or by the small group of British architects e.g.Wells Coates, Maxwell Fry and Owen Williams, who were influenced by their continental and U.S. colleagues. The majority of English architects in the 1930s built very traditionally and acknowledged modern trends mainly by the application of decorative elements such as metal window frames with horizontal glazing bars, inappropriate flat roofs, or "Moderne" features using stripped down decorative elements, often drawn from classical precedents. A very few architects embraced the decorative tics of Art Deco, a style that had more success in the decorative arts than in architecture.

The other day, on one of our visits to Hull, we visited the Paragon railway station hotel (now the Royal Hotel, formerly the Royal Station Hotel), a fine stone building of 1849 by the architect G. T. Andrews. This is one of the few central Hull buildings that largely escaped the devastating bombing that the city suffered in WW2. A serious fire in 1990 saw careful rebuilding and consequently today we can admire its composition, carving and imposing facade. We can also enjoy the Art Deco doorway that was added to the entrance from the station concourse in the 1930s. This very theatrical entry has a rounded arch that echoes those of the older building. However, it is simplified, involves white glass illuminated from inside, and has decorative "curls" at the bottom. A glazed "overdoor" is also in very simply composed stained glass. The classical setting is acknowledged by the royal coat of arms that surmounts the doorway, and by the discreet brackets at the top left and right. Decorative metalwork can be seen in the ventilators in the centre of the steps. The whole composition feels like something lifted out of a 1930s cinema, or an American city, and in this context inserts a welcome note of gaiety that all too few people seem to notice.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Nikon D5300
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 48mm (72mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f8
Shutter Speed: 1/80 sec
ISO:125 Exposure Compensation: -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Piranesi and the London Underground

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London's "Tube", more properly known as the Underground, is an interesting place for the photographer because it is a metro system that has developed over such a long period of time and therefore offers subjects old and new. In fact, it includes the world's first underground line that was developed by the Metropolitan Railway and opened as long ago as 1863. The Underground is a system that, despite having 270 stations and 250 miles of track, is still being extended and consequently has a number of sleek, modern stations to contrast with the older structures of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

The other week I used a couple of these recent stations - Canada Water and Canary Wharf - both examples of what I call the "stainless steel" stations. I think of them in those terms because they feature large quantities of stainless steel alongside the inevitable concrete. However, modern and gleaming though they undoubtedly are, I also cannot help but think of them as "Piranesian". That word is an adjective especially familiar to students of the history of art and architecture. It derives from the name of Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720-1778), an Italian etcher and engraver born near Venice. He started out as an illustrator of contemporary views, moving on to studies of the remains of ancient Rome that he drew with an obvious delight in old stonework and the contrast of Mediterranean light and shade.

However, it a series of sixteen drawings from his imagination for which posterity remembers Piranesi, works that fired the imagination of the Romantic movement and inspired a number of architects. These showed the interiors of imaginary prisons, "Carceri d'Invenzione". In high contrast he depicted gigantic stone vaults, stairs, machines, ladders, chains and ropes and crawling about these fantastic, cavernous interiors, tiny people, dwarfed by their surroundings. Looking at today's black and white photograph of the exit hall and escalators at Canary Wharf underground station you can perhaps understand how Foster + Partners' work conjures up in my mind this inspirational draughtsman's imaginings.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Sony RX100
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 10.4mm (28mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/80 sec
ISO: 125
Exposure Compensation: -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Trains, cars and photography

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I've never been a car buff, I've always preferred my bicycle. Though I do own a car it's with reluctance and I've always seen motor vehicles as destructive, things that have wreaked havoc on planning and urban settlements. However, I've also found them an undeniable source of humour as regular readers of this blog will know. With this outlook, as you can imagine, my conversations with other men about cars don't follow the usual path. My wife pretty much shares that outlook. And yet it is her proud boast that in the 1980s she could identify most of the cars seen on Britain's roads. How so? Well, our oldest son, from the age of two and from the vantage point of his pushchair, wanted to know what to call each one he saw, so my wife had to read the names and then tell him. He would delight in spotting further examples and tell my wife about them.

But, I am not a complete transport illiterate, and I do have some expertise in locomotive identification, particularly those that travelled the lines of British Rail in the 1980s. You might have guessed that I gained it from the same source. My son's interest in things transport-related expanded to trains and I learned the names alongside him. So, I can tell a Deltic from a Class 37, a Class 47 from a Class 50, and the minutiae of the Class 8 shunter is no stranger to me. However, my interest continued only as long as it took for my son to learn more by himself, and so I have little knowledge of subsequent developments. Consequently, when I came to give a title to the photograph of the diesel multiple unit (DMU) in today's photograph that I took while waiting at Grantham station to meet someone travelling on it, I had to look it up.

Of all the specialist photographers, those photographing trains are some of the most driven. Invariably (and unlike me) they do it in support of their hobby or interest, and with a dedication that is a marvel to behold. Moreover, they document each image with a level of detail that few other photographers match: name of type of loco, specific name, number, location, route, time, specific variables of one sort or another, camera details etc. My poor effort doesn't match this level of care and attention.* It was an "opportunity shot", and is only the third train photograph to appear on this blog. My other efforts are here and here.

* In the spirit of a real train photographer I should say that this photograph was taken on Wednesday 21st September and shows a Class 180 (No. 109) First Hull Trains DMU on the 10:30am Hull to King's Cross service at Grantham station, Lincolnshire. It had departed 20 minutes late and arrived at Grantham at 12:19pm, 18 minutes late, due to a line problem.

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Lumix LX3
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 5.1mm (24mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f4.5
Shutter Speed: 1/800
ISO:125
Exposure Compensation: -0.66 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Sleaford station

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One day I'll count the number of photographs I've posted that have a person as the main subject. Ignoring the occasional self-portrait the total must be less than five out of the 878 on PhotoReflect and 60 on PhotoQuoto. In fact, I'm struggling to remember more than one!

However, I do like to include people in photographs for interest, scale and as strong compositional elements. I regularly post shots that feature people for one or all of those reasons. Moreover, I find that some photographs, and landscapes in particular, benefit from a human figure, though I think many photographers appear to hold the opposite view. I also like, where I can, to take photographs of urban scenes that include people, though my images are never just about the people. One of my own favourite shots of this sort is a very Victorian looking view of Greenwich Park in London. When I say "Victorian-looking" I mean that in terms of its feel rather than the details.

Today's photograph has something of that feel too. It shows passengers waiting on the railway platform at Sleaford. The station in this Lincolnshire town - like most British stations - is a Victorian construction. The oldest Tudor-style stone building dates from 1857, and much of the rest, of brick, from 1882. I stood with this range of buildings behind me to take my shot. The photograph shows the ornate Victorian cast-iron and wood canopies and the more modern information board and monitor displaying train times. However, it wasn't just the architectural details that prompted the shot, it was the four people spread along the platform and the light from the low sun beyond. The brightness added silhouettes, shadows and halos to the scene that appealed to me. Like the image of Greenwich Park this one has a feel of some of the Victorian paintings by minor artists that one sees in regional art galleries - views of the local high street, station or horse racing course. The one thing that is quite different, of course, is the number of people in the image. In the nineteenth century this station would have been packed with waiting passengers, but at the end of a cold January day in 2010 there were only the four.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Lumix LX3
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 10.2mm (48mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f3.2
Shutter Speed: 1/400
ISO: 80
Exposure Compensation: -0.66 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

High tech in 1896

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A newspaper article I read the other day decribed how, when the journalist was standing on a gleaming new London station platform surrounded by shiny high-tech, high speed trains, the eyes of everyone were turned upon an old steam engine that was waiting to take passengers on a mainline pleasure trip. The engine in question was 70013 Oliver Cromwell, that was built in 1951 and holds the distinction of being one of the last four steam engines to be used by British Rail before diesel and electric took over entirely in 1968.

Given the relative newness of that particular engine it isn't surprising that it is still in use, hauling rail enthusiasts and the nostalgic on trips around the network. What is more surprising is the age of some of the other engines that undertake this work. The other week, during a few days in Norfolk, I dropped in on the preserved North Norfolk Railway at Sheringham. My introduction to this line was last year when I took this photograph of a C.B. Collett-designed engine of 1924, numbered 5224. On my recent visit I managed to snap the only surviving Class 27 of the Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway, number 1300, that was built in 1896. It was on loan to the Norfolk line, and was busy taking people up and down their scenic route by the sea. This is by no means the oldest working steam engine to be seen in occasional use today, but looking at its functional shape, sturdy build, and gleaming paintwork, not to mention the evocative sound of its smoke and steam, there is no wonder that people retain (or acquire) an affection for these ancient leviathans. When I visited the station the following day a small diesel railcar of 1950s vintage, for all its smooth "modern" charm, was attracting considerably fewer admirers.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 13mm (26mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/500 seconds
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -1.0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Cherishing the past

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It's interesting how the "futurologists" get it wrong isn't it. As a callow youth I remember being told that when I was a man my working day would be shorter as machines removed the drudgery, that we'd all have flying cars, that colonies of people would be living on the moon and nearby planets, that my clothing would be a sort of all-in-one jump-suit, and my food would be a manufactured gloop that contained all the calories and nutrients essential for health. At the dawn of the computer age a sage was heard to pronounce that the UK would never need more than 3 of the machines. Then, when computers were becoming common we were told that offices would become "paperless". It's predictions of this sort that make me think I could be a futurologist.

One of the predictions that I never saw made was that the more we travelled into our future, the more we would cherish what was left of our past. This seems to be a fairly widely held view, at least in the UK. It's also a view that has positive and negative consequences. Let's start with a negative. Ask most people what kind of house they would really like and they'll tell you about some old, romantic looking building, wearing a patina of age, set in a rural idyll. The idea of an energy efficient, modern structure that effectively meets the needs of modern living is the dream of few. On the positive side, this affection for our past means that enough of it is preserved and remains for us to place ourselves in time, and so better understand where we are by where we've come from.

I was thinking about this when I visited the North Norfolk Railway at Sheringham recently. The Victorian station of this preserved railway has been restored and fitted out with original signs, advertisements, luggage, trolleys, weighing scales, etc. The volunteer staff wear old-style uniforms, and all this makes the perfect setting for the steam trains and early diesels that travel over its tracks. Standing on a platform I took this shot of the opposite platform and its adjoining buildings. The overhead glass and metal canopy was filtering the light that fell on the lovingly restored and preserved artefact and people. You'll notice that the two prominent, original, enamel advertisements are for cigarettes. Another thing I never saw predicted about my future was that cigarette smoking would be banned in public buildings, and that's a development that has pleased me mightily.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 48mm (96mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/320 seconds
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.7 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Not so common sense

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"Common sense is the collection of predjudices acquired by the age eighteen".
Albert Einstein (1879-1955), German-born theoretical physicist

Many would think Albert Einstein's view of what constitutes common sense somewhat jaundiced, but it clearly contains an element of truth. Perhaps the dictionary definition of "sound judgement not based on specialised knowledge" would receive more support. Common sense is a great quality, but it can often lead us astray, and is frequently enlisted by those wanting to cut through what they see as the obfuscation of deeper analysis.

In the debate over the environment, and in particular the production of greenhouse gases, common sense is used to support the growing of biofuels. It seems obvious that renewable sources must replace depleting oil, and will have less environmental impact. And yet, recent analysis by scientists from a range of disciplines suggest that the proposed cultivation of crops for fuel is often worse for the environment than fossil fuels. Similarly, the purchase by consumers of locally-sourced food is widely felt to be better for the environment, reducing the cost and pollution associated with transport. It just seems like common sense. Yet the production of green beans in Kenya, which are then flown to the UK, is found to be less environmentally damaging in all but the main months of the UK outdoor harvest. Apparently Kenyan beans are grown more organically, without the machinery and range of pesticides, herbicides and fertilizers that are used here. And, whereas the UK (and nearby mainland European growers) use heat to get early and late crops, in Kenya this isn't necessary. Research turns common-sense on its head.

I was thinking about these issues when I photographed this steam engine, 5224, a C.B. Collett design of 1924 on loan from the North Yorkshire Moors Railway, here at the preserved North Norfolk Railway line at Sheringham. I reflected on whether improvements to the coal-burning steam engine would ever make this type of propulsion compete economically and environmentally with diesel and electricity. Common sense tells me that it is unlikely, but then common sense sometimes proves to be nonsense!

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 13mm (26mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f8.0
Shutter Speed: 1/100
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -1.0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On