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Human, mother, wife, home educator, learner, photographer, writer, reader, mind reader, critic, defender, champion.

Friday 2 April 2010

Goodbye 2000s #3

Roughly one and a half per cent of all the photos I've ever published are of reflections. So, as I'm reflecting on the last decade, here are four of them.














Rainy Reflections Taken in June 2007, this is one of my most popular photos, having been viewed over 500 times. It's attracted 51 comments and 37 faves.  The following comment is taken from my old blog.

The day I took it was the day that I really got hooked on photography again. I was trying to explain to a friend how I felt when I took this photo. For some reason (perhaps it was the cider) I was unable to put this into words. But essentially, it is this; it was knowing that I alone had spotted these reflections in the pavement - amid the rushing crowd, I alone had stopped to stare in wonderment. It made me feel special - like I understood the world. It was showing us all something beautiful, but nobody had noticed. Just me. I couldn't find those words at the time, so I told my friend it was like catching a fairy.














Winter Walk Taken in January 2008 on the lovely little Kodak that my son now uses, this one has only been viewed 74 times, but it's been faved 7 times, not a bad hit rate. And it did manage a respectable 9 comments. It was a particularly grey day. Most of the photos I took this day were immediately converted to black and white because that's how I saw them when I took them. I was seeing in black and white all that day, so much so that when confronted with all this glorious purple, my poor eyes popped out having almost forgotten what colour was. This is the shot that prompted the comment that I always make Chatham seem so interesting, and so it is, if you squint.















Self Portrait with Stripy Legs This one has only been viewed a pathetic 35 times. I can't even really explain why I like it so much. I wanted the reflected man to be in the middle of the left hand door panel, so I waited for him. Then the bugger started to run and I almost didn't catch him at all. Now I'm not saying he should have let the car hit him, but without the reflected running man this is just a daft self portrait with banana-striped legs. Still, I guess that would've been enough to keep me amused.














Shop Girl (Retail. Detail) This is another one taken in June 2007. It was originally posted in colour and attracted 70 views and just one comment. I decided to post it in ever so slightly cross processed black and white a year and a half later to see what response it would get. I figured that since there was so much going on, so much to look at, a black and white conversion would allow the eye to concentrate on form and contrast. The newer version has been viewed just one more time than the colour version, although it's had half as much time to gather views. It has ten comments and five faves. Does this prove anything? Do people prefer black and white imagery? Do photographers prefer black and white imagery? Or is it just the photographers I know that prefer black and white imagery? It puts me in mind of that observation that nothing can be proven, something about one half of one sheep in Scotland being black, a philosophy joke. So what do we see? Modern life, mobiles phones, the boredom of retail, the stride of the woman on the left which implies she is wearing the bag in the shop window, consumerism, sale, sale, sale.

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