One of my favourite places to visit in the dark (and I suspect many others too) is Salford Quays in Manchester. Salford Quays is a modern development of hi-tech businesses, media, retail and apartments, not to mention car parks. It was based on an area of land once occupied by inland docks connected to Liverpool by the Manchester Ship Canal.
With competition from overseas, the Docks became redundant and lay in decay for years. Some of the docks were acquired by a development corporation and over the last 30 years or so (I'm not sure how long) the docks have been occupied by the BBC and more lately ITV. The surrounding areas make a great place to visit with the Imperial War Museum North being one of the attractions.
I like to visit at dusk in the vain hope of capturing a sunset then wander around in the dark shooting whatever pops up. I also question my sanity walking around with upwards of £4000 worth of camera gear in the dark with some of the unsavoury characters I see walking around! I'm a large chap and I reckon must have a built in deterrent against getting mugged!
Media City
This is a photographic nemesis for me. Trying to balance the lights in the buildings of variable brightness isn't easy as well as exposing for the rest of the scene!
Salford Quays Sunset
I've shot this scene before at the same time of day. It kind of demonstrates the point that you probably need to return more than once to nail an image and that photography is 50% luck!
The Imperial War Museum North
The sunset on this evening was colourful. I was also too far away across the other side of the Manchester Ship Canal with the wrong lens with me! 16 x 9 crop it is then!
Detroit Bridge
That's Detroit Bridge Manchester not Michigan! These are two images shot on different occassions but with different focal lengths:
Camera rotation
One of my obsessions over the years has been camera rotation photography where the camera is rotated around the lens axis and the images are created in one exposure. Probably my favourite from Salford Quays is the 4 way image of Detroit Bridge:
And more recently, rotating the BBC:
The Imperial War Museum like it's never been seen before:
Metrolink in motion
One of my obsessions in photography is to capture motion where the surrounding scene is frozen but the scene becomes dynamic with the movement of an object.
For this tram, I waited as long as I dared before starting the exposure so as to partly expose the tram in it's stationary position and timing it so that the tram moves creating a ghostly effect. I didn't manage to get a decent attempt on my last visit so here's one I prepared earlier!
About me:
I usually specialise in shooting lightpainting images but occasionally dabble in urbex and artistic model photography. I'm always on the lookout for someone to collaborate with; please don't hesitate to get in touch if you'd like to create art.
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