2020 Vision | Think Like a Tourist

I love to Travel, the adventure and excitement sets me up perfectly to create images and document my life during this experience.

When I am home, I have fight off the boredom and think like a Tourist to get out of the house with my Camera.

I have lost count how many images I have created of my neighbourhood.

One variation after another.

It’s not boring to me, I love it because the quality and direction of light can make all the difference to how I feel about the image I have created.

I am imposing a new creative discipline on myself; slowing down and just appreciating my neighbourhood.

Maida Vale is a very enchanting part of London.

I truly love and appreciate living here.

If there is one thing to inspire my creative expression and seeing is a pattern intrupt to my normal thought process.

I normally shoot daily with either the XF35mm 1.4 or my daily companion the X100T with the fixed 23mm Lens.

This is my normal vision.

One thing I have been paying attention to is a simple question; when I study the layout of my neighbourhood or any place I visit, I ask my self, what is the best focal length for this place?

Would you believe, this question has been amazing for my vision and seeing.

Landscape and Cityscapes are what I consider Wide Angle possibilities. You can throw in a Telephoto to isolate aspects of a scene if so desired.

Now Streetscapes have become interesting to me; different parts of London can be very compressed so a 23mm could be used or a 35mm for tighter expression.

I look, assess, allow my feelings to guide my me and create my images accordingly.

My Neighbourhood has a perfect field of view for me.

The layout is not too Wide and yet is has quite an expansive expression.

The XF23mm works very well.

However, my optimum viewing and creative process works perfectly using the 18mm F2.

This Lens is a thing of beauty.

It works for my eye.

I love the fact that I can achieve front to back sharpness at F16 with Manual Focus preset to 2 meters - this is my go to settings for using this Lens when I have a story telling composition to create.

So Maida Vale is my 18mm

Little Venice, Paddington Station and surrounding area works at 18mm however, it screams for 16mm or Wider.

Speaking of Paddington, I just got back again from shopping and I was not as impacted by the ghost town feel from a few days ago.

The thought occurred to me; how many times I would love to create an image with no people in the way messing up my shot.

I am not complaining.

This Lockdown has presented me with a golden opportunity to celebrate London without any worry.

This a my daily exercise.

I will share some images I created today in my next post.

Consider this Journal entry Part 1

To be continued.

Thanks for reading x