Exercise: A public space

This second exercise I took the photographs for on a previous visit to Whitstable, I try to have a look at what photographs I will need to take for a few exercises at a time. I do this as I have found sometimes the ones you want for a particular exercise don't work but that you can get some to e used on other exercises.

I wanted to show not only the beach but also the harbour as this is still a public space, where people gather to look at the beach hut shops, drink coffee and eat seafood as well as watch the boats in and out of the harbour. There is a beautiful sailing barge called Greta that operates from the harbour but unfortunately it wasn't in on this particular occasion.

Chatting with a local trader,

As you will be able to see from the top photographs even on a very cold day, the harbour area is a hive of activity. I go here on many occasions I find the whole place restful but at the same time inspiring.

Photograph four is an area that has been built in recent years and is used as a stage area, the pebbles in the wire wall also have clay pebbles made by local school children added, a fact I found out whilst talking to the couple who where sheltering from the wind and eating their fish and chips!.

I have tried to capture a public space albeit a slightly diverse area however all parts are interlinked. I was very conscious of peoples feeling and would take a couple of pictures then move on, as I didn't want anyone to feel they had been singled out.

Project Public events, public spaces

There are two exercises to this section the first one is an organised event:


As I have previously said I am really not comfortable doing street photography, unfortunately in this day and age if you have a camera in your hand you seemed to be viewed with suspicion with is a real shame. 


I work in a smallish market down called Faversham and this year they decided to hold a hat parade on Easter Saturday, this was open to everyone including dogs.  I decided on this as I was pretty sure there would be a lot of people there with cameras and therefore I would be easy for me to take the photographs I wanted. 


To a degree this is what happened, however where I was hoping the event would be well organised and would set off in an orderly fashion after the wandering minstrels, it didn't really work out that way. Lots of people were milling around  managed to get a couple of photographs at the beginning to show everyone assembling but I had to push my way through.

The wandering minstrel ended up being one man playing the squeeze box which was fine but not quite the image I had in my mind when I decided to photograph this event.

I was lucky in that the town crier saw I was trying to photograph him and he quickly turned towards me almost poking his tongue out in a fun way!

I was suddenly aware that everyone was looking towards the gap between two shops, and when I managed to get there and look there was this amazing character called Fanny by gaslight, slowly making her way to the beginning of the parade.

She really was a character on her stilts laughing with everyone but also throwing a look of almost disdain around. I would say this was a decisive moment as talked about by Henri Cartier Bresson on many occasions.

She moved to the front of the parade with the town crier and as the press photographers had arrived by this time I managed to stand next to them with out getting in their way and take some photographs as they got Fanny and the town crier to pose for them.

I would have liked to have got a bit more of the town crier in but unfortunately i had no where to go I didn't want to get in the photographers way and there was too many people behind them and around them to be able to get anywhere else.

The parade heads off but as you can see it was a bit muddled, I did manage to get a couple more photographs of people as they passed.

This man gave me a smile as he went past and in general I found people would stop for you if you could attract their attention.

I would really have liked the lady above to have looked towards me but unfortunately I couldn't attract her attention in all the noise, but it was the colours in her hat and how she had matched her hat to her jacket and beads.

The final photograph is of a beautiful retired grey hound who had got a bit bored waiting and decided to break his hat and then not look at the camera, but they do say never work with children or animals!

The camera setting used for all these was F10 1/125second shutter speed with a cloudy white balance setting and an iso of 200 focal length varied between 18mm and 92mm. 

Post production was done mainly in camera raw with minor adjustments to clarity, exposure and vibrance sliders.  In elements I cropped a couple to remove un interesting sky and I also cloned the bottom corner of the first photograph as there was part of a child's toy in the way which was distracting.

Overall I was reasonably happy with the way it went as I have previously stated I was hoping it would be more organised as the parade went off instead of which they just seemed to go and then had to work through the crowds that were standing around, it would have been nice if the town crier had rung his bell as they set off and then a few times as they made their way to the venue at the end of the parade.  For me I found it frustrating at times trying  to get the photographs I wanted but I guess it gave me a small insight into a press   photographers work as even they seem to have difficulties getting where they wanted to be.