Another Word for Coincidence

Mar 11, 2008 · Comments
uncategorised

Coming out of the Photographers' Gallery I was encouraged by the light ahead. As I squatted down to fish a camera out of my bag I noticed something moving in the distance - a thumb on a film advance lever. It’s funny how things like that stand out in a crowd and I shouldn’t really be surprised when another photographer also spots the light, especially near the Photographers' Gallery.

As I started to get up, the thumb turned, to reveal Matt Stuart. Ha! I don’t often meet people I know when strolling around London but towards the end of an enjoyable wander with Matt we also ran into Stephen McLaren.

Anyway, back to the light. That junction* has six roads branching off making for a relatively large open space that often seems to have a fair amount of reflected light. I can’t think of any good pictures that I’ve taken there but I like this one that Jawed took with a battered 6x9 folder of mine. Maybe it’s a place where I should spend more time shooting but often I’m happy to just look.

Here’s what Matt was looking at (from a different position with a longer lens). The man with the blank green sign was promoting McDonalds but only if you approached him from behind. It did look strange, running at 50% effeciency, but I had to wonder if blank signs were on the long list of things to avoid shooting, along with shop mannequins and homeless people. I was tempted to clone out the Selfridges text on the yellow bag to make another blank thing but it didn’t seem worth the effort and I settled for cloning some of the clipped highlights where the bag caught the light.

Update: *The Photographers' Gallery has moved since this post.

Possibly related posts:

• October 27, 2008: Favourite Corners No. 32
• July 6, 2006: Onto the Streets Again

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Old Comments

The comments from the previous WordPress blog.

Paul Russell: Typical. You wait for a street photographer for ages, and then three turn up at once.

Maybe the guy with the McDonalds sign was a performance artist, à la Mr Odd Erection.