This photo walk is sponsored by Kodak Alaris who are providing a few rolls of film for everyone to use. When sharing any photos on social media using this film please tag @westen30 and @photowalkme and use the hashtag #WestLondonPhotoWalk2019.

To sign up for the photo walk please visit PhotoWalk.Me

Photo Walk Route

Sponsored By Kodak Alaris

Please follow them

On Facebook
On Instagram
On Twitter

It was a great group, I think there were 15 of us in total. Some people I’d met before, some I knew through social media but not met and some I didn’t know at all. It was a real pleasure to meet them all. Sandeep did a great guest post on the PhotoWalk.Me blog about the walk, so I won’t go into detail as Sandeep has already done a better job.

Images

You can find more photos shot on the walk here on Twitter.

Below are some scans of shots taken with my Leica M6 and the Kodak Portra 160 donated by Kodak Alaris. I even managed to get a few portraits of everyone using my new (60 years old) Leica 90mm lens.

There is an order form at the bottom of the page, please fill it in and submit asap to secure your set of these limited edition photographs. If you want to donate more than the £25, please note that in the Additional Information box. When I receive your order I will send you a Paypal link for payment.

About the UK Solidarity Fund

The UK Solidarity Fund has been set up by the British Red Cross to help people affected by terror attacks in the UK, following the recent attacks in London and Manchester.

Eight people were killed and dozens injured after attacks in London Bridge and nearby Borough Market on 3 June.

Less than two weeks earlier, 22 people were killed and 119 injured at the Manchester Arena on 22 May.

The UK Solidarity Fund will help victims of terror attacks anywhere in the UK, in the first instance, in London.

Donations will ensure that victims and their families do not face short-term financial difficulties.

The Photographs

Prints for Charity

The Photographers

Thank you to all of the photographers below for letting us use their images, please follow them and visit their websites.

1. Thom Davies

Thom took this moody B&W shot with his Leica MP and 50mm Summicron on Ilford HP5+ pushed to 1600 near Bank. Thom can be found on Instagram(@135project) and Twitter(@135project).

2. Matt Parry

Matt took this fantastic colour shot at Leadenhall Market with his Olympus 35RC on Provia 100f. Matt can also be found on Twitter(@mparry1234) and on his WordPress site https://mparry1234.wordpress.com/

3. Ade Stock

Ade took this great shot of our very own Sandeep, looking very dapper as usual at St Dunstan in the East. Shot with a Nikon FE2 and Nikon 50mm AF-D F/1.8 lens on Kodak Portra 160 and lit with a Yongnuo 560iii flash and 560Tx transmitter. Ade is one of the hosts of the Sunny16 Podcast (can be found on iTunes and I assume any of the other purveyors of quality podcasts), he can also be found lurking on Twitter(@sunny16podcast).

4. Bill Bennett

This lovely photo of the Gherkin peeping out between Willis Building and Lloyd’s of London was taken by Bill using his Olympus OM-2 Spot with 50mm f1.8 lens on Agfa Vista Plus. Bill is on Twitter(@filmbloke48) and via his website http://www.bennett3.co.uk/photography/

5. Sarah Bedwell

Sarah took this beautiful square format B&W shot at St Dunstan in the East with a Yashica Mat 124g on Kodak TMax 400 at EI200. You can find Sarah on Twitter(@flameforcefive) and Instagram(@flameforcefive) and through her website http://www.flameforcefive.com/

6. Simon Bedwell

The only pinhole shot here was taken by Simon with a RealitySoSubtle 6×6 Pinhole on Fuji Acros 100. This was also taken at St Dunstan in the East. Simon is on Twitter(@simonbedwell)

7. Sandeep Sumal

This great shot of the Gherkin by Sandeep was taken with and Olympus OM1n on Oriental Seagull 400. Sandeep is on Twitter(@givemeabiscuit) and Instagram(@filmphotography.london), Sandeep also has a website http://www.filmphotography.london/

8. Tom Rayfield

Finally this great shot from Tom(I’m very jealous of this one) was taken on Agfa Vista Plus 200 at box speed with a Contax S2 and 50mm Zeiss Planar lens. This was taken on the Southbank. Tom is also on Twitter(@mr_rayfield) and Instagram(@tomrayfield) and his website is http://tomrayfield.com/

Order Form

The Proposed Route

Thanks go to Sandeep for coming up with this route for us.

Meeting point: outside Café Rouge, Hays Galleria.  The nearest station is London Bridge and Hays Galleria is just off Tooley Street no more than 2mins walk from the Tooley Street exit of the station.  Anyone not familiar with London let us know and we can provide more precise directions and a map.

Time:  to meet between 10:30am and 11am with the aim to leave by 11am.  Café rouge can serve breakfast and coffee for those that need it.

Route: We don’t plan on being too prescriptive here and hopefully the route is a good mixture of landmark sites and more street art places.

Starting on the Southbank by London Bridge we will then cross the bridge heading past Monument and visiting St Dunstans in the East (a very nice photography location)

From here we will head north through the city past the Lloyds building, Leadenhall market and the Gherkin.   We will then go to Spitalfields market.   This is where the street art part of the walk will take us on to Brick Lane and North to Shoreditch High Street then towards Rivington Street.

Lunch:

We do not plan to have a ‘formal’ sit down lunch venue.  We will however pass many coffee shops and sandwich places en route so help yourself.  That said we will arrange various meet up points & times so if people are slower/faster than others we know where to meet.  These meet up points are likely to be somewhere where you can get food, drink and a toilet break.

For the end of the day we will reserve a small area in a bar near the end of the route for those that want to wind down.

A few points:

It’s a group walk and we are totally open to suggestions or changes in the route. Also ideas for meeting points if you know somewhere in particular.   As we are doing this for a bit of fun and for us to get together there is no charge and as such no funded refreshments.

Fund Raising

Given the horrible things that have happened in London and Manchester over the last few weeks Sandeep and I thought it might be a nice idea to try and raise some money for the UK Solidarity Fund set up by the British Red Cross for victims of terrorism in the UK. We are still ironing out ideas and if anyone has any suggestions they would be more than welcome. What we are currently thinking of is asking those who come on the walk to submit one photo taken during the walk to be printed as limited edition sets of postcards and put up for sale. All proceeds from the sale will be given to the charity. If the printing costs aren’t too high I will cover the cost of printing and postage myself otherwise I may ask for a small donation towards the printing. This is all still in the planning stages so nothing is concrete yet. Also this is completely optional of course nobody will be expected to participate if they don’t want to. If you do have any ideas please leave a comment below.

Please remember this is not sponsored by anyone, this is just a few friends meeting up for a walk, a chat, maybe a photo or 2, a spot of lunch and a couple of drinks.

I will keep this post updated with new information as we come up with it and send out emails to those that register below.

The intended route can be found here.

Registered

Sandeep
Simon Bedwell
Ade
Matt Parry
Thom Davies
Tom Rayfield
Rob Davie
Sarah Bedwell
William Bennett
Gary Williams

Register Now

Kentmere 400 Samples

Images shot with Leica M6 TTL, developed in Kodak HC-110 and scanned on an Epson V550 flatbed scanner with Silverfast 8 scanning software.

Kentmere 400, London

Kentmere 400, London

Fomapan 400 Images

All images taken with Leica M6 TTL and Voigtlander 35mm Color Skopar and developed in Kodak XTOL.

Portobello Road, London

London

London

London

London

London

London South Bank

London, South Bank

My Gear

I didn’t want to take loads of gear, I wanted to use just one camera and one lens. I took with me my Leica M6 TTL with Voigtlander 35mm Color Skopar f2.5, 5 rolls of Fujifilm Superia 400 and my Weston Euromaster lightmeter. I didn’t bother taking a bag, just loaded up my pockets.

The Street Photography Workshop

The workshop started at 10am with the talk that Matt gave at the Photography Show, despite having heard it already it was still interesting to hear again offering a refresher on Matt’s techniques. A lot of courses (not just photography) often spend a lot of time going over the basics this can be quite dull and usually unnecessary, luckily there was none of this. Beyond mentioning the need for fast shutter speeds, there weren’t any boring explanations of aperture, iso etc nor was there any talk of gear. Following the talk we were split into 2 groups there were about 20 of us in attendance so there were 10 in each group. There were 2 assignments, “following” and “fishing”, each group was given one of these assignments for the morning and would swap over for the afternoon.

Following

The group I was in was given the “Following” assignment, for this we were each given a map with a route marked on it and told to go out separately and follow the route taking photographs as we go along. What I liked about this was that we weren’t all going to go out as a big group. Firstly big groups stick out like sore thumbs, which isn’t ideal for street photography and secondly groups of people tend to spend more time chatting than taking pictures.

I headed out at just after 11am and was told to be back by 1pm giving me just under 2 hours to walk the loop. The route took me along Oxford Street, down New Bond Street to Piccadilly, along to Regent Street back to Oxford Street. I tend to walk quite quickly so I walked the loop twice before heading back. I should try to walk a bit slower as I probably miss quite a lot while walking so fast. I shot roughly a roll and a half of film during that time. Back in the training room everybody was selecting 5 of their best images from the assignment and handing over their memory cards to have the images transferred for the review later in the day. I obviously couldn’t do this as I was the only one apart from Matt shooting film.

Fishing

After lunch we headed out for the afternoon session my group were led out by Matt and each dropped off at various spots along Oxford Street to “Fish” for photos. This felt a bit unnatural to me I like to walk and keep moving, maybe stopping for a little while if I see a good background. Staying in one place for an extended amount of time was a new experience for me. I was placed at a busy junction with a lot of foot traffic, including some interesting characters. Interesting characters alone a good street photograph does not make though. I was getting plenty of photos, but because it was so busy it was difficult to isolate individuals and place them with interesting backgrounds. Matt would pop around to each of us offering tips, such as where to place ourselves, how to go unnoticed and even pointing out possibly interesting scenarios. I will definitely try fishing again, but in a different location maybe.

Image Review

After the afternoon assignment had finished and we got back to base everyone gave in their memory cards again to have their selected images copied over for review. I could have brought my x100s for the workshop instead of the Leica, but the M6 is my street photography camera now and I didn’t want to use anything else so I chose to forgo the image review. Even though I couldn’t have my images reviewed it was still a very interesting part of the day. Matt showed each persons images on a projector, giving a brief critique of each image, what was good, what was bad etc. I actually learnt a lot from this despite not having my own images reviewed, Matt showed us why a perfectly acceptable image may not be a particularly good street photograph.

Results

Unfortunately I didn’t get any good photos from the day, but this is to be expected, street photography is hard and you cannot expect good photos every time you go out. I also think that my notion of what makes a good street image has changed since the workshop. Images that I previously would have considered quite good I now realize aren’t so good after all. The only reason I have added any photos from the day at all is to show that I did take some, not that I think they are any good. I will not be sharing any of these images on social media at all.

Street Photography Workshop – Oxford Street, London

Street Photography Workshop

Final Thoughts

Overall I found the street photography workshop to be excellent. If I have one criticism though it’s that I think there were too many participants meaning there wasn’t enough time for much one on one interaction with Matt. I think for a workshop such as this 10 would have been more appropriate. Matt is an excellent street photographer and a great teacher, I hope to take what I have learnt from him and put it into practice in my future street photography.

Recently I’d been feeling quite down and uninspired with my photography, I’d developed roll after roll of rubbish and was just a bit fed up with it all. I think the main reason for this is that a few months ago I finished a contract in Canary Wharf and started a new one in a small town outside of London and street photography opportunities have been limited. Every lunch time I go out with my camera, just as I did in London but invariably go back to the office without even releasing the shutter. I was telling my wife about it a couple of weeks ago and she suggested that I have a day in London on the Saturday as the kids were at a friends Birthday party anyway.

On the Saturday morning I had breakfast in a local cafe with my wife, to fuel me up for the day ahead. When we got there some friends of ours were already there, I told them what I had planned for the day and my friend said “You know Pride is on today?”. No I didn’t, I had no idea, it not being something I particularly keep up with. I’ve never been to a Pride event before, not for any reason other than it not really being aimed at my demographic. Obviously I fully support LGBT rights, not actively I suppose, I’ve never been on a march or anything, but in spirit I do. I had originally planned to have a look around Shoreditch as I’d heard and briefly seen that it would be a good place for a spot of street photography. That changed when I heard Pride was on, I knew this would be the perfect opportunity for photography.

Normally when I go out to do some photography I take my Think Tank Retrospective bag a selection of cameras, lenses and other bits and pieces that weigh a ton. This time however I decided to leave the bag at home and just take my Leica M6 TTL, Voigtlander 35mm f2.5, Weston Euromaster lightmeter and a Japan Camera Hunter half case filled with film.

Heading out to my first Pride

I got the train into London Victoria, then the tube to Green Park and then walked to Regent Street. I got there about 13:30, I think the parade started at 13:00 and the streets were lined with thousands of people. As soon as I got there I knew it was going to be a good day, there was a great atmosphere, with young, old, gay and straight together for a good time.

Regent Street, London

Regent Street, London

I couldn’t see much of the parade as it was so busy, most of my photos of it are shot either over the top or around other peoples heads. I’ve read somewhere that when going to events such as this you should turn around and look to the edges of the crowd for more interesting street photos, so this is what I did. I don’t have many images of the parade itself as I decided to concentrate on the crowd instead. My camera was already loaded with a half exposed roll of Kodak Tri-x which I blew through in a matter of minutes. This is when I realised I’d made a mistake, my film case was mostly filled with black and white film and a day like this called for colour film. I had 2 rolls of Portra 400 with me, but I knew this wouldn’t be enough for a whole days shooting. I loaded a roll of Portra into the camera and continued to photograph the crowd aware that the film wouldn’t last long. I’d read on the Pride in London website that there were stages for music setup in the streets of Soho and I knew Calumet had a shop that sold film in Wardour Street, so after shooting a roll and a half in Regent Street I headed for Soho.

Regent Street, London

Soho, London

I found Calumet and purchased 5 rolls of Portra 400 from them at what I think is one of the cheapest prices around for Portra. With my pockets filled with film I headed back out into Soho, where in my opinion the party was really happening and where I spent the next 3 or 4 hours.

Soho, London

Soho, London

There was a great party atmospherein Soho especially along Old Compton Street, with music playing from the bars and people dancing in the street. Everywhere I looked there was someone interesting to photograph and nobody seemed to mind, I think this gave me the confidence to get closer than I normally would. I’m still trying to get over the uncomfortable feeling of taking a strangers picture up close, but this experience has helped a lot.

Soho, London

Soho, London

I spent the rest of the day in Soho, leaving for home about 7pm, I would have stayed longer but I had to get home. All in all it was a thoroughly enjoyable day, I might even go to Brighton Pride in August too. The photos I took during the day may not be the greatest street photos ever taken but, at least I have a few from the day that I like. I took more pictures that I liked in that one day than in the last 3 months combined.

Soho, London

Soho, London

Soho, London

Soho, London

All images were shot with a Leica M6 TTL and Voigtlander 35mm Color Skopar f2.5 loaded with Kodak Portra 400@1600. The film was processed by AG Photolab and scanned by me with the Epson V550. Click here for the full gallery.