Flawed Photo on a Rainy Day in Blackpool

This is (I think!) Lytham Rd, Blackpool, England, on a stormy day approaching winter. There’s good old Blackpool Tower in the background. The reason my memory is dodgy today is that this is a long time ago—November 18^th, 2006 is the date stamp of the image file. It’s only a 2mp image—I was economising on card space in those days, not realising that it really didn’t matter. This was my first trip to the UK and I’d dropped by Blackpool to visit a pen friend (now deceased) and make a pilgrimage to his shop. A hail storm came in off the Irish Sea while I was out and about, and I remember having fish and chips in a small corner shop while hailstones bounced in at the door.

Artistically, it’s a reminder of what not to do: the bin in the foreground ruins the shot, which is probably why I never used it before. But the sense of place is strong in this picture: the people, the vehicles, the storm sky receding with weak sunshine on the wet pavers... If I’d had my wits about me I would have walked to the other side of the bin, to exclude it, yet got substantially the same picture. But I wasn’t thinking in those terms—I saw the lighting and general composition, and grabbed it.

So there you are—a picture with a number of merits about it, and one glaring drawback. I could crop the bin out, but cropping horizontally would also exclude those lovely reflections in the pavers. Cropping vertically, while creating a nice picture, loses the street scene to right and places the lamp post very close to the right hand edge. Does that feel jarring? I’m not sure, so the cropped image is below—please compare and make your own evaluation! Minor post-processing—a touch of contrast, sharpness and extra colour. Fuji FinePix S5600. Image by Mike.

PS: Two posts in quick succession make up for that fortnight with nothing!

Lytham Rd, Blackpool

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The sky was the motivating factor in this image. It was just after sundown on a chilly evening in November, 2006. I was standing on a bridge, looking north toward Blackpool Tower, and was exploring for a while before retreating to my hotel. The short wavelength light in the shadowed street is an interesting, soft registration, while the clouds make for an artistic counterpoint to the angular, built environment. Sharpened and enhanced, with gamma correction bringing up middle values and contrast hardening them off. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.

Atlantic Weather

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This is another study of the Irish Sea coast of Blackpool, taken in December, 2006. Hail made it difficult to get anywhere near the seafront, and I was sniping these shots between bursts in the weather. In this one I managed to hold the camera level in the wind, and composed the car and building against the long graduation of the storm front over the sea. The containers at left add a vivid splash of colour which really reveal the iron greys of the background. On days like this it is the momentary, passing lighting conditions which draw the eye, and the luminous quality of the breakers creates the defining contrast. Sharpened and balanced for publication. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.

Old Streets by the Sea

As a summer town, Blackpool is usually recorded on film in the good weather. That famous tower is commonly shot against a blue sky, and from the perspective of a busy, bustling foreshore, filled with holidaymakers. So when I was walking these streets in November, 2006, dodging hail and showers between comics shops and fast food shops, it struck me as an atmospheric and atypical way to see the place. Though many of these buildings probably date from the early 20th century, the streets themselves are 19th century or earlier, and the perspective compression of a mild telephoto effect here really shows up the organic lack of symmetry. These streets are probably less than 100 meters from the beach and were built over ancient dunes, thus the rise and fall of profile and undulation along the coast. This gives a rustic, weather-beaten character which is very photogenic. The picture was sharpened, slightly gamma-corrected, and the contrast and colour were brought up a little. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.

Icy Rain and a Holiday Beach

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English weather is a joke, but to be fair, this is November and sunseekers are in Spain or Malta...or the Caribbean. I visited Blackpool for a couple of days in 2006 and my only glimpse of the Irish Sea was this heaving, grey mass with thundering white surf, and it took me several goes to reach the seafront itself as hail kept driving me back. This was the sea fronting the 'Golden Mile' of amusements and attractions: the town was still busy, but a shadow of itself in the summer, and a vivid memory was eating at a dine-in fish and chip shop while hail made a white carpet outside. It's a simple shot, telephoto to create the composition, then fight the buffet of the roaring wind to get a reasonably decent horizon line. The conditions were so hostile I did not stick around to take multiple frames of the same subject from a variety of vantages, so as to pick the cherry among them. Mild enhancement includes sharpening, contrast and colour-saturation. Fuji FinePix S5600, automatic. Image by Mike.