B145 – A DOG THAT CAN ANSWER THE PHONE

Yesterday was a bit of a busy day,  that started at 7 in the morning somewhere in North London with a dog that could Answer a phone, no joke. He could literally take a phone off the hook and then put his head to it, craziness. Anyway, yesterday I was working with an old chum for the day on a commercial, which involved a really really smart dog.

After that finished, it was back to London for a sick clothing company called Lone Rascals party, at a vodka distillery in Hackney, check out her clothing its pretty cool stuff, perfect for all your festival and party needs! http://www.lone-rascal.com. thank you to Izzy and aggie for a fun party!

Im a bit hungover and late for work so ill keep this short and simple, check out this photos from yesterday, I think they are actually really cool. for a busy day running around, I’m pretty happy with how they’ve turned out.

Oh yea im trying to find the perfect export settings for my photos, so if they look dodgy over the next few days, let me know. I want to get the best setting of smart phones and laptops, its not the easiest thing in the world, so if any one knows the perfect settings please let me know!

and heres the link to Lone Rascals again just incase you missed it before: http://www.lone-rascal.com

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– ladies his names david murray and hes accepting offers, his favourite restuarant is nandos but he’s willing to try somewhere new –
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– it looks like theres not many people there, but it was acutally packed and had like 3 different parts. there was a free bar giving out vodka so you can imagine where most people were – 
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– this dog was the dog that could answer the phone –

 

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– the sky in this photo, was insane –

 

B143 – BACK TO THE STREETS

Today I just wanted to go out and take photos of people, I havent done that for a long time and it was something I was determined todo. After finishing work at like 6ish, I headed to sainsburys grabbed a red bull and hit the street just to take some photos and chill out, it was one of those days where you are hoping for something good to happen, like the time I saw a man sun bathing on Shoreditch highstreet.

it was just one of those days where you have to wait and wait and wait for that photo opportunity, lucky enough a guy walks past holding and an umbrella and I think I managed to pull the shot off, you might also be able to see the guy furthest on the right giving him some weird look.

Street photography is something I really want to get better at, I really enjoy walking around and just taking photos of people, who are posing or doing anything. they’ve just switched off and going from A to B. Alot of it comes down to right place, right time, so I think Ive just got to carry on taking as many photos as possible and one day I might take that amazing photo! not sure about my writing skills though, i think thats a lost cause.

Anyway heres my snaps enjoy.

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– not sure what he needs the umbrella for, but be probably had a good reason –
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– she is in full toga part mood –
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– this guys a legend –

B142 – My mini Rain forest

because of the whole decorating the flat this weekend your going to have to see more pictures of the work, I would love to show a picture from the streets of East London but thats not going to happen.

In the flat theres this big window ledge that sticks out like a foot by 6ft long, my plan is to cover the whole thing in plants, I want to have a mini rainforest! so every chance I get i’m buy more and more plants, im not sure if its becoming some sort of un health obsession, but plants actually make a flat better.

I have no idea about plants, I just like green ones, about 5 months ago I started a Catcus farm but that seems to be slow work, nothing has really grown. So I don’t think that is going to take off any time soon. Im not giving up on the whole little mexico cactus farm in my flat, just need some other plants so I can work on the rain forest, does anyone know what are the best plants that grow indoors? any tips would be welcome.

Anyway I came back last night and was talking to amy and she said that I should try and take some flat lay photos, Ive never tried it before and its actually pretty good, my idea was to take a flat lay and then see if I could take different angles of the same subjects and see what turns out better. this was this vinyl record in the corner of the shot thats got this girl on it, I really wanted to concentrate on her, sometimes have her in focus, some times not. The thing I enjoy about shooting faces and people, it gives the person looking at the photo something to think about, try and guess there emotion of mood. Im not sure if you get that from a illustrated cartoon on the front of a Whipped Cream and other Delights vinyl but its still adds something to these photos.

Theres definitely room for improvement, I want to try flat lay photos with other objects that are more flat instead of plants. Basically plants aren’t flat, so it makes it hard to get the correct focus point, in a way though that has added something extra to these photos as a one time thing, now I’ve done this style though I really do want to try it with complete flat objects and see what the results are like.

Its quite I good Idea for my blog, on a day that not much is happening, I could take a couple photos of some flat lay’s and still manage to keep this interesting.

Anyways heres my snaps from last night.

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– my attempted at a flat lay –
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– there she is –
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– I’m a fan of this photo and the colours –

B141 – 48 hours later…

This weekend was mostly spent painting my living room and kitchen, it was only meant to be the living room, but after we raided Homebase for just about everything they had we said “F@ck it lets paint the kitchen too” . Lucky amy left me to decide on the colour, she said it was my choice and she wouldn’t get involved. when she said that I knew it would be a cool wall. What she actaully meant was, I would pick colour and then she would do the rest, Lucky I wanted bright orange, she was happy with that, so we ended up getting a very very bright orange.

then it was just a case of painting the whole thing, which is ok for the first 4 hours but doing a few coats on the ceiling was horrendous. but theres no better feeling than looking back at your work and getting that feeling on self-accomplishment.

any way I completely forgot to take any photos till like half 9 and night, so heres a few close ups of my favourite parts of the room. theres still work to be done, so Casa Del Josh isn’t finished yet.  But we are close. Very very close.

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– this is the new addition, the coco nut tree –
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– loud and proud – this orange is Morroccan sunset, crazy isn’t it  –
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– the mirror needs a clean –

 

B140 – thats what you call a sky

this weekend is paint the living room weekend, we’ve chosen the sunniest weekend in the whole of August to do this, but we are half a room down and tin of paint in and too far gone to quit now.

but after painting for 5 hours yesterday, amy and me decided enough was enough and that we should head out for a walk and to grab a drink and maybe some food. so we headed for some fresh air, the River Thames, lucky and for some un planned reason we got there just as golden hour was kicking in, so I got some absolute smashers. We also saw some armed police take someone down, not shoot just arrest pull him off his bike and arrest him. not sure what he done, but he must of annoyed someone.

After all that palaver, we ended up getting some food for a cool little restaurant on the river called Cote Brasserie, its some french restaurant chain but does really good food.

We are now getting dressed to head over to Homebase to grab supplies to finish the living room, my DIY skills are being put to the test, but i’m confident in my abilities and amys style to get us across the finish line.

Todays a bit of a ramble from me, Ive talked about a lot but nothing important. so just enjoy these snaps.

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– I dont know this women –
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– or this taxi driver –
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– I know this person –

B139 – Mental Friday, no parties just a bunch of cameras and stuff

yesterday was one of those day’s spent prepping for up and coming shoots, arranging kit and trying to get as much kit as possible in to peli cases, just like a big puzzle. So for that reason, my photos from yesterday aren’t that exciting.

One thing Ive realised about this little project I’m doing is, what you have to do is always take photos, even on days when you know what your going to write about, those are the days where if you see a cool angle or nice lighting, take a snap on your iphone, because they have become so handy to me on days like today when im struggling to put anything amazing together, Im just quickly scrolling through my phone for bangers I might of taken last week.  thats basically whats happened today, but I don’t want it to be a complete throw back to old photos from previous days. so “m going to throw in some photos I took yesterday as well.

Enjoy these snaps, I’ve uploaded four just because I want to keep you guys happy.

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– ignore the tissue next to the lens I forgot to move it –
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– taken yesterday, on my route to work –
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– the view through a 85mm prime – as you can see it looks burry without a camera –
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– the only bit of blue sky I saw yesterday, but I got to play with camera’s so its nothing to complain about –

B136 – Slow Shutter Speed

Tuesday was pub quiz night, a serious thing. I have to say they aren’t really my strong point. but it was a good laugh anyway, on the way to the quiz though we had a bit of a long wait at Shoreditch over ground, so I spend the time having some fun with sow shutter speeds, its basically where you let everything go blurry but things that don’t move stay sharp.

Its good because if you have all the settings right you can catch the right amount of light to really bring out the photo. I think that street photos look good in Black and White, it adds this extra feeling to the photo and its hard to have a snap in colour and still have the same effect. Thats down to the fact that street photos always have the feel to them imperfection being perfect to capture the moment, which transfers to B&W photos so much easier. Deep Stuff.

Something I think is important to slow shutter speeds, is still capturing the fact that things are still moving in the photo, if the shutter is too slow you’ll lose that and if its that little bit too fast it will just look like a blurry photo, I had my shutter around 1/6 with F5 and ISO 400 .

So for now I’m just going to have all my street photos in B&W, but I suppose I might give colour street photos a try soon. but for now, heres my photos.

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– I like the movement that blurry photos give you –
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– it helps to give a sense of things running around –
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– I like this one, amy once again being used as a model, if I was going to do it again I would have amy stand still and completely in focus –

B132 – this is food porn

if you dont know of this place then you need to know. Londons Brough Market is food porn central, it literally has this massive selection of food from all over the world. I was walking around london yesterday getting some errands done and taking pictures of London on a Friday, and just ended up in Brough market, its the perfect place to take photos, everyone has this massive excited look on their face and just wants to try everything thing they see.

Brough market for this reason has always been on of those places I’ve wanted to photograph but for some reason never have, well yesterday I just ended up there and im glad I did, if you just go there and walk around maybe try a bit some tasters or just look at all the foods, youll realise that most Tesco’s and Sainbury’s are terrible for food choices.

When you type in London Brough Market on google, the first thing that comes up is the attacks there a few months ago, if you scroll past that ( I dont mean it out of disrepesct, I just mean theres way more to Brough Market, than the actions of a few confused boys) and just type in facts, you’ll realise that this place dates back to 1014 and was created by the Danes as a medievel market to stop off at and buy some stuff before heading into London. Its also the place with annoyed the authorities because it was just this little market which under cut all the City of London’s own traders.

So what did the city do, in 1444 it brought the Market off the people and chartered it as part of the city of London, which then lead to a 3 day riot. but its all good because in 1550 Edward the VI, sorted this problem out by officially selling southwark and the Brough Market to the city for £1000.

I could go on here to tell you about another thousand years of history, but if you’ve read this much already and still not interested then you probably don’t want to know.

so anyway here some foodie pictures I took yesterday.

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– that looks like proper food –
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– shes not sure on the cheese –
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– for some reason I just like this –

 

B131 – THE PROPER STUFF

Theres is bar in spitalfeild market called Beadles, it this small wine bar, with a massive collection  from all over the world ive been there a few time and every time I go, I try a proper wine, none of that house wine that you get in a pub. I still have no idea about wine, but this place is making me want to learn more.

I had a famoso, which is an Italian  grape which is from the region of Romagna, it basically disappeared for years before being brought back to life by some new producers, who believed it was time for the grape to make comeback. apparently the grape gives a pale strew colour, which didn’t adapt well to the market until recently and is becoming more and more of an essential for the wine connoisseur. so if you see it, buy it and give the stuff a try or head to Beadles Wine bar in Spitalfeilds and drink it there.

incase any of you are wondering, I literally typed the name of the wine on google and this was all the information I could copy and understand, so thought I would share it with you.

All these photos were taken on the Iphone SE

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– I should of taken a photo when we first got the drinks, sorry I forgot –
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– no sure what wines these are, but they look good –
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– famoso wine is on the right, look at that “pale straw” colour –

B130 – WHAT A DAY THAT WAS

Yesterday was all about the rain, it literally chucked it down for the whole day. it was like a monsoon an english monsoon, but still a monsoon. The highest rain fall was in recorded in Kenley with 44.8mm of rain thats 1.78 inches!! when you compare that to places like Thailand where they get an average of 170mm of rain, things anit so bad, but I still go completely soaked on the way home.

One thing I love about the rain in London is seeing how different people deal with it, some put plastic bags on there heads and run around, some use a new paper and others just dont care. its the people that don’t care about the weather who make me smile, they anit letting the weather beat them, from the ones wearing a t shirt in the rain, to the guy who’s reading the newspaper while getting soaked (see my photo below), its all about beating the weather and sticking two fingers up to those pesky rain clouds. i think those are my favourite kind of londoners.

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– perfect place to catch up with the evening standard –
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– something pretty cool about london in the rain –
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– getting home quickly –