What to photograph on a grey day when the light is flat?

Light and Shade

Covent Garden on a sunny day in early spring; a gift for photographers, with so many opportunities to play with contrasting light and shade. Beams of light striking through rows of pillars and railings; a mosaic of light and dark as the sun - still relatively low in the sky, even at mid-day - strikes deep into the heart of the open structure of the old market.

A hasty lunchtime stroll didn't really allow time for my head to get into gear, to adapt from corporate drone to observer of light. But one scene took my eye for five minutes.

It was the light shining through the samples hung above this stall at edge of the market, at the boundary of light and shade, of inside and outside, that first caught my eye.

To begin with, the stallholder was sitting slumped in a chair next to the artwork she was selling.

If I'd been able to get close enough (the reach of the zoom on the LX5 is not great) it might have made a nice shot; she had a rather weather-beaten market trader's face, full of character.

Maybe she caught sight of the camera, maybe she was just cold; she moved out into the sun, and that composition was lost.

I so rarely take photographs of people, and so dislike having my own photo taken, that I'm reticent about obviously making strangers the subject of the shot. But however good the light, an empty market stall looks incomplete.

Markets are about people.

At least using the LX5 is relatively discrete - I just look like another tourist taking snapshots, not a DSLR-touting wannabe photo-artist.

Potential customers come and go; once in a while, someone must buy something, although no-one did in the few minutes I was there.

The stallholder didn't look bothered - tourist prices probably mean there's a hefty mark-up.

And it's a nice spot to watch the world go by.

The connection with the above may be tenuous - this isn't about light and shade, nor is it in Covent Garden, merely outside a restaurant in Drury Lane, en route back to work - but it makes a nice end-piece.

Before and After

Before:

Smallford Pit: out-of-camera jpeg.  1/640 sec ~ f/4.0 ~ ISO 80

and after:

Smallford Pit: Post-processing in Lightroom 3

Amazing the difference a bit of treatment in Lightroom 3 can make.  An almost HDR-like affect, purely by a couple of graduated exposure adjustments.

Taken on a cycle ride along the Alban Way.

Alley

1/60 sec  ~  f/2.6  ~  ISO 400

Sometimes, high-ISO noise can work to your advantage.  This is a crop from the centre of a much larger original.  The camera chose an exposure of 1/60 sec at ISO 400; if I'd been paying attention I'd have used a slower shutter speed as the LX5 has excellent image stabilisation, and dropped the ISO for a cleaner result.  But then I'd have missed the opportunity to take advantage of that noise by sharpening it to give the film grain effect which seems to suit the subject so well.

The Poet Dreams of the Mountain

Sometimes I grow weary of the days with all their fits and starts.
I want to climb some old grey mountain, slowly, taking
the rest of my life to do it, resting often, sleeping
under the pines or, above them, on the unclothed rocks.
I want to see how many stars are still in the sky
that we have smothered for years now, forgiving it all,
and peaceful, knowing the last thing there is to know.
All that urgency! Not what the earth is about!
How silent the trees, their poetry being of themselves only.
I want to take slow steps, and think appropriate thoughts.
In ten thousand years, maybe, a piece of the mountain will fall.

~ Mary Oliver ~

Hat tip to Panhala

Just fabulous...

London as she is rarely seen

Lincoln's Inn

Mecklenburgh Square

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