My father inspired my passion for cameras and photography when I was a child. I think initially it was his wonderful old folding film camera that attracted me to photography. It’s always been the camera first that has been the attraction, then to see what I can produce with it. (Always been a bit of a gadget freak)
Then on leaving school I completed a 3-year course in photography. This led me to becoming a full-time professional photographer, initially as an advertising and commercial photographer for various London studios and latterly running my own business as a wedding and portrait photographer. However in my spare time my passion is and always has been street photography, which I have been shooting on and off for over 10 years. This is mainly since I switched from film to digital, as I like the immediacy of being able to review my images at the end of the day over a cup of coffee.
I love nothing more than spending a day wandering about London (where I live) with my camera (these days a Leica M8), watching people going about their daily lives and looking for the photo opportunities that literally can unfold before my eyes. I tend to have regular haunts that I visit, like Oxford Circus. Places like this that are literally swarming with people and also because these locations are full of tourists, you are less conspicuous wielding a camera.
I find street photography a time for me to switch off and shoot what I like, rather than my commissioned work. So the only pressure is self-imposed, in that I always hope to come back at the end of a day’s shooting with a least one image that I really like. However the truth is that like fishing, most days I ‘catch’ nothing. Generally I prefer my images in black and white, as I agree with David Bailey, in that certain colours in a photograph can take your eye away from the main focus of your image.
My influences or as I prefer to put it, work that I admire, include Elliott Erwitt, Joel Meyerowitz and more contemporary street photographers like Matt Stuart and Nick Turpin. My aspiration is that in the future I would like to be known for my street photography rather than my wedding and portraiture. Who knows, I can dream.
Links:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/gp_photography/
http://gazonthestreet.com
http://gazonthestreet.tumblr.com
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