Brook Road

Ash on December 23, 2015

I had the opportunity to photograph an electrician at work for a website I was developing. The shoot was the first of a couple we did of a Victorian side-return extension in St Margarets.

I learnt that trained electricians move fast. This one can trim and strip three wires in about five seconds flat. I had my tripod, flash and reflector with me, but I soon decided to shoot handheld with available light, which was the only way to keep up.

The scene was lit by a series of Velux windows and a builder’s lamp, which had very different color temperatures. As Carter moved about the lighting would often change dramatically. As a result a lot of the exposures were guesswork.

I pretty much always shoot manual, with manual exposure settings and manual focus. Partly this is a matter of habit and partly it’s good practice because it means I know what compromises are being made. It’s also pretty much essential to use manual focus in situations like this where the depth-of-field is shallow and the ‘right’ focal point usually isn’t the closest object.

The flipside of shooting manual is that sometimes I get it completely wrong where the camera would have muddled through okay in auto mode. Fortunately Capture One, which I used to post-process the shots, does a great job of salvaging shots with dodgy exposure or color-casts.

Nightingale Road

Ash on December 23, 2015

I shot these photos of the ongoing renovation of a Victorian flat in Nightingale Road, Balham, as content for a website I’m building for an electrician friend.

We arrived at the flat quite late on a winter’s day, and the light was fading fast. I took a few close-up shots of wiring and socket boxes using flash bounced off a hand-held reflector, then used the tripod to take some high-ISO long exposures of the bare rooms.

You can check out some more of the shots here.

South Africa

Ash on December 23, 2015

Although I’ve lived in London for over 15 years now, I’m a South African by birth and by heart. Ania and I travel to SA as often as we can: usually only once every few years in practice because the flights are expensive enough that economically it makes sense to make longer trips less often. I always take photos when I’m there — or, lately, video — and these are a few of the pictures I’ve shot over the years.